9/14 – Ironing Board Sam – The Depot, Hillsborough, NC
9/15 – Ironing Board Sam & Big Ron Hunter – Apex Jazz Festival
9/20 – John Dee Holeman & Lightnin’ Wells – SOOTS Benefit, Chapel Hill, NC
9/22 – Music Maker Blues Revue – Roots N Blues N BBQ, Columbia, MO
9/23 – Leyla McCalla – Mass MoCA Fresh Grass Bluegrass Festival, North Adams, MA
9/29 – Ironing Board Sam & Drink Small – Sweet Palmetto Festival, Columbia, SC
10/4 – 10/7 – Deer Clan – Shakori Hills Music Festival, Pittsboro, NC
10/6 – George Higgs – St. Anne’s Chapel, Tarboro, NC
10/11 – Pura Fé – 8th Annual Dreamcatcher Awards Gala, Hamilton, Ontario
10/12 – Big Ron Hunter – The Depot, Hillsborough, NC
10/13 – Ironing Board Sam, L.C. Ulmer, Ben Peyton, Drew Young Band – Music Maker Stage, Southern Mississippi Roots Festival, Hattiesburg, MS
10/13 – John Dee Holeman – Richmond Folk Festival, Richmond, VA
10/14 – Ironing Board Sam – Crescent BBQ and Blues Festival, NOLA
10/19-10/21 – Robert Lee Coleman, Ironing Board Sam, Nashid Abdul Khaaliq, Big Ron Hunter, Ardie Dean- Blues at the Crossroads, Salina, KS
10/27- 11/2- Ironing Board Sam, Carolina Chocolate Drops – Legendary Rhythm & Blues Cruise
11/11 – George Higgs – Pinecone Music of the Carolinas, NCMoH, Raleigh, NC
11/19 – Lakota John and Kin – American Indian Heritage Festival, NCMo, Raleigh, NC
Every variety of Roots music, be it blues or bluegrass, is inimitably tied to a place. Even if its branches have spread beyond that place, the root of its influence remains strongly regional. That’s why I find “Busrider Blues” by Henry Byrd so interesting: his mumbling bluesman vocals and finger-picking guitar mix that eastern blues regionalism with an almost nomadic theme. He evokes the transience of bus stations and train depots, the kind of community that springs up around these places and makes them cultural oases.
Today, September 13th, 
