By Ken Paulson
Random thoughts and observations about the Americana Music Festival week that was: The Nitty Gritty Dirt Band‘s 50th anniversary show at the Ryman was the perfect kick-off and an extraordinary event. Take the four current members of the Dirt Band – Jeff Hanna, John McEuen, Jimmie Fadden and Bob Carpenter – and add Byron House, Sam Bush and Jerry Douglas, and you have the ultimate Americana band. Then you add appearances by Jackson Browne, Vince Gill, John Prine, Alison Krauss, Rodney Crowell and returning Dirt Band member Jimmy Ibbotson and you have a singular evening. Recorded for PBS, the show’s few flubs just meant we had a chance to hear the classics twice – most notably Jerry Jeff Walker and the band doing his “Mr. Bojangles. …Based on their most recent album, we had high hopes for Dustbowl Revival and they absolutely delivered, even inspiring some City Winery patrons to dance, a scene we hadn’t witnessed before…
Dustbowl Revival at the City Winery
Our single favorite song of the week was Steve Earle doing “Mississippi, It’s Time,” a stirring song about the Confederate flag that reminded us how powerful truly topical songs can be….On the same stage, we saw Loretta Lynn, whose stage show probably hasn’t changed much in the past 40 years – and that’s just fine…We used the new app for our schedule all week and just have one request: build bios into the app for artists and panel members rather than passing us through to websites….We were honored to present the Spirit of Americana Free Speech in Music award to Buffy Sainte Marie on Wednesday night and then sat in when she visited with Middle Tennessee State University students the next day. They loved her energy and sage advice: “Don’t believe any of that junk about genres.”…We saw some tremendous unbilled shows at various receptions around town, including the new trio Applewood Road…. The Americana Music Festival remains the best single week for music in Music City –and that’s saying something.