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2010 Fall Concert:
Fall Fusion 2010
Friday, October 15, 7:30 pm
pre-concert talk with at 7:00 pm
Weis Center for the Performing Arts
Bucknell University, Lewisburg
This season is very exciting, starting with our kick-off
concert, Fall Fusion 2010! introduces yet another cutting-edge performance.
Guest Artists:
- more info below
Concert Sponsor: Woodcock Foundation for the
Appreciation of the Arts, Inc.
Conductor Underwriters: Robert & Patricia Goulstone; William & Lois VandenHeuvel
Monroe Crossing Underwriter: Maue Health, Inc. – Frederick R. Maue, M.D.
Our Fall Fusion concert features American folk-songs performed by the Chorale, including Shenandoah, Down by the Riverside, and other traditional favorites. This event will also include a set of classic bluegrass, bluegrass gospel and heartfelt originals performed by our special guests, Monroe Crossing. Lastly—The World Beloved: A Bluegrass Mass—is a collaboration of bluegrass and choir, made far more dramatic by first hearing the two ensembles separately. The composer, Carol Barnett, hopes our audience will discover something new and wonderful in the combination, as she has.
…from COMPOSER CAROL BARNETT
 “My highest hope is that listeners coming from one tradition—classical or bluegrass—and perhaps dubious about the other, might discover something new and wonderful in the combination, as I have. Composing the music for The World Beloved has given me the chance to write cheery sacred music. It’s brought me back to memories of music heard while visiting my grandparents: country music with a church flavor that told stories and came out of a scratchy old record player. Grandma would not have allowed dancing, but under the table I tapped my toes.”
To read more from this composer:
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MONROE CROSSING
Named in honor of Bill Monroe, “The Father of Bluegrass,” MONROE CROSSING plays an upbeat blend of classic and traditional bluegrass, bluegrass gospel and heartfelt originals, playing at major venues & festivals across the country.
Always a crowd pleaser, Monroe Crossing is known for its dynamic stage show and for the warmth it shares on and off stage—interacting with one another and the audience. The only bluegrass band EVER nominated as “Artist of the Year” (2004) by the Minnesota Music Academy, Monroe Crossing won the MMA’s “Bluegrass Album of the Year” award in 2003. The group also took home awards for Best Female Vocalist, Guitar, Mandolin and Banjo at the Minnesota Bluegrass and Old-Time Music Association’s 25th Anniversary Awards Banquet.
Called “The Midwest’s Premier Bluegrass & Gospel Quintet,” they were an International Bluegrass Music Association Showcase Band at the 2007 World of Bluegrass Convention in Nashville, and were inducted into the Minnesota Music Hall of Fame on November 2, 2007. Their eighth CD “Live From Silver Dollar City” was released in December.
“I dare ANYONE to watch Monroe Crossing and not get happy!”
– D.A.Callaway, Silver Dollar City
 ART BLACKBURN
Guitar, Vocals and Songwriting
Called “a font of creative flatpicking for decades” by Inside Bluegrass magazine,
Art brings to the band more than 30 years of experience and a true love for the roots of Bluegrass music.
As band leader of Art & Sandi’s Pretty Good Band, Big Skyota, and The Pretty Good Bluegrass Band, Art brought together some of the finest musicians in the region and has entertained thousands across the Midwest. The winner of the Minnesota Bluegrass & Old-Time Music Association’s Bluegrass Guitar Player of the Year Award in 2000, it was his creative persistence that was the genesis of Monroe Crossing.
Today, Art’s powerful voice, exquisite flatpicking and thoughtful songwriting lend a fresh originality to the tradition upon which the band is founded.
 LISA FUGLIE
Fiddle, Mandolin, Guitar, Vocals and Songwriting
Originally from Nigeria, Lisa learned mandolin from an old Bill Monroe 78rpm record. Though that old record is long gone, its spirit of Bluegrass remains. Mix in her international background, and Lisa’s performances are truly a cross-continental and cross-cultural experience!
Excelling on all the stringed instruments, she plays fiddle, mandolin and guitar with Monroe Crossing. A stellar vocalist, she is also a prolific songwriter, solo performer, studio musician, and educator who has performed with such notables as The Hers, the Outskirts, and the Deadly Nightshade Family Singers.
She received the Folk Arts Apprenticeship Grant from the Minnesota State Arts Board to study fiddle with Minnesota legend Bill Hinkley, and was the recipient of the 2000 Female Vocalist of the Year Award from the Minnesota Bluegrass & Old-Time Music Association. Lisa plays with the drive and intensity that defines Bluegrass fiddle, but listen closely and you will hear a world of experience.
 BENJI FLAMING
Banjo
From Minneapolis, the band’s youngest and newest member is the returning charter member, Benji Flaming. Benji started playing banjo at age 10, having spent the previous two years composing and playing “new age”/electronic music on his family’s electronic keyboard. Two years later, he released his first recording, consisting mainly of Christmas carols arranged for solo banjo.
As an original member, he engineered and played on the band’s critically-acclaimed debut CD, “Across The Blue Mountains.” A multi-instrumentalist, he recently produced a collection of alternative rock songs reinterpreted as bluegrass music for the “Tribute Sounds” label, on which he played banjo, guitar, dobro, and bass, showcasing his arrangement and engineering skills.
Benji has been featured at the International Bluegrass Music Association’s annual FanFest, made multiple appearances on their “Masters Workshop” stage, and in 2000, was voted “Banjo Player of the Year” by the Minnesota Bluegrass and Old-Time Music Association. His love for music is obvious by the drive and energy of his unique banjo stylings.
 MARK ANDERSON
Bass and Vocals
Mark came to Bluegrass after twenty years of playing bass and drums in a series of “alternative” groups. In 1995, friends suggested he get a string bass and bring his alternative zeal to the Bluegrass community. He quickly realized he’d found a musical home and joined Art Blackburn in Art & Sandi’s Pretty Good Band, and later, The Pretty Good Bluegrass Band.
Mark is acknowledged as one of the Midwest’s elite Bluegrass bass players. In fact, he was nominated by the Minnesota Bluegrass & Old-Time Music Association as 2000 Bassist of the Year in both the Bluegrass and the Related Music categories! No matter the style or venue, Mark’s earthy drive is unmistakably his own and is sure to set the feet tapping.
 MATT THOMPSON
Mandolin, Fiddle and Vocals
After a chance encounter with a Bill Monroe record, a young Matt Thompson
instantly fell in love with this incredible sound and proceeded to order one Monroe record after another. Mandolin became Matt’s instrument of choice, and Bluegrass a huge part of his life.
Within two years his initial group, The Bluegrass Connection, won First Place at the 1982 Minnesota State Fair talent contest. Later bands included River Basin Bluegrass, Inside Track, and Big Skyota with Art Blackburn. In 1997, he co-founded True Blue and performed on Garrison Keillor’s “A Prairie Home Companion.”
A superb singer, arranger and the band’s MC, Matt also plays twin fiddle for Monroe Crossing. And he received the Minnesota Bluegrass & Old-Time Music Association’s Bluegrass Mandolin Player of the Year Award in 2000. Now that Matt has returned to his traditional roots with Monroe Crossing, you’ll hear his heart and soul in every note.
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Coleen Renshaw, Fall Fusion Pianist
Coleen holds a Music Education degree from Susquehanna University with graduate work in Vocal Performance at Penn State University. She taught music at the Midd West School District for 35 years and has directed countless choirs, plays and musicals. Today, she’s a vital asset to SVC as an outstanding soprano and a rehearsal accompanist. Coleen is the church organist of Emmanuel Lutheran Church in Middleburg and also has a private voice studio.
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