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I’ve started working on a new album for Stephen El Rey. We’ve worked together many times, but this is my first project serving as producer and arranger. We’ve completed initial tracking after a long stay at the legendary Sonic Ranch studios outside of El Paso.

I am proud to say I’ve begun production on a three-volume series of instructional videos on traditional American fingerpicking for Stefan Grossman’s Guitar Workshop. It’s a real honor to work with this legend of old school American guitar. Stefan learned directly from just about every old timer that folks like me admire and study.

I’ve completed recording and mixing a new solo album of old American music to be released in 2021 on Tiki Parlour Records. Consider signing up for my newsletter for updates on its release and previews.

With 16 tunes, I’ve sought to create an album that represents my full musicality. From one track to the next, you might hear droning banjo, intricate fingerstyle guitar, a dusty piano, dueling harmonicas. You might hear arcane ballads or weary blues. You might hear a performance that’s a close study of an obscure century-old recording; Or you might hear an old tune that was dramatically re-interpreted because that’s how it resonated in me. Some things will sound spontaneous and off-the-cuff; Others will sound meticulously arranged. It is my hope that fans of traditional American music will find something in this album that surprises them: a tune they’ve never heard before, a familiar tune played in a way they never imagined, or tunes collected together in a way they haven’t seen before.

I’ll be appearing on Tom Brosseau’s Great American Folk Show, airing on Prairie Public Radio and streaming online March 7th at 5pm central time. They will feature two tunes from my forthcoming solo album, to be released on Old Time Tiki Parlour Records later this year. If you live in the Great Plains region, find a radio station where you can listen here or else stream it here.

Mara Kaye and I filmed a great set of blues tunes for the San Diego Athenaeum’s piano concert series.