Roots In Revue

Back in May, we had us a good, old fashioned shindig here in Louisville. Roots Revue Festival they called it. Between Saturday and Sunday of Memorial Day weekend ten bands took the stage down at the Paristown Arts District.

Billed as the city's newest bluegrass and traditional music festival, the festivities were put on by the distillery across the street, Uncle Boojie's.

The distillery wasn't quite open to the public yet but that didn't put a dent in the fun. Running out of bourbon was one thing that we were in no danger of.

There were plenty of folks in danger of having a good time, however.

Was covering the goings-on for the local weekly newspaper, which was my first time doing that. Been sitting on the photos until the piece got published, it's supposed to go live here in the next day or two so Hive is getting to see it first.

Several of the performers were from Louisville or had connections to the area. The headliner for Saturday night was Sam Bush, a legendary musician instrumental in putting progressive bluegrass on the musical map.

Although originally from Bowling Green, Kentucky, it was in Louisville that his band New Grass Revival formed.

A master of multiple instruments, he put on quite a performance. Not just with his band either, he also sat in with the Bibelhauser Brothers, the local band that preceded him on stage, as well as having all the day's musicians back up on stage with him for the encore.

For all bluegrass music there sure wasn't a lot of dancing going on, at least until Sam Bush took the stage. Then the people sitting down went and got a cop to make the dancers sit down.

That worked for a little while, but eventually the music got to be too much.

Even the cop couldn't argue with that.

Each day of the festival featured a performance by a music school, with the Kentucky School of Bluegrass and Traditional Music starting things off on Saturday and the Louisville Folk School opening things up on Sunday.

Sunday was a bit more relaxed, but no less enjoyable.

The Seldom Scene may have been the headliners for Sunday but it was Gary Brewer & The Kentucky Ramblers that stole the show.

From just across the county line in West Point, Kentucky, they had finally made it into the Billboard charts a few years back, with their 40th anniversary album. Which would explain how they sometimes had three generations of Brewers on the stage.

The Seldom Scene wasn't fiddling around when they closed out the Roots Revue. Not bad for a band that's been around long enough to be doing covers of their own material. This was only the second edition of the festival, looking forward to seeing what the next years will bring.