Cary Black

Cary Black is a bassist, teacher, vocalist, and producer who lives in Olympia, Washington.  Described by Alan Senauke in Sing Out! magazine as “a musician's musician,” Cary is at home in a wide variety of musical settings.

His performance and recording credits include work with Laurindo Almeida, Ernestine Anderson, Tex Beneke, The Boys of the Lough, Bob Crosby, Nokie Edwards, Dan Hicks, The Kingston Trio, Laurie Lewis, Rose Maddox, Mollie O'Brien, Eddie Pennington, Johnny Ray, Kay Starr, Eddie “Cleanhead” Vinson, Ernie Watts, and Claude “Fiddler” Williams.

Cary has toured extensively, appearing at festivals and concerts throughout North America, Europe, and Asia.  He has made numerous radio appearances including the Grand Ole Opry and A Prairie Home Companion; and he has performed on the PBS, ABC, FOX, and TNN television networks.  During the period when Cary played and sang with Laurie Lewis and Grant Street, the band was awarded the Song of the Year and Entertainers of the Year honors by the International Bluegrass Music Association.

Cary taught music theory and improvisation for six years at The Evergreen State College in Olympia, and has taught upright bass for twenty years at the Puget Sound Guitar Workshop.  He has also taught bass at the California Coast  Music Camp, Greater Yellowstone Music Camp, Bluegrass at the Beach, B.C. Bluegrass Workshop, Sound Acoustic Music Camp, and Wintergrass Academy.

David Coe

David Coe began playing fiddle in southern Oklahoma where he was born and raised.  The music that he was drawn to was not the “contest” style of that region but old time Appalachian tunes as well as traditional Irish fiddling.  This interest led him to play in bluegrass bands at festivals around Oklahoma, and later in country dance bands around Oklahoma, Texas and New Mexico.  In the late 1970s he met and began touring with nationally-known country artist Michael Martin Murphey and that musical partnership continues to this day.  Together they have played venues from Carnegie Hall to the Grand Ole Opry with many TV shows, studio recordings and live concerts along the way. David concurrently pursued his interest in Irish music, eventually making his way to Ireland and studying at the prestigious “Guinness School of Musicology” (i.e. playing in pubs with great local Irish musicians).   

In the late 1980s David moved to Nashville where he has kept up a steady schedule of touring and recording.  He began playing with the Nashville Irish band The Rogues in the 1990’s in addition to doing his own regular performances and workshops at the Country Music Hall of Fame.  David has recorded several CD’s of fiddle music over the years in styles ranging from bluegrass, to Irish, to Appalachian.  He  has taught private fiddle lessons for over 20 years. He also teaches Irish fiddle and improvisation at Texas State University Strings Camp. David lives in Nashville continues to share his love of fiddle music wherever he goes.

Julie Davis

Julie Davis has long been at the heart of Denver's folk music scene, so much so that at Swallow Hill, the second largest folk music school in the nation is now known as the Julie Davis School of Music. 

Julie has been bringing music to people’s lives for most of her own. Harry Tuft, owner of the Denver Folklore Center and the granddaddy of Denver folk music, says that “Julie was the second employee of the Folklore Center, and the youngest.” At age fourteen, she and Harry struck a deal: he’d teach her intermediate guitar; in return, she’d teach a beginner class for him. Over forty years later, she’s still teaching and making a difference through music.

Besides performing, Julie teaches guitar, recorder, pennywhistle, flute, autoharp, and beginning piano, and offers group classes on guitar, singing, storytelling, ensembles, and performing.

Dave Firestine

Dave Firestine is probably best known as the jam leader at the Carp Camp, an institution at the Walnut Valley Festival in Winfield, KS.  The Carp Camp is the center of the universe for fiddle tune jamming, where one can hear Irish, old-time, New England and French Canadian tunes from the crack of noon to the wee hours of the morning.  Dave's style is eclectic, incorporating a blend of old time and Irish styles. He is especially fond of tunes that have a unique twist, or sets that introduce interesting changes of tempo or keys to perk up the listener's ears.

Dave plays mandolin, banjo, bouzouki, bodhran, and guitar with three bands around Tucson, AZ: Round the House, the Privy Tippers and The New Potatoes.  As a Roster Artist for the Arizona Commission on the Arts, he teaches workshops in schools.  He also co-hosts the Tucson Irish session and old time/contra dance music session and leads jams and teaches workshops at the Tucson Folk Festival, Sharlot Hall Music Festival, the Dewey Dulcimer Festival and the CTMS Summer Solstice Music Dance and Storytelling Festival.

Go to Dave's home page.

Mark Johnson

Mark Johnson is an American master of the 5-string banjo. Highly accomplished as both a three-finger style bluegrass player and a clawhammer player, he has revolutionized the art of playing clawhammer style banjo and advanced the five-string banjo well into uncharted territory with a style he calls “Clawgrass.”

Mark has released four albums, the latest two with his amazing mandolin partner, Emory Lester. Mark’s first release, “Clawgrass,” recorded in 1994 and featuring his friends Larry, Ronny, Tony and Wyatt Rice, was highly acclaimed in the Bluegrass and acoustic music print and radio media and earned him praise throughout the acoustic music industry.

Mark's unique style doesn't really fit into a strict category. It's very bluegrass but has overtones of traditional folk, progressive acoustic, newgrass and old-time all mixed into one. It's authentic. It's unique. It's Clawgrass.

See a few videos of Mark.

Go to Mark's home page.

Tim May

Tim May is one of today’s hottest flatpickers, period.  For fifteen years, he performed with the progressive bluegrass band Crucial Smith, playing most of the high-profile festivals in the country including Telluride, Winfield and Winterhawk.  In 2002-2003 he toured with Patty Loveless in support of her bluegrass albums Mountain Soul and White Snow: A Mountain Christmas.  In 2005, he recorded on Charlie Daniels’ album Songs from the Long Leaf Pines, and was solo guitarist on the Grammy-nominate track I’ll Fly Away.

Tim has also toured with John Cowan Band, performed at the Grand Ole Opry as a member of Mike Snider’s Old Time String Band and recently played on the all-star Rounder recording Moody Bluegrass: a Nashville Tribute to the Moody Blues, of which Mark Hurley of Higher and Higher, the Moody Blues fan magazine, said “The jaw-dropping guitar solo on The Voice would cause Eddie Van Halen to week from insecurity.” 

Tim's taught at Nashville Guitar College, South Plains College and Nashcamp, and is a national clinician for Breedlove guitars.

Of his playing, Pat Flynn said “Tim always says that I influenced him, but the truth is that I’ve learned something every time I play with him.  I owe him a lot,” and Dan Crary said simply, “Tim May has just become one of my favorite guitar players.”

See a few videos of Tim.

Go to Tim's home page.

Carol McComb

Singer, songwriter, multi-instrumentalist and educator Carol McComb has performed from Carnegie Hall to the Ash Grove in Los Angeles.  At age 19, she was half of the duet Kathy and Carol when she and Kathy Larisch signed with Elektra Records.  For eight years, she toured with the nationally-known Gryphon Quintet as a lead singer, songwriter, and guitar and Dobro player.  Most recently, she toured with Linda Ronstadt in the summer of 2007.  Her eighth and most recent album, Little Bit of Heaven, has received high critical praise. 

Carol has taught private and group lessons for Gryphon Stringed Instruments in Palo Alto, CA for over 30 years, and since 1988, her popular instruction book and tape set Country and Blues Guitar for the Musically Hopeless has sold more than 100,000 copies. She’s been called a “songwriter’s songwriter” and her songs have been recorded by Bill Staines, Laurie Lewis, the Good Ol' Persons and 2004 Grammy winners Cathy Fink & Marcy Marxer, among others.  She’s a co-founder and former director of the California Coast Music Camp, and has spent thousands of hours working with students.

Go to Carol's home page.

Raul Reynoso 

Guitarist, singer and composer Raul Reynoso was born in Los Angeles, California.  He started playing bluegrass guitar in 1974 and soon acquired the skills that would earn him two California State Flatpicking Guitar championships as well as many Western regional titles.  Today, he is most noted for his expertise on acoustic guitar and mandolin with a mastery of styles ranging from bluegrass and western swing to ‘30s jazz in the tradition of the legendary Django Reinhardt.

Raul first rose to prominence in the band of banjo virtuoso Larry McNeely, and his three-year stint with the band included one recording and two appearances on the Grand Ole Opry.  The release of Raul’s CD “Royal Street” has brought Raul international acclaim from jazz reviewers in the US, UK and Europe.  The instrumental and compositional skills displayed on his CD have solidified his position as one of the world’s greatest guitarists.  Music critic Jim Hilmar said “When it comes to guitar styles, Raul Reynoso’s clean, lithe, articulate picking technique is to die for.”

Along with John Jorgenson, Raul is one of the pioneers of the Gypsy Jazz movement, and has been nominated Instrumentalist of the Year three times by the Western Music Association. 

Raul has taught privately for over 35 years, and has done workshop and clinics for the last fifteen. He is a mentor at the Booher Family Music Camp, and has done workshops with John Jorgenson for the JazzMasters Workshop.  Raul has also taught Bluegrass workshops with Dan Crary, John Moore, Beppe Gambetta, and Steve Kaufman.

See a few videos of Doug.

Go to Doug's home page

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Radim Zenkl, mandolin player, composer and instructor, plays many musical styles including bluegrass, folk, flamenco, jazz and classical. He has taught at a variety of music camps, with repeat engagements totaling over 70 week-long workshops in the last fifteen years.

Originally from the Czech Republic, Radim emigrated to the U.S. before the fall of communism. Shortly after settling in the San Francisco Bay Area, he was performing at major music festivals and sharing the stage with artists such as Jerry Garcia & David Grisman, Tuck & Patti, Bela Fleck & The Flecktones, the David Grisman Quintet, the Preservation Hall Jazz Band, Tim O'Brien, Peter Rowan, John McCutcheon, Dan Hicks and many others.

He’s recorded five solo CDs and appeared on many more. Two were recorded for David Grisman's Acoustic Disc record label, and his 1996 Shanachie Records release “String & Wings” features improvised duets with 20 different artists including Jerry Douglas, Bela Fleck, David Grisman, Tony Rice and Rob Wasserman.

Winner of the 1992 U.S. National Mandolin Championship, he’s at the cutting edge of the mandolin’s future, performing solo concerts worldwide, collaborating with leading artists of the acoustic music scene and inventing new playing techniques.

See a few videos of Radim.

Go to Radim's home page.