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Exploring the anachronism of Ahkwesasne traditions in a modern world, December Wind frontman Atsiaktonkie creates songs about maintaining ancient spiritual traditions, finding the ties of generational love, and stewarding the land. The proud history of a people is evident in every note, and the folk-rock melodies with their gentle Native rhythmic influences are irresistible. |
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Buried in the deep-set groove laid by a couple hundred years of exile and sojourn, the roots of the Cajun people are firmly planted. Balfa Toujours explores these roots, digging up hoary fiddle tunes and venerable dance numbers, and add their own branches to the cultural tree, keeping the Balfa Family tradition alive and well for the next generation. Their fundamental ability to get even the most stoic music listener onto the dance floor is world-renowned - we dare you to stay seated.
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These North Carolina boys keep the classic elegance of hard-driving high lonesome bluegrass alive and well. They're a back porch band and they're proud of it, and we're so looking forward to seeing them up here in Yankee country once again.
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It is often in the darkest places, amidst the very hardest luck and troubles, that the most beautiful art arises. Such is the case of gospel music. Borne of an era where even the glorification of God was a segregated affair, gospel married the history of Judeo-Christian tradition with the bluesy syncopation of West African music, and has remained one of the most beloved aspects of African-American Christian culture. Taking up the cross for the new generation, Ithaca's Bethlehem Church Youth Choir are bearing this sacred tradition into the future.
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Waist-deep in Americana, Big Leg Emma tackle weighty topics with feather-light rhythms and fiery positivity. They've been keeping the dream alive in Western New York for seven years, and are back by popular demand for what promises to be a raucous, rockin' show. |
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Punk is, and always has been, about rebellion. In this day and age, the rebellion that the world most needs is against corporate greed, environmental carelessness and social injustice. It's pure Navajo Punk: raw, unfiltered and very important.
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Gone are the days of soda jerks and sock hops, but Bobby Henrie and the Goners are determined to keep alive the driving guitars and swinging rhythms of old-school rockabilly. Put on your dancing shoes - you're gonna need 'em! |
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Avant and neo and prog and nouveau and dozens of other elegant and forward-thinking prefixes swirl around in your mind when you listen to the strains of Boy With a Fish, an outfit who melds the eerie with the irresistable and the noir with the blanc. Extraordinary, to say the least. |
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This Irish-American group is born out of the best Irish seisuns (jams) in Pittsburgh, and contains some of the best-known names in Irish music today. With pipes, whistle, fiddle, squeezebox, bodhran and all of those other instruments that make Irish music so sweet sounding and dancer-friendly, they have got it down pat. Slainte! |
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Memories seem to differ on whether the Bubba George Stringband played their first big gig in front of the Home Dairy or the Ithaca Diner, but it was definitely somewhere on the Commons, Jeb was definitely around 10 years old, and after they'd played for a few hours, the tattered fiddle case lying on the ground definitely didn't have more than a few bucks in it. They sure did get good, though, and they sure do still love playing together. We're proud to have them open the GrassRoots festival and keep tradition alive, in more ways than one.
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With the mayhem of early low country stringbands, the wry sadness of early delta blues guitar players, and just enough hokum to keep it light, this father, son and best buddy band make the old sound new and the new sound old. Greasy guitars and a moaning fiddle - it don't get more better. |
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A couple of brothers and a couple of guys who may as well be, the Buvas - Pennsylvania Dutch for "little boys" - have busked on street corners from Vestal to Copenhagen, incited more than a few dance riots beside backwoods campfires, and jammed with Gypsy Princesses and Rastafarian preachers. The Buvas represent the very best that old-time music has to offer - inclusiveness, expansiveness, and raging fun.
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Folk and rock favorites, rockin' folk originals, and more feel-good, soul-shaking grooves than you can shake a stick at. Calico Moon is rootsy, soulful, and just plain fun - what's not to love? |
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The Chicken Chokers were a driving force of old-time music in the punk-folk revival of the early 1980s, leading the charge to make old-time cool again for the first time in a hundred or so years. Indeed, it worked - GrassRootsers of all stripes know how hard-rocking a good old-time band can be, and the Chicken Chokers are assuredly one of the best. |
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Courtney Granger is Cajun music royalty. His grandmother is a sister of the trailblazing Balfa Brothers, who were among the first to bring Cajun music outside of Louisiana. The Cajun music of today bears not only traditional influences that can be traced all the way back to Brittany and Normandy, but also influences from early Country and Western music - George Jones, Hank Williams, and the like. Of course, early Country took many cues from Cajun music, as well, and Courtney digs into both sides of this equation, with a voice that hearkens to the golden days.
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If you're under the impression that drums serve only to lay down a beat, you are in for an ear-opening experience when Cyro Baptista and Beat the Donkey take the stage. Finding the tonality in percussion instruments and creating polyphonic harmonies with bike horns, garbage can lids, glass jugs, and pretty much anything else that Cyro Baptista can think to beat on, Beat the Donkey is both visually arresting and sonically exquisite. With a polyethnic approach to songs and sounds, Cyro Baptista is, at once, like nothing else in the world and like the whole world together. |
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New Orleans is more than a city. It's a living, breathing entity which feels joy and pain, sorrow and bliss. More music has originated in and around the area than nearly anywhere else in the world - dixieland, jazz, blues, swing, rock, R&B, funk... the list goes on. The Dirty Dozen Brass Band are both proud caretakers and fierce trailblazers in the New Orleans music tradition. Spiking the traditional brass band sound with hard-edged funk and deep Delta soul, the Dirty Dozen Brass Band have long since gained the approval of their hometown (a picky bunch, to be sure!) as well as the world at large. Maintaining hope even after their beloved hometown was devastated, they are a major force in the revitalization of New Orleans musical culture, and we're proud to welcome them for their debut performance at GrassRoots. |
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The one thing that reggae, zydeco and old-time country all have in common is that, when in capable hands, they all rock like crazy. Donna the Buffalo dips into all of these traditions and more, and comes out with a sound that's both unique and familiar, danceable yet thoughtful. They are the founders and creators of the GrassRoots festival, and, if you think about it, their music is a pretty darn good metaphor for this festival as a whole. |
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Eilen is a songwriter and singer who writes stark and contemplative bluesy country songs and has a voice from a bygone era. It's smooth and sleepy, with a touch of dirt-road grit and a twist of honky-tonk that takes you to places you've only seen in old pictures. |
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The Sahara Desert, though one of the harshest landscapes on earth, is home to many nomadic tribes, who have roamed the sun-drenched dunes for hundreds and thousands of years. The Tuaregs and the Wodaabe are two of these tribes, both of whom are struggling to maintain an ancient lifestyle in a modern world. At the annual Festival au Desert celebration in Mali, several members of each of these tribes met in a jam session, and realized that their shared love of desert blues, combined with the unique traditional sounds of each of their cultures, was combining to create something truly special, both musicially and politically. |
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Some folks like to call Ithaca "The City of Evil". Though we disagree with their reasoning, we ain't gonna argue that Ithaca's got a touch of the dark side, as do these fellas. In their capable hands, old-time murder ballads and tawdry early blues numbers sound like yellowing lace and crumbling mansions and other wonders of graceful decay. |
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It's swampacana… It's prodigiously groovy, with warm echoes of reason and heartache, love and thought. Family Knife's music lends itself comfortably to hyphens (neo-folk, avant-groove), but even more comfortably to dancing and thinking and all those other wonderful things that great music makes you wanna do.
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Introspective vocals collide with chunky power-chords to give us the long-legged alterna-pop of Fisher Meehan. Fisher is a damn fine songwriter, and this gives him the pull to assemble a damn fine lineup of musicians to back him up. Everyone loves a good rock song, and Fisher's got a slew of them. |
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What is it about Southern Gospel music that just makes you feel so good? We don't know for sure (although we can make some guesses), but we do know that Lloyd Canady and the Flying Clouds are the real deal. Straight out of Plum Branch, South Carolina (home of a railroad station and a church, and not much else), they play with every bit of foot-stomping hand-clapping praise-giving goodness that you'd hope for, and more. |
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Where movement collides with sound for a multisensory art experience, Galumpha is more than a modern dance troupe - they're poetry in motion. Impossible pretzels, unimaginable insects, nonsensical monsters and gonzo chorus lines - you'll see all this and more, soundtracked by your favorite GrassRoots music. |
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Giant pandas are entirely too rare. Guerrillas spring on you without warning. GPGDS is both - reggae this good is entirely too rare, and their infectious rhythms will sneak up behind you and catch you in the groove. Hot and sultry, GPGDS has quickly become a favorite among regional reggae fans, and after just one listen, you'll know why. |
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GrassRoots Festival Chamber Orchestra - Pulling together dozens of the greatest classical musicians in the greater Finger Lakes region, the GrassRoots Festival Chamber Orchestra will return this year, presenting a unique and dynamic program of classical and new music. Rest your weary bones and soothe your weary ears; it's a lovely way to start your Sunday morning. |
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The Gunpoets' heavy beats combined with Rising Sun's gut-wrenching rhymes have garnered a dedicated local following for this roots hip-hop group. Hip-hop is more than just poetry, or rhythm, or sweet looping melody - it's an aggregate that can't be shut down, and the Gunpoets are leading their own revolution in the genre. |
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With an ear for traditional hot pickin' and high lonesome singin', the Hackensaw Boys are deep-rooted in the traditional sounds of bluegrass, with modern-tinged lyrics that make the band both accessible for young'uns and comfortable for ol' timers. Catching the ears of folks in the North, South, East and West, this will be the Boys' first time in our neck of the woods. Watch yourselves, it's gonna get hot! |
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Hank Roberts
The cello is a sometimes-neglected string instrument, nestling comfortably in the tonal space between the fiddle and the bass. Well, we sure like that space… it's warm and rich, mellow and vibrant. We especially like it when Hank Roberts is in charge, because his delicate yet rock-solid jazz-rock compositions fill it so perfectly. |
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Like a monster bug with antennae made of electric fiddle strings and wings made of old-time 78s, legs of vintage fretboards and glowing LED eyes, the Horse Flies have buzzed around in the realm of the post-modern for over two decades, and continue to carry their psychedlic stringband sound into the future. |
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Hubcap plays original twangy indie punk-pop, and hot damn, they're good. Their songs explore those classic themes that are common to both country and punk music music - love, loss, the loss of love, the love of loss... With a hard-driving delivery tempered by just enough sweetness in the melody, there's an exquisite poise in Hubcap's sound. |
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With a sound as rich as their name is short, IY is heavy on I-town rhythms and positive attitude. With rock, funk and reggae influences, their sound and message add up to pure musical joy. |
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Organic and pure, with a seeming effortlessness that's just too gentle to be true, Jennie Stearns writes and sings some of the most beautiful songs we know. Barefoot waltzes and front-porch singalongs blend with perceptive pop sensibilities to create something truly lovely. |
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They call him "Alt Country", "Americana" and even "Y'all-ternative". We don't know what any of that stuff means, so we just call him "Jim" (it's shorter). In a world where modern country music is about as exciting as a warm, stale Bud Light, Jim Lauderdale stands out like a shot of White Lightning, and we think he's extraordinary. Jim Lauderdale has canceled all summer dates due to vocal cord surgery. We wish him a quick healing process, and we look forward to seeing him again in 2009! |
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Haggard and Cash and Jones - Oh My! There ain't much better than classic country songs, delivered by a top-notch honky-tonk band. It's best that you bring either a dance partner or a beer to cry into, because you're gonna need one or the other. A new configuration of GrassRoots veterans, we can't wait to hear these fellas again. |
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Throw a rock of your choosing at a country of your choosing, and out will pop cowpunk. Or something like that. We might not have that quite right… what we do have right, though, is that JoeJo rocks with the best of 'em, and they're local favorites for good reason! |
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Roots reggae has been literally dying out in Jamaica for several years now, since younger musicians seem to be choosing the more modern styles of dub and dancehall over the classic sound. The genre is returning to its former glory, though, thanks in no small part to a group of guys from Boston, MA and Ithaca, NY. Real reggae vibrations flow through JBB's music… come bathe in them. |
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Johnny Dowd's music is dangerous. It puts all sorts of thoughts in your head and a funny tingly feeling in your shoes. It's experimental in a way that rock and roll really oughtta be all the time, cut with just enough Country to make it go down smooth. |
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The Jones Benally Family Dance Troupe are an internationally acclaimed Navajo (Dine) dance troupe from Big Mesa, Arizona. Jones Benally is an elder, wise in a way that most of us will never be, and he does the traditional hoop dances for both ancient reasons (to cure the ill) and modern reasons (to teach his tribal traditions to a waning Native population and to non-Natives as well). The magic of the hoop dance is surprisingly real, and one could see how it might make a body feel better.
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