FULL LINEUP ANNOUNCED FOR 26TH OLD SETTLER’S MUSIC FESTIVAL

HEADLINERS INCLUDE MICHAEL FRANTI, DEL McCOURY BAND, SON VOLT

Nearly 30 Acts to Perform on Four Stages at Four-Day Event

AUSTIN, Texas — With newcomers such as roots-reggae star Michael Franti, soul singer James Hunter, old-time players the Carolina Chocolate Drops, heartlanders Son Volt, sweet-voiced Martin Sexton and country-folkie Justin Townes Earle, the 26th annual Old Settler’s Music Festival promises to be one of the most exciting ever.

Taking place April 18-21 at the Salt Lick Pavilion and Camp Ben McCulloch, south of Austin, the full lineup also includes returning favorites such as Leftover Salmon, Fred Eaglesmith and Bob Schneider. Single-day wristbands, 3- and 4-day packages, and the all-inclusive Platinum Pass are available at oldsettlersmusicfest.org, frontgatetickets.com or 888.512.SHOW.

This year’s roster also features Terri Hendrix, The Gourds, Russell Moore & IIIrd Tyme Out, Della Mae, Peter Rowan’s Twang an’ Groove and many others; nearly 30 acts will perform on four stages. Many artists, including Schneider, also participate in popular songwriting and performance workshops. Festival attractions include unique crafts, children’s activities, craft beer and food selections and, for the first time, private-label wines, produced for the festival by nearby Duchman Family Winery.

“It’s exciting to have such an eclectic array of artists on our stages this year,” says festival director Jean Spivey. “From the legendary bluegrass of Del McCoury to the uplifting, funky beats of Michael Franti, one thing all of our artists have in common is that they are really, really good. Our 26th year promises fabulous musical experiences as well as the Texas-friendly, easygoing atmosphere that defines Old Settler’s.”

Here is the festival lineup for 2013. Show and workshop times will be announced soon.
Thursday, April 18
Fred Eaglesmith
Della Mae
Wood & Wire
The Giving Tree Band
Lone Star Swing

Friday, April 19
Michael Franti
The Del McCoury Band
Son Volt
Justin Townes Earle
Fred Eaglesmith
Terri Hendrix
The Reivers
Dirtfoot
Della Mae
Green Mountain Grass

Saturday, April 20
Leftover Salmon
Bob Schneider
Russell Moore & IIIrd Tyme Out
Carolina Chocolate Drops
Martin Sexton
The Gourds
James Hunter
Jerry Douglas
Peter Rowan’s Twang an’ Groove
Casey Driessen Singularity
Rose’s Pawn Shop
Elephant Revival
Lake Street Dive
The Dunwells
Kimberly Zielnicki featuring the Lost & Nameless Orchestra

Sunday, April 21
The Gourds
Russell Moore & IIIrd Tyme Out
MilkDrive
Steve Poltz
Elephant Revival

Old Settler’s Music Festival offers a one-of-a-kind festival experience that includes nearly 30 superb bluegrass, roots and Americana acts performing on four stages over four days, and camping in the beautiful Texas Hill Country. Festival-goers return year after year for amazing shows by award-winning artists such as Patty Griffin, Buddy Miller, Bruce Hornsby, Yonder Mountain String Band, Alison Krauss and Union Station, Bela Fleck, Amos Lee and local favorites Joe Ely, Alejandro Escovedo, Iron & Wine and Sarah Jarosz.

For more information, visit oldsettlersmusicfest.org
facebook.com/oldsettlers
@Oldsettler

The Top Ten Reasons to Attend World of Bluegrass 2012

Reason #1: It's great, we're here, and you should be too!

The great band Della Mae is just wrapping up their showcase and Jim Hurst, The SteelDrivers and Volume Five are waiting in the wings ready to go on next, as I'm writing this message to you! We're halfway through World of Bluegrass week with three big days left! You still have time to hop in the car, on a bus, on a plane, a train, hot air balloon, or a bike and join us in Nashville! Check us out on Facebook here and here to see the videos, photos and comments from all corners of the Nashville Convention Center--which is literally ringing with great music and the laughter of old friends.

You should be here, too!

Still coming up Thursday: our annual IBMA Town Hall meeting for all members and those interested in finding out about membership, the Special Awards Luncheon with the presentation of IBMA's Distinguished Achievement Awards and industry awards for broadcasting, event production, print/media, liner notes and graphic design for a recorded project, and a new award for bluegrass songwriter of the year!

Tomorrow night is the International Bluegrass Music Awards at the historic Ryman Theater, hosted by Del McCoury and Laurie Lewis. I'm backstage at the Ryman right now, listening to soundchecks by one amazing band after another, and getting more excited by the minute! You definitely don't want to miss this one, folks! Tickets are still available at ryman.com, in person at the Ryman Box Office, and at the World of Bluegrass registration desk through tomorrow afternoon (Sept. 27).

