Claire Lynch is at the forefront of women who have pushed the bluegrass boundaries. She has garnered two Grammy nominations and recorded with artists ranging from Linda Ronstadt to Ralph Stanley. Her band includes veteran bass player and IBMA award winner Mark Schatz, Florida fiddle and mandolin champion Jason Thomas, and from the hot, new generation of players, Matt Wingate on guitar, mandolin, and dobro. This stellar ensemble delivers a personable and high energy performance including tender country ballads, hard