Balsam Range
The 2018 International Bluegrass Music Association’s Entertainer of the Year, Balsam Range, has become one of the genre’s most award-winning acts. Since forming in 2007, the group has garnered 13 IBMA awards on the heels of 9 critically-acclaimed albums. Balsam Range has left audiences spellbound while headlining major festivals from coast-to-coast, selling out venues across the nation and in multiple appearances at the Grand Ole Opry. The band’s latest album, Aeonic, debuted at #1 on the Billboard Bluegrass Albums Chart, and features the #1 radio song, “The Girl Who Invented The Wheel.” Prior to the release of Aeonic, the band collaborated with the Atlanta Pops Orchestra Ensemble to record 2 albums, the second of which, Mountain Overture, debuted on the Billboard Bluegrass Chart at #5 and the Classical Crossover Chart at #6. Their previous outing, Mountain Voodoo, debuted at #4 on the Billboard Bluegrass Albums Chart and remained on that chart for 45 weeks. Three singles from that album reached #1 on the Bluegrass Today Chart, including “Blue Collar Dreams,” which spent three consecutive months at the top. Mountain Voodoo also was named IBMA Album of the Year in 2017. In addition to winning Entertainer of the Year in 2018, Balsam Range vocalist Buddy Melton won IBMA’s Male Vocalist of the Year for the second time and bass player Tim Surrett won IBMA’s Bass Player of the Year for the second time.
The Cleverlys
The Cleverlys are a one-of-a-kind comedy/music blend coming from the remote part of the Ozark Mountains, near Cane Spur, Arkansas.
Digger Cleverly, along with his nephews Ricky Lloyd, Sock, DVD and Cub, make up The Cleverlys. They have traveled the globe, if the globe only consisted of the United States, performing at music venues and some of the nation’s largest festivals like Stagecoach, Telluride, CMA Music Fest and even the Grand Ole Opry.
The New York Times wrote, “If Earl Scruggs, Dolly Parton, and Spinal Tap spawned a litter of puppies, it would be the Cleverlys.”
Don’t be fooled by this faux-family band – they are all accomplished musicians putting their unique bluegrass spin on cover songs from any genre. The Cleverlys’ set list includes genius arrangements of tunes like Psy’s “Gangnam Style,” a medley of Blackstreet’s “No Diggity,” and Flo Rida’s “Low” that recently went viral on Facebook, with over 11 million views from a local TV appearance.
Rolling Stone Magazine says Digger’s “out-of-date eyeglasses are as thick as his hillbilly accent, but whose comic sensibilities are a hilariously off-kilter hybrid of Homer & Jethro and The Office.”
