Ridley Pearson
Ridley Pearson
Edgar-nominee, Ridley Pearson is a #1 New York Times bestselling author of (more than 50) award-winning suspense and young adult adventure novels. His novels have been published in two-dozen languages and have been adapted for network television and the Broadway stage. Ridley’s crime novels have earned a reputation for writing fiction that “grips the imagination.”
Ridley’s middle-grade-reader series include, The Kingdom Keepers, Steel Trapp and Lock & Key. The Peter and the Starcatchers series,co-written with Pulitzer Prize winner (and bandmate), Dave Barry, (adapted to the stage by Rick Elice) was awarded 5 Tony Awards.
Ridley’s research has spanned the globe and has included, a prison for the criminally insane in the U.K., exploring the engine room of a cruise liner, and multiple after-hour tours of Walt Disney World and Disneyland.
Ridley plays bass guitar in an all-author rock band comprised of other bestselling writers (Dave Barry, Amy Tan, Mitch Album, Scott Turow, Greg Iles, and occasionally, Stephen King). The Rockbottom Remainders, has raised over 2.5 million dollars for various non-profits. He lives–and writes–in the Northern Rockies along with his wife, Marcelle.

Eric Brace
Eric Brace (and Last Train Home)
Eric Brace runs Red Beet Records and makes music on his own, with Last Train Home and as a trio with Peter Cooper and Thomm Jutz. In 2003, he founded the label and he and his band, Last Train Home moved to East Nashville from the Washington DC area. Brace had been a journalist at the Washington Post and had run the Top Records label.
Eric returns to the DC area with some frequency, playing clubs where he built his loyal following and participating, as in the embedded video, in numerous BandhouseGigs productions, including the recent live stream “From BandHouse to Your House.”

Radio Paradise
Radio Paradise is a listener-sponsored Internet radio station that identifies itself as an “eclectic online rock radio” station. The channel differs from most FM channels and other Internet stations in that the music played is chosen by human DJs to form thematic relationships in smooth arcs. Wikipedia

Snarky Puppy
Snarky Puppy
After a decade of relentless touring and recording in all but complete obscurity, the Texas-bred/New York-based quasi-collective suddenly found itself held up by the press and public as one of the major figures in the jazz world. But as the category names for all three of the band’s Grammy® awards would indicate (Best R&B Performance in 2014, Best Contemporary Instrumental Album in 2016 and 2017), Snarky Puppy isn’t exactly a jazz band. It’s not a fusion band, and it’s definitely not a jam band. It’s probably best to take Nate Chinen of the New York Times’ advice, as stated in an online discussion about the group, to “take them for what they are, rather than judge them for what they’re not.” (website)
Snarky Puppy joins another Roaming the Arts favorite Mingo Fishtrap as a band formed out of the wonderful music program at the University of North Texas.

Mark Erelli
Mark Erelli
is an American singer/songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, and touring folk musician from Reading, Massachusetts who earned a master’s degree in evolutionary biology from the University of Massachusetts Amherst before pursuing a career in music. Wikipedia
Latest recording — Blindsided
“(Blindsided) soars on the wings of jangly guitars, heartfelt vocals and soulful harmony lines…Yep, that’s the sweet spot right there. And there’s enough of it to make this album matter.”
–The Associated Press
“Erelli is a throwback of sorts, a foursquare acoustic songwriter in an age of digital audio workstations. For ‘Blindsided’ he has amped up with a superb band…a rock ‘n’ soul set of songs with friction” –Boston Globe
