Big Country...

This is what the John Paul Jones Arena looked like a few minutes after the Carrie Underwood/Keith Urban concert last Thursday in Charlottesville. D & I joined our daughter for a belated Christmas present to take in this big-time high-tech country pop extravaganza and I must say it was in impressive showcase for two talented stars who have reached a level in the music biz that affords them a dazzling level of staging and support. I'll confess that this remarkable excess of sound and lights is something I'm fascinated by...the perfectly synchronized efforts of a crew of 140 people who set this gear up, run it and tear it down in every arena they play just to make it all larger than life...a half dozen tractor trailers and dozen tour buses to move them all around...a live concert video production with mulitiple cameras including one flying over the floor like in the NFL. The technical coordination and wizardry just blows me away and even though acoustics and my unfamiliarity with Keith and Carrie's tunes made lyric comprehension difficult, I still enjoyed the scope and specatacle of it all. Keith Urban was a tireless and generous performer, welcoming three teens with a big sign on stage for multiple hugs and a lifetime memory to take home and after strolling out in the crowd playing his electric guitar, he proceeded to take it off, sign it with a Sharpie and give it to some random guy in the crowd...to keep! Looked like a nice Les Paul or something too. And he lingered long after the show pressing flesh and signing anything and everything. Both kids earned their money, and so did the team that puts in so much long before and long after the stars have done their thing. Big time.

We at JAMinc are very excited about our new venture with Page Wilson's venerable Out O' The Blue Radio Revue which will result in his airing many of our In Your Ear Studio A concerts on WCVE on Saturday nights. For the past couple of years we've staged over a dozen of these intimate performances lovingly captured by Carlos Chafin and the peerless gear at IYE. You can look forward to hearing edited sets by Dirk Hamilton (our most recent), John Cephas & Eliza Lynn (our next one on May 1st) and we hope many of our past shows featuring Peter Ostrouschko, Phil Wiggins, The Kruger Brothers, Bruce Molsky, Jake Armerding and many others. Page plans to air approximately one half hour of live recorded concert in each hour of his weekly program. We're jazzed to find such a perfect way to share these wonderful musical experiences with a wider audience and we'll let you know here and elsewhere when the first one will run. In the meantime, join us for the incomparable Piedmont blues man John Cephas and rising singer- songwriter Eliza Lynn, who's recently toured the British Isles with the likes of Nanci Griffith and Dougie MacLean. It should be memorable evening. Just visit the Website for more info and for reservations.

Kay and company at Ashland Coffee and Tea have a strong spring lineup set to go in our favorite listening room starting with a terrific bluegrass band from Alaska called Bearfoot on April 23rd, to be followed by Eliza Gilkyson, Jake Armerding, Brad Spivey & The Honky Tonk Experience, Slaid Cleaves w/Charles Arthur, John Cowan, Steep Canyon Rangers, Chatham County Line, Justin Townes Earle and the Biscuit Burners. That gets us into June, and that's not all. Check their calendar for the full roster.

Don't forget The National welcomes Old Crow Medicine Show on April 23rd and Jerry Douglas on April 25th. That'll give him plenty of time to make his Sunday afternoon set at MerleFest, which by the way starts a week from Thursday and for which we'll try to offer some running commentary. If you're going, look me up around the Cabin Stage, my home away from home for those four glorious April days every year for the past eighteen.

I don't remember a more beautiful blooming spring than the one we're in the middle of, but maybe I'm just more receptive to such things as the years fall away. Blessings to count...TT