Some good reasons I love Alaska . ,After a local fiddler and I groused about the darkness and cold , You might asked why i live here? I got to thinking -- I worked with many kinds of people ,and cultures ,made lots of friends through work and music. Alaska has a healthy music community of which I have been a part for about 40 years or more . We have an old time music , Bluegrass ,Country ,and a very strong Irish music culture ,we have have two Irish dance academies that have contributed several champions ,and one world Champion. Every week we have Trad. Irish sessions on Sunday afternoon,at a local pub and parents bring their children ,and some of them are mighty players . There are two old time Jams every week and a fair amount of square dancing and contras with long time and great local bands (like Crooked Road,Jubilee ,Muskeg Sally , and Fat Weasel to name only a few --) For Both Irish ,New England and Old time . We have great folk festivals ,The Anchorage Folk festival in Jan . And the Alaska Folk festival in our capital City (with no road connection) in April . Summer time we have nice festivals ,and great camping at them ,in various parts of the state. After all this time and art/music I have become very at home here,I love going with my friends to the music happenings ,and even get to contribute to the Alaskan Athabaskan music an over a hundred years old tradition - by playing guitar for my friend ,Athabaskan Fiddler Bill Stevens. Last summer, two years ago we we invited to play at the Moosehide Gathering down river from Dawson city in the Yukon Territory, I met and played with Athabaskan fiddlers ,and people from as far east as Hudsons Bay . There is a lot here in the north . I also love the Kluane Bluegrass festival ,only a 20 hour drive from Anchorage in Whitehorse Yukon Territory . It is interesting here . I even once interviewed some people who had lived in villages before the white man came,or so they said ,and talked with a man who knew of a shaman who had heard of the white mans hell ,and went down through the layers of the earth to visit hell but was stopped by a stone wall,and could hear white people talking on the other side of the wall there . There are a lot of reasons I love Alaska ,its mostly the people ,and also the so many Native cultures that enrich our state. Also Alaska has helped to produce some nationally ,and internationally known Musicians ,Greg Booth ,who plays with the Katy Kallick Band , Frank Solivan and Danny Booth of Frank Solivan and Dirty Kitchen ,and Fiddle Amanda Kerr Former national fiddle champ.who plays professionally ,and has taught many happy Students in Alaska, and Dusty Rider ,a world class banjo player, now with the Rail Splitters -in Colorado Kalia Yeagle-a fine fiddler,and world class singer who used to play with one of the top eastern Bluegrass bands,Too Blue . Our Alaskan musicians ,such as Gary Markley (banjo) Joel Kadarauch banjo and guitar , Joe Page- Mandolin ,and those wonderful musicians in Juneau -in The Alaska Bluegrass band, Bootleg Brown ,Full Sail ,and the father of Alaska Bluegrass Carl Huffman ,and to many to name here are tops. Plus we have a new generation of musicians coming along Who are making a name for themselves .---thanks to Mary Schallert and her Alaska Folk arts Music camp Bell Mickelsons music camp in Cordova,and her going out to the villages to teach fiddle music .-and - the traditional music camps in Fairbanks and Homer Alaska ,and Amanda Kerr,and all the other traditional music teachers and their teaching .. It is powerful and good ! I would hope that towns in the lower 48 are as rich in music .
Posted on: Wed, 20 Nov 2013 23:50:07 +0000
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