Long Journey Home Album Release

The long-awaited release of John McCutcheon’s tribute to the 1925 Fiddler’s Convention is coming up this weekend!

The album Old Time Music at Clarence Ashley’s is what inspired John to drop out of college and become a banjo player! And this year in a tribute to the 1925 Fiddler’s Convention, John has brought together some of the finest fiddlers in the country to record an album, aptly named Long Journey Home: A Century After the 1925 Mountain City Fiddler’s Convention. Molly Tuttle, Old Crow Medicine Show, Tim O’Brien, Becky Buller, the Kody Norris Show, Sparky Rucker and many more are featured on this album. Proceeds from sales benefit the Center for the Arts.

John will be with us for a concert at Heritage Hall on Saturday night as part of the Musical Heritage Tour. Get your tickets now! 

Singer, songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist John McCutcheon has been at the forefront of American folk music since the late ’70s, covering a wide variety of traditions including Appalachian dulcimer and fiddle music, topical protest songs, and children’s albums for respected folk labels like June Appal, Red House, and Rounder Records. Establishing himself as a master of the hammered dulcimer on the groundbreaking 1977 release The Wind That Shakes the Barley, the Wisconsin native moved into making children’s music in the early ’80s with albums like Howjadoo and Mail Myself to You. Proficient on numerous instruments including the hammered and mountain dulcimer, fiddle, guitar, banjo, and jaw harp, McCutcheon has also performed widely as a storyteller, written several books, worked as a social and labor activist, and produced albums for other artists such as Holly Near, making him somewhat of a renaissance man. He has remained prolific well into the 21st century, both on-stage and in the studio, releasing thoughtful, finely crafted albums like the 2006 literary project Mightier Than the Sword and 2013’s diverse 22 Days, a collaboration with Bosnian cellist Vedran Smailovic.