If you can't be here in person, be sure to catch us on the first ever live streaming broadcast on www.bluegrassnation.org or www.bluegrasstoday.com, or live on Sirius XM satellite radio, WSM-AM or wsmonline.com.

Fan Fest, with more than 60 great bands, a world-class fiddling competition, the masters workshop stage, an exhibit hall, celebrity jams, the great "Kids on Bluegrass" set, and jamming unlimited kicks off Friday morning, Sept. 28 and runs through Sunday, Sept. 30. Single day and three-day passes are still available at the gate. Kids under 16 are free with an adult, and there are special discounts for students with a high school or college ID. Here's the line-up.

Great business connections are being made, amazing music is being played, and big fun is still to be had during the next four days of World of Bluegrass in Nashville, Tenn.!

Hope to see you! If you can't join us, follow us on Twitter, on Facebook (IBMA & Bluegrass Nation pages) and Instagram, and tune into the show tomorrow night at 7:30 p.m. Central.

-Nancy C.

New Contest Offers All IBMA Members Chance to Win a “Little Cabin Home on The Sea”

Mountain Song at Sea’s Ultimate Bluegrass Cruise

NASHVILLE, Tenn. -- In an exciting new membership drive, all active members of the International Bluegrass Music Association (IBMA) as of September 27, 2012 will receive a chance to win an oceanview cabin for two on Mountain Song at Sea’s Bluegrass Cruise.

An entire ship has been chartered for the festival, which boasts a fantastically diverse lineup: The David Grisman Sextet, Del McCoury Band, Punch Brothers, Steep Canyon Rangers, Tim O'Brien and Bryan Sutton, Kruger Brothers, Peter Rowan, Larry Keel & Natural Bridge, Travelin' McCourys, Shannon Whitworth, Della Mae and Town Mountain.

Thanks to the generosity of cruise hosts The Steep Canyon Rangers, Mountain Song Productions and Sixthman, one lucky winner will receive a Mountain Song at Sea cruise package for two with an Ocean View cabin (value: $2,030), in a drawing to be held onstage during Fan Fest at IBMA’s World of Bluegrass in Nashville, Tenn. on September 28-30, 2012.

All current members of IBMA (including professional, Grass Roots, youth, lifetime & organizational members) as of September 27, 2012 will be eligible for the drawing. For more information, click here.

On February 1-4, 2013, Mountain Song at Sea will set sail on a round-trip cruise from Miami to a private island in the Bahamas aboard the Norwegian Sky, a luxury ship chartered for the festival. Highlights will include concerts, artist collaborations and jams, and plenty of interaction between artists and fans in beer and wine tastings, workshops, games, and a poker tournament with cruise hosts The Steep Canyon Rangers, IBMA Entertainers of the Year.

Just in time for World of Bluegrass discounts and the last rounds of voting for IBMA’s Music Awards, the membership drive features a sale on professional membership perfect for bands and businesses--“four for the price of three.” The professional membership sale is good through the end of 2012. Call 1-888-GET-IBMA directly to take advantage of this offer!

IBMA members will also be eligible for a 10% discount on the cruise. Sixthman, known for award-winning music-themed cruises, is accepting cruise reservations now at 877/379-9189. Members must mention their IBMA membership to receive the cruise discount. Those who join by September 27 will be eligible to win the Mountain Song at Sea cruise package.

In addition to annual conference discounts, IBMA members have access to a number of showcasing, networking and professional development tools. (Check out the long list of diverse IBMA member benefits and services here.) For more information on the cruise, click here or call 1-888-GET-IBMA.

Visit Mountain Song at Sea online for more information.
Click here for rules and additional info
on IBMA’s cruise contest and membership promotion.

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Contacts:
Judy McDonough, JEMMedia:
(615) 243-5994, mcdonoughmedia1@yahoo.com

Caroline Wright, IBMA:
(615) 256-3222, caroline@ibma.org

Laurie Lewis & Del McCoury to Host 23rd International Bluegrass Music Awards Sept. 27

Laurie Lewis & Del McCoury to Host 23rd International Bluegrass Music Awards

Nominations for the IBMA Awards, the centerpiece of World of Bluegrass week,
to be announced at a special press conference Wednesday evening, August 15, at The Loveless Barn in Nashville.

NASHVILLE, Tenn., July 12, 2012 -- A powerful and delightfully unusual pairing of bluegrass superstars -- Laurie Lewis and Del McCoury -- will host the 23rd Annual International Bluegrass Music Awards this year, on Thursday, September 27, 2012 at 7:30 p.m. at Nashville’s historic Ryman Auditorium.

Nominations for the International Bluegrass Music Awards will be announced at a special press conference scheduled for Wednesday evening, August 15, at The Loveless Barn in Nashville.

The IBMA Awards are the centerpiece of World of Bluegrass week, scheduled for September 24-30 in Nashville. Produced by the International Bluegrass Music Association (IBMA), the trade organization for global bluegrass music, World of Bluegrass also includes the industry’s Business Conference and Bluegrass Fan Fest.

“I’m thrilled to be invited to co-host the Awards Show with the great Del McCoury!” said singer/songwriter/fiddler Laurie Lewis from her home in northern California. “I predict this will be a very significant and poignant event, as the bluegrass community comes together to recognize and honor its own, and to pay tribute to some of the pioneers we’ve lost this year, including the great Earl Scruggs.”

A two-time winner of the California State Women's Fiddle Championship, Lewis began her career in the mid-1970s as a co-founder of all-female bluegrass band The Good Ol' Persons. She’s worked as fiddle player on the Masters of the Five String Banjo tour with Ralph Stanley; was twice voted IBMA’s Female Vocalist of the Year; and The Oak and the Laurel, her collection of duets with musical co-conspirator Tom Rozum, was nominated for a Grammy® in 1996.

Lewis also contributed songs to the Grammy-winning True Life Blues: The Songs of Bill Monroe, and to Grammy-nominated Clinch Mountain Country. Her original tunes have been recorded by Kathy Mattea and Patsy Montana, whose cover of Laurie’s “Cowgirl Song” is the unofficial theme song of the Cowgirl Hall of Fame. She’s toured and worked in various configurations over the years, and in 2006 began working regularly with a band she calls “The Right Hands.” Lewis’ latest recording, Skippin’ and Flyin’, an acclaimed tribute to Father of Bluegrass Bill Monroe, features her pals Linda Ronstadt and Kathy Kallick (her old friend and fellow Good Ol’ Person).

“I was excited to be asked to host the IBMA Awards again,” said IBMA Hall of Fame member Del McCoury from his home near Nashville. “With World of Bluegrass moving to Raleigh next year, this might be the last Awards Show IBMA will hold at the Ryman Auditorium, at least for a few years. It's a tremendous honor for me to be co-hosting with my old friend, Laurie Lewis. We haven't had the opportunity to perform or record together much over the years, but she's a great lady and I know we are going to have a lot of fun hosting the show."

Born in York, Penn., McCoury was a briefly a member of Bill Monroe’s Blue Grass Boys, working as the band’s lead vocalist and rhythm guitarist in 1963. He performed as a regional artist for some years, and in the 1980s welcomed his sons, Ronnie (mandolin) and Rob (banjo), to his ensemble. Today he is leader and patriarch of The Del McCoury Band, a quintet that includes his sons, plus fiddler Jason Carter and bassist Alan Bartram. The band has seen spectacular success in the 21st century, bringing huge new audiences to bluegrass at venues and events like Madison Square Garden, Bonnaroo, and High Sierra, and introducing bluegrass audiences to new music through appearances and recordings with artists as diverse as the Preservation Hall Jazz Band, Steve Earle, and Phish. Five years ago, McCoury began hosting his own annual DelFest in Cumberland, Md.

At the 2003 IBMA Awards Show, Ricky Skaggs had the pleasure of inviting the Del McCoury Band to become a member of the Grand Ole Opry. For those who attended, it was an unforgettable moment. A 2010 recipient of a National Heritage Fellowship lifetime achievement award from the National Endowment for the Arts, McCoury was inducted into IBMA’s Bluegrass Hall of Fame in 2011.

The IBMA Awards Show will be broadcast live on Sirius XM Satellite Radio (Bluegrass Junction, Channel 14) and syndicated to more than 300 U.S. markets and 14 foreign networks, thanks to the sponsorship of Compass Records, Deering Banjos, BMI, the International Bluegrass Music Museum, BluegrassToday.com and 650 WSM AM. Program directors and station managers may sign up to be affiliates online at www.ibma.org.

The International Bluegrass Music Awards are voted on by the professional membership of the IBMA.

For more information on World of Bluegrass, including tickets to the International Bluegrass Music Awards, visit www.ibma.org, join IBMA’s Facebook group, or call 615-256-3222 (888-GET-IBMA). Tickets are on sale now at the website and at the phone number listed above.

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Contacts:
Judy McDonough, JEMMedia:
(615) 243-5994, mcdonoughmedia1@yahoo.com,

Caroline Wright, Interim Publication Editor/Special Projects Director, IBMA
(615) 256-3222, caroline@ibma.org




Judy McDonough
615-243-5994
Twitter: @jemmcd
mcdonoughmedia1@yahoo.com