Steve Dilling of Sideline - on the air

Sideline, 'the embodiment of the North Carolina bluegrass sound', will begin their first tour of Ireland less than two weeks from now. The six-day itinerary (on the BIB calendar and the poster image below) takes them to each of the historic provinces of Ireland. Every bluegrass enthusiast in this island should be grateful to the mygrassisblue.com team for bringing over a band of this calibre.

Before the band arrive, mygrassisblue.com have arranged a series of radio appearances with Steve Dilling (above), founder, banjo-player, and 'Big Man' of the band. Before forming Sideline, Steve played banjo for the Bass Mountain Boys, the Lonesome River Band, and (for twenty years) Russell Moore & IIIrd Tyme Out. He endorses banjos by the top-rank Czech maker Prucha, who has put Steve's name on two banjo models. More on his life with the banjo is in an interview by David Russell in Banjo News Letter for July last year.

Thanks to Dave Byrne jr of mygrassisblue.com for the following schedule of radio spots featuring Steve - and, in the last of these, the full band:

Pre-arrival

• Fri. 28th June, 11.00-11.30 p.m. | 'Country Show' with Tommy Rosney, Highland Radio, Donegal (http://www.highlandradio.com/on-air/listen-live/) | Chat with Steve Dilling
• Mon. 1st July, 7.30 p.m. | 'Country Jamboree' with John Ryan, Ocean FM, Sligo (https://www.oceanfm.ie/) | Chat with Steve Dilling
• Tues. 2nd, 8.10 p.m. | 'Country Roads' with Joe Cooney, Midlands 103 (http://www.midlands103.com/radioplayer/) | Chat with Steve Dilling
• Tues. 2nd-Thurs. 4th, TBD | 'Sounds Country' with Dermot Moriarty (https://www.radiokerry.ie/) | Chat with Steve Dilling
• Sat. 6th, 11.10 a.m. | 'The Saturday Connection' with Charlie McGettigan (https://www.northernsound.ie/) | Chat with Steve Dilling

During tour

• Tues. 9th, 1.30 p.m. | 'The John Breslin Show', Highland Radio, Donegal (http://www.highlandradio.com/on-air/listen-live/) | Full band in studio ahead of the tour's first gig in Letterkenny ]

Details of the Radio Kerry interview will be confirmed ASAP. Yesterday (26 June) the Donegal News carried this report about the band, with special reference to the show in Letterkenny that  opens the tour.