Opinion / Humor

This week we've decided to reach deep into the archives to pull out a two-part series from 2013 about band transportation. Other than the price of diesel just in the last week, and the disappearance of the car or bus

We return this week to the subject of naming bands. It's an easy topic to come back to because it's a subject that could probably fill an entire instruction manual, or even a novel (in the case of some band

When playing a show in Chicago recently, I stopped to eat at a Greek restaurant on the northwest side of the city and I ordered something pretty standard: the gyro plate, and it was an excellent choice. When it arrived,

The 2026 Winter Olympic Games got me thinking about bluegrass "athletic" competitions, and brought back a memory of an IBMA World of Bluegrass of years gone by: A number of years ago, there was an event at the IBMA World of

It happens every four years now: we all see a lot of curling on television and people tend to be baffled by it. Some enjoy it anyway, some don't, and some make tired jokes about it (see final paragraph). Well,

Mr. Bluegrass Manners is back at last. I was actually starting to worry about him. It turns out after the success of his book about bluegrass social distancing, he has started a successful podcast about diffusing bluegrass conflicts called Your

Just a note that this column was written well before the advent of AI, and to clarify again, I'm referring to Artificial Intelligence, not a guy named "Al." I have to say, though, that I just tried the procedure outlined

Are you possibly old enough to remember cigarette advertising on TV and radio? If so, you probably also still refer to David Grier as "Lamar Grier's boy," and you might remember who Gerald Ford's vice president was (also Lamar Grier,

As you may have noticed, we live in a world of constantly evolving language. The prevalence of texting has certainly been a big influence, as we seek more and more concise ways to express ourselves (when an appropriate emoji isn't

Happy Bluegrass New Year! The first column of the year is almost always devoted to the annual Bluegrass Quiz. This is its third year under that name (it used to be referred to as the Bluegrass Knowledge Test, which some