Albert Lea Journal Features, Events, Opinion and Reviews

By Jeshua Erickson, Managing Editor

If you’re a fan of good bluegrass music or at least curious about the bluegrass experience, SPBGMA’s (The Society for the Preservation of Bluegrass of America) 8th Annual Fall Bluegrass Weekend, look no further than Albert Lea’s Freeborn County Fairgrounds this September 23-25. (MAP)

SPGBMA expects as many as five hundred attendees this year, many of whom make the trip to the fairgrounds from Wisconsin and Northern Iowa, bringing their campers and motor homes to stay for the weekend.

Endless hours go into bringing SPBGMA events to places like Albert Lea.

“My total time: it’s 26 hours a day; it’s on-going — every day almost, we have three thousand members and we put out a publication, festival guide, band directories and a quarterly newsletter,” said Chuck Stearman, SPBGMA’s president.

And for anyone who’s attended a live bluegrass festival like the one SPBGMA is putting on in September, there’s no question why people like Stearman and bluegrass promoters across the country are as dedicated as he is. Traditional bluegrass harmonies and instrumentation make for a musical experience unlike any other.

SPBGMA’s taken some risks in order to provide high quality traditional bluegrass music year after year.

“Basically, what we’ve set out to do as a preservation type society is to maintain traditional instrumentation. We don’t allow any electric instruments,” said Stearman.

In SPBGMA’s international band competitions, held in Nashville every year, they limit it to the six basic instruments known to bluegrass: bass fiddle (upright bass), five-stringed banjo, mandolin, guitar, fiddle (violin), and Dobro (resonator guitar).

“We’ve stuck to it; we got a lot of criticism early on, especially with the electric bass,” said Stearman.

At one time, there was a significant number of bands wanting to use the electric bass, said Stearman, but because organizations like SPBGMA have consistently requested only bands who use traditional instrumentation, many bluegrass groups started using the bass fiddle instead of the electric bass.

“There are very few groups using electric bass any more,” he explained.

In addition to instrumentation and harmonies, many early traditional bluegrass bands were also ‘family bands’.

“Right now there’s just an explosion of families wantin’ to get into bluegrass,” said Stearman. “It’s one of the greatest things that families can do together.”

There are are at least two gifted musical families coming to Albert Lea this fall.

“The Anderson’s [pictured right] and then the Bistodeau family, you really want to take note of those two family groups,” said Stearman.

Other notable groups at the festival include the following: String Fever, The McPunk Brothers, Bob & Sheila Everhart, Bluegrass Addiction, and Drive Time.