"... Have you ever been to the State of Franklin? Have you ever heard of it before now? How about visiting what was once the State of Franklin and listen to JD Crowe and the New South at the same time or how about visiting the First Town in Tennessee and hearing The Expedition Show? ..."
--Historic Jonesborough Bluegrass Series

"The Appalachian Mountains are only now beginning to be recognized as one of the primary incubators of African-American music, especially the blues tradition. Appalachian blues comes in a variety of styles—vaudeville blues, piano blues and boogie, string-band dance blues, guitar and harmonica-based down-home blues, ragtime blues, East Coast rhythm and blues, and so-called white mountain blues. Moreover, it includes such celebrated artists as Bessie Smith, Cripple Clarence Lofton, Cow Cow Davenport, Pinetop Smith, Josh White, Rev. Gary Davis, Jaybird Coleman, Luke Jordan, Dinah Washington, and James Brown. Why, with such an array of blues legends—the Empress of the blues, the Queen of the blues, and the Godfather of soul—has the region's blues tradition received so little attention? Part of the answer lies in the sheer size of the region...." -- Barry Lee Pearson in Appalachian Blues, Smithsonian Folklife

! DON'T FORGET ! to donate, as you're able, for everyday operating expenses and envisioned upgrades to the institutions -- media, websites, cultural centers -- that most inspire, enliven and educate us throughout our uniquely beautiful and beautifully storied Appalachian environment. Nearly all of our wonderfully talented and entertaining musicians develop CDs, and even DVDs sometimes, for sale from their sites and during live performances at inviting venues from public to private throughout the Mountain Empire. We're so fortunate to have this heritage and its continuance through dedicated professionals who also obviously truly love their calling: our traveling troubadors who carry our history of enlightenment and innovation to citizens throughout the world for our benefit and for theirs. Blessings. ........... ... ...... ............

MOUNTAIN EMPIRE MUSIC AND MUSICIAN LINKS

"The Federal Communications Commission is proposing an ambitious 10-year plan that will reimagine the nation’s media and technology priorities by establishing high-speed Internet as the country’s dominant communication network...." -- F.C.C. Plan to Widen Internet Access in U.S. by Brian Stelter and Jenna Wortham, New York Times 3/12/10
“Broadband will be the indispensable platform to assure American competitiveness, ongoing job creation and innovation, and will affect nearly every aspect of Americans’ lives at home, at work, and in their communities.” --Julius Genachowski, F.C.C. chairman

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• Acoustic Coffee House one of Johnson City Tennessee's newer and acclaimed venues for innovative regional musical performances and happenings
• Appalachian Cultural Music Association supports a Museum Store and is "dedicated to the preservation of our Appalachian musical heritage and the continued growth of Old-Time, Bluegrass and traditional Country music"
• Arts Alliance Mountain Empire Appalachian organization of regional groups and individuals engaged in and/or actively supportive of the performing arts. AAME produces the widely-distributed and also downloadable A! monthly magazine of historic background and current event scheduling
• Birthplace of Country Music Bristol TN/VA's Smithsonian-affiliated site on-line and on the ground for the Mountain Empire's historic heritage of regional grassroots music and its innovator/practitioners
• Blue Highways TV streaming Music (Juke) Box, TV Show of old-time country music, on-line shop and recipes
• Blue Plum Festival Johnson City TN's annual street revel in live music, regional crafters innovative and traditional, and cuisine ethnic to folk
• Bluegrass, Old Time and Country Music Department with its extraordinary array of performing bands, within ETSU's Center for Appalachian Studies, offers on-line shopping including for the unusually beautiful Kenton Coe/Edward Schell concert DVD "Appalachia: A Visual Concert"
• Cranberry Thistle Main Street Jonesborough TN's hangout weekdays and weekends for famed and new, traditional music and musicians of the Mountain Empire
• The Crooked Road Virginia's heritage country music trail
• Down Home -- Mountain Empire music icon Ed Snodderly's venerable and beloved venue for well-known and up-and-comin' musicians, check that site's alphabetized links section for websites -- bios, commentaries, travels, CDs, schedules -- of our best performing artists
• Historic Jonesborough Dance Society Non-profit that holds, in addition to extra-special events, twice-monthly contra dances for beginners to pros with accompaniment of outstanding musicians regional and otherwise in appearance at the Visitors Center Auditorium
• International Bluegrass Museum Owensboro Kentucky's outstanding site on the ground and on-line features -- in addition to the museum -- a video oral history project, streaming from ! Radio Bluegrass International ! and the four-day June Romp (River Of Music Party)
• International Storytelling Center Jonesborough's famed and popular storytelling venue not only presents tellers but also outstanding musicians from around the world during its annual festival and through their teller-in-residence program to enthusiastically involved audiences locally and from around the globe
• ***Lightnin' Charlie*** ***website background music*** is long-time blues musician/songwriter and regional gem performing solo, with wife Beth, and with The Upsetters, as heard on our airwaves, recorded, and "live" to the delight of audiences of all ages in an astounding variety of venues from main event tents to hospices for the elderly
• The Local Grass Radio Show "Putting the spotlight on bluegrass that grows at home."
• Mary B. Martin School of the Arts recently organized ETSU structure promoting and presenting performing arts of all genre in the Mountain Empire
• Milligan College Music Performances extraordinarily excellent and popular presentations within the beautiful Seeger Chapel and new Elizabeth Leitner Gregory Center
• Mountain Music Project with the incomparable multi-instrumentalist, Appalachian native Danny Knicely as Musical Director, MMP "encourages the preservation of traditional music in rural and underserved communities throughout the world"

  Find more artists like Danny Knicely at Myspace Music

  
  
  
• Mountain Music Makers Trail & Heritage Centers Blue Ridge region festival and fixed venue sites, with interactive map of specific event locations and dates
• Mountain Music Showcase provides on-the-road interviews and performances throughout the Mountain Empire for radio, television and on-line streaming
• Music On The Square Jonesborough Tennessee's much-lauded and very popular, weekly weekend celebration of regional musicians and tellers
• Nashville Music City another historic hub of Tennessee Sound in rhythm and rockin'
• Mounain Stage Archives popular live broadcasts from West Virgina
• MUSE (Musicians United to Sustain the Environment) founded by the inspiring hiker musician Walkin'
• Jim Stoltz
• Radio Free Lexington Kentucky WRFLfm 88.1, since 1988, with eclectic streaming playlist
• Radio Gotricities very cool homegrown music player featuring regional artists, includes genre selection or all, band index and weekly performance schedules, part of the Gotricities regional info and event site
• ReverbNation choose your genre! (or all, random or not)
• Rhythm & Roots Festival Annual three-day Bristol TN/VA celebration of Mountain Empire music and culture generally
• Rites of Rhythm Asheville NC's multi-talented and storied Jessie Lehmann, of Chix with Stix and The Boom Chix amongst other groups, with !background streaming!
• Song of the Mountains award-winning "Keep the Music Alive" bluegrass concert series held monthly at the Lincoln Theatre in Marion VA with many shows videotaped for and aired by PBS affiliates nationwide. The non-profit organization also sponsors an annual three-day summer festival at Davis Valley Winery.
• Symphony of the Mountains Developed over the past sixty-plus years and including a youth orchestra and Voices of the Mountains chorale, this organization draws from the best Mountain Empire musical talent to present outstanding classics and new works in memorable performance ensemble
• Tennessee Arts Commission umbrella organization for preserving and promoting new and heritage arts, musical and otherwise
• Voice of the Blue Ridge Radio Mount Airy, NC's WPAQ -- now with online streaming!! -- has been on the air since 1948 with the SAME FORMAT of all bluegrass and old time music covering everyone from the well-known to the unknown
• WCSK fm broadcast by the Kingsport City Public School system via a transmitter at incomparable Bays Mountain Park, Lake, Planetarium and Wildlife Refuge, the signal, 90.3 on the radio dial, is clear for many miles although its excellent programming isn't yet carried also on-line
• WNCW fm -- For two decades this outstanding NPR affiliate based at Isothermal Community College has broadcast Mountain Empire culture, the best of music and news, from Boone, Charlotte, Greenville and Wilkesboro North Carolina with ListenLive on-line streaming now as well as through traditional radiowaves
• Worldwide Bluegrass "Best Bluegrass Music On Earth. Bluegrass Radio with Live Bluegrass Shows and Interviews"
• WSM legendary Nashville commercial station live-streaming Bluegrass Underground, the Grand Ole Opry, Music City Roots from the Loveless Cafe
• ZOCI !! "Zombies of Commercial Interest," a subset of The SUBs ("Social Unconsciousness Brigade"), is a musical group still forming and represented through the "Real Fans of WETS fm" Facebook page

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WETSfm, Tri-Cities TN public radio station, announces -- after over 30 years on air and with an audience of over a million regionally to date -- that, as of February 2010, it no longer broadcasts regional music, live and recorded, or musician interviews weekdays, just exclusively during a few weekend evening and early morning hours.

Two months later, Director Wayne Winkler conducts a public discussion with the remaining 248 fans of WETS concerning program changes and their effects on listenership and fundraising.

• The Current from Minnesota public radio
• DatPiff mixtapes
• Eclectic24 Santa Monica College, California NPR affiliate KCRWfm with news, cultural events and commentary, and 24/7 music streaming
• Judaica Sound Archives from Florida Atlantic University an extraordinary collection of Judaic music streamed on-line, includes search by composer, artist and song
  
• National Public Radio Concert Series live performances from venues monumental to intimate across the globe streamed for hours and hours of listening enjoyment, sign up for "song of the day" e-mail also to keep up-to-date on the latest in musical artistry from all genre
• National Public Radio 24-hour programming stream
• National Public Radio 24/7 Music Channel
  
• *******Pandora Radio****** high tech alternative plays only listen to the music you like and provides the peripheral and background info you wanna know too!
• Pitchfork based in Chicago IL with extensive sampling of many artists' recordings including the Mountain Empire's own Ben Sollee and his Appalachian Voices benefit tour with Yim Yames and Daniel Martin Moore
• radiotime free on-line talk and music of a pretty incredible variety from resources around the world! This is a total gem.
• ***** Project Vibe ***** Five-star streaming -- "The Soul of Internet Radio -- ProjectVibe is Music -- Music is Love -- Spread Love"
• Smithsonian Folklife Radio streaming recorded and live performances from the annual folkways arts and crafts outdoor festival with selected videoed performances from its Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage
• Radio Africa streaming indigenous music in collaboration with Smithsonian Global Sound from the fabulous Smithsonian National Museum of African Art
• Soul Sanctuary
• Southern Music Net omnibus music and musical information site with great videos and historical data
• TuneIn access live streaming from your choice of around 50,000 stations
• WBJB from Brookdale NJ Public Radio The Night radio streaming
• WBXR Cumulus Internet Radio from Columbia MO
• ***** WEHC ***** Emory & Henry College VA ListenLive, now includes the very popular WOMEN ON AIR live performances and interviews with host Susan Lachmann
• WRES urban sounds from NC's Asheville
• WTPT Greeneville SC New Rock commercial radio

Go to Mountain Empire Video Samplings

Return to Mountain Empire Music and Musician Links

adam haworth stephens / WE LIVE ON CLIFFS / album preview from Saddle Creek on Vimeo.

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