October 2-4 will be the biggest weekend of the year for bluegrass music. World of Bluegrass booms in Raleigh, NC. Hardly Strictly Bluegrass throws its annual free roots music party in San Francisco. And in Los Angeles, the Bluegrass Situation is graduating to a major new venue, the outdoor Greek Theater. Many bluegrass artists will play both coasts, shuttling from one major gig to another in both directions. I hope everyone is safe and has great shows.
I’m writing this to wish my colleagues and friends in Raleigh all the best for a big IBMA convention and another stellar Wide Open Bluegrass Festival. Because this year, I’m going West, young man. I haven’t missed a World of Bluegrass in at least ten years, and the last two in Raleigh have been simply outstanding. So it was an agonizing choice to make, but in the end, an invitation from the Bluegrass Situation organizers was too much to resist. I’ve enjoyed their events in other settings in the past and I’m really excited to see and experience their mother ship festival, a broad-minded one-day event with Punch Brothers, Della Mae, Sam Outlaw and more. It’ll be more Americana than bluegrass per se, but this realistically is how bluegrass is reaching the wider world. These events – newish gatherings in places that have lacked bluegrass support and audience – are vital to the growth of the music. I’ll be taking notes and writing something up.
I want to say a few words about the IBMA, because it was just one year ago that I was part of the board that voted to begin a search for a new, long-term executive director. As is widely known now, that decision leaked out before the senior people could sit down with then ED Nancy Cardwell and initiate an appropriate path going forward, including due gestures of recognition and appreciation for her years of service and insight. Our debate and decisions was characterized in the press as a “vote of no confidence” which was not accurate, and a turbulent period ensued. I ended my two terms on the IBMA board of directors at that Fall meeting, so I watched from the middle distance as the board worked through a period of stress. I didn’t see it then nor do I see it now as anything other than good old democracy at work, despite characterizations by some observers as chaos or a threat to IBMA’s integrity. It was none of those things, though there was a very large and challenging transition to go through. IBMA had to end one long era of governance, presided over with grace and quiet steadiness by Dan Hays. And it had to find a new ED who brought a rare (and hard-to-find) combination of fresh vision, knowledge of the bluegrass universe and experience with financials and sponsorships. They seem to have found that in Paul Schiminger, and I wish him well in his tenure with IBMA and with the first WOB on his watch.
IBMA has had drama, often manufactured drama, around it since I got interested in it many years ago. But on balance, it’s really been a very well run operation in my experience, and I urge everyone who feels like they’ve been estranged from IBMA to give the new leadership your ears. Get engaged and ask not what IBMA can do for you but what you can do, etc. etc. I valued my board years quite a lot and I’m extremely appreciative of those who supported me in that post. I wasn’t a world-class board member by any means but I am proud to have been the lead writer on the current IBMA Mission Statement: “IBMA is the trade association that connects and educates bluegrass professionals, empowers the bluegrass community, and encourages worldwide appreciation of bluegrass music of yesterday, today and tomorrow.”
I’ll stand by those carefully chosen words, even as I miss my friends and the abundant music at World of Bluegrass this year. See you in 2016 for sure.
