Westport 2023: very special workshops

Thanks again to Uri Kohen, head of the organising team of the Westport Folk and Bluegrass Festival (9-11 June 2023), for this news, particularly exciting for old-time enthusiasts:

Each year Westport Folk and Bluegrass Festival is staging two workshops, and for 2023 we have something very special in store.

* On Saturday 10 June at 12.30 p.m. Greg Reish of the Centre for Popular Music at Middle Tennessee State University and its Spring Fed Records label will present a workshop on the early recordings of the Haley Family and on the restoration of the Haley Family recordings.

Ed Haley was a legendary early-20th-century Appalachian fiddler whose music has influenced generations of old-time and bluegrass musicians. Although he never recorded commercially, in the late 1940s Ed and his wife Ella made a series of home recordings on lacquer discs. In this workshop, co-producer and Spring Fed Records director Greg Reish describes the painstaking process of restoring and reissuing these rare recordings in a landmark boxed set released in 2022 [above left]. He will also discuss the Haley family’s complex and lasting legacy in the canon of American old-time music.

* On Saturday 10 June at 2.30 p.m. old-time fiddle maestro Austin Derryberry [above right] will run a fiddle workshop, showcasing his unique approach to fiddle playing and old-time music.

Austin is an awarded multi-instrumentalist, specialising in the fiddle, guitar, and banjo. He has been featured at the Country Music Hall of Fame and has performed at festivals and workshops throughout the United States and Europe. In addition to being a highly accomplished musician, Austin is also a skilled luthier who often performs with instruments of his own design and making. Austin was part of the inaugural class of the 2017 Tennessee Arts Commission Apprenticeship programme, where he studied violin making under Charles Horner. He won the 2019 Traditional Grand Masters Fiddle Competition in Nashville, Tennessee, and performed on the Grand Ole Opry.

© Richard Hawkins