Forthcoming book on the Old-Time Fiddler and Banjoer, Kerry Blech

Hello, Fiddle Hangout Citizens.

I have just submitted a book length manuscript on the fiddler, Kerry Blech, to my publisher – McFarland of North Carolina. 

After I finished a book on Dan Levenson, with co-author David Brooks, I decided to take a year off and read through the entire collection of Old-Time Herald – gifted to me by an old friend from northern Virginia (who was a founding member of the Arlington Banjo Lobby).

What caught my attention were the reviews by Kerry Blech – and, to tell the truth, Gail Gillespie, Art Rosenbaum, and one or two others. 

Kerry’s devotion to the elder fiddlers struck me as notable and worth digging into.  Not long into reading through the Old-Time Herald magazine, beginning with their first issue in 1987, I decided it would be worth a book. 

I began working on a writing project about Kerry’s creative trajectory through the old-time music community that focuses on Kerry’s:

14.  Field Recording work, his archiving of cassettes he made (and collected) of elder fiddlers

14. Efforts to compile the histories, and convey the stories, of tunes that were played in remote contexts by rarely known local fiddlers

14. 22 years’ worth of record and CD and video reviews Kerry penned for the Old-Time Herald

14. Involvement in a project in the early 2000s focused on harvesting the field recordings of the Hammonses from West Virginia made by Dwight Diller and by Wayne Howard with the goal of turning those reel-to-reel tapes into CDs

14. Chat group activism, from the early 1990s through the first decade and a half of the 21^st century, as an avid contributor to several old-time music chat groups and online platforms

The manuscript will probably see the light of day as a book by the end of this year.  Until then, I’ll try to whet your appetite for a book on Kerry Blech.

Thanks for your attention.  Have a great day, and make great music.

V/R,

Lew Stern

Durham, NC

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