Thanks for looking in on my new bluegrass blog.

First time views of this blog may want to scroll down to "First Post" for an explanation of this web log.

Winter Pick Photos

Winter Pick 2014 Photos

Winter Pick 2014 Gardiner, Montana

Another very successful Winter Pick event was held in Gardiner, MT, over the weekend of January 24-26, 2014. Some folks checked in even earlier and the pickin' and singin' was heard all over two floors of the Gardiner Super 8.  Rob and Linda Grosvenor hosted this event once again and it has grown nicely over the years. Originally it was at their house, but has now overflowed into a local hotel.  Pickers were there from all over MT and probably from other states as well. Food was available on Saturday for a small donation and Rob can be seen in a later photo preparing some.  Dennis Anderson's wife, Sandy, sent along some excellent pulled pork and coleslaw. Others brought goodies as well.

One correction from an earlier post: I was surprised to see Bruce Lee there. As I had mentioned he usually goes to Deer Lodge for their event which was also scheduled for the same weekend. It seems that too many pickers wanted to attend both events so Deer Lodge has been postponed. I believe it will now be held on Saturday February 22.  That should be verified before heading up to Deer Lodge.

Below find some Winter Pick photos:

 More photos from Winter Pick in additional posts.

Yellowstone Bluegrass Association in 2014

Sharon Karlson is the new YBA president for 2014. This is her first board position although she has been a good member for several years. Trent Indreland has moved into the VP position replacing Ed Pierson. Scott Moore continues to be the secretary-treasurer for another term. We all owe Scott a debt of gratitude for serving in this often thankless job. It involves a lot of careful work and was done well by Terry Indreland for several years. Paul Dextras and David Nelson are returning board members and Edd Tremblay of Red Lodge is a new addition to the board. All others are from the Billings area with Billings Heights and Lockwood well represented. The YBA Friday night jams have been well attended with 15-20 or more singer musicians on hand each week. Here is a partial view from one of them.

 

 Some close ups include: 

Your friends will be looking for you next Friday.

   

Big Weekend for Bluegrassers

This weekend January 24-25 features two big jams for this wintery month.  In Western Montana pickin-n-grinnin is on Saturday, January 25, 2014, from noon til?? Dinner for $5 donation, too, at the The Office, 511 Main.  Bill and Charlene Anderson host this annual event. Billings picker Bruce Lee is a regular at this jam and has gone for several years.



The Yellowstone Park bunch have a 2-3 day event called "Winter Pick" in Gardiner, MT. Robert Grosvenor is the main man putting on this event. Past participants have raved about the great times at this jam near the Headquarters for Yellowstone Park at Mammoth Hot Springs. I hope many readers will have made it to one of these great Montana bluegrass events.

First Post

A New Site With Bluegrass Music News From Billings, MT and Elsewhere Including WY, ND, SD, ID and National BG Topics.

For quite some time I have published "Roger's Bluegrass E-Letter" which was sent as an e-mail attachment to a list of bluegrass enthusiasts. Several problems developed including difficulty in updating new e-mail addresses, if I even had them, as well as deciding which formats to use for the attachments.  Some folks did not want to open any attachments as some could be harmful to their computers, although mine were quite safe. For that reason I have decided to start a "blog", short for web log, in which my posts can be entered at any intervals, even daily at times.  Likewise viewers can check them out at any time by clicking on this new bluegrass blog.  In a blog the latest post will be listed at the top and earlier posts will be below based on their date of entry. It will be like keeping a journal of bluegrass activity.  Readers will now be able to go to this blog at their convenience and it won't be cluttering up their e-mail any longer. People should also be able to comment on any of my posts and I hope many of you will. Any suggestions for improvements or other BG topics will be most welcome.

I hope you find this new site to be worthwhile enough to check it out periodically.  Let me know what you think, either on this blog itself, or by e-mailing me at gdaefiddler@q.com. Thanks for reading this first post
on Roger's Bluegrass News.