I have seen the future of acoustic music…

By Mike Buchman

I have seen the future of acoustic music and it is bright. Boys and girls, barely tweens to late teens, with shiny smiles, braces, a touch of acne and a predilection for playing well beyond their years on clawhammer banjo, fiddle and other string band instruments. They were sitting on the floor at the foot of the Grand Ballroom mainstage at Wintergrass 2010 as Saturday slipped into Sunday, watching a few of their beloved mentors, Mike Marshall and Darol Anger jamming with the Swedish superstars Väsen. They were bouncing in a nascent line dance and swinging their young brothers and sisters while belting out the lyrics to Ramblin’ Jack’s Railroad Bill at the raucous set of the youth movement’s senior citizens, Boston-based string band Crooked Still.

They are pre-pubescent veterans of Wintergrass Academy and similar education efforts at festivals all around the country, a new generation trained by superstars who are themselves still in their late teens and early 20’s, and they are ready to take over the world, God love 'em! They are making music with neither definition nor boundary, gleefully mashing Lester’s G-runs with world beats and trad sounds from around the globe.

Take for example Tatiana Hargreaves, a 14-year old sprite from Corvallis, OR, who joined Crooked Still for a song during their afternoon set Saturday. She’s the younger sister of Alex Hargreaves, the 19-year old fiddle phenom who recently released an album featuring the omni-present Mike Marshall and was featured this Wintergrass in the band of 18-year old Sarah Jarosz. More about them in a second.

In one song it was Tatiana who embodied the riches to come in acoustic string band music. Jamming twin fiddles with the other worldly 20-something Brittany Haas, and standing next to 5-time national Old Time Fiddle Champion Tristan Clarridge who holds down the cello chair in Crooked Still, Tatiana stole the ears and hearts away from her slightly older peers, yes peers, then walked off the stage to warm hugs from the Still.

Wintergrass is a now legendary gathering of the tribe, and the tribe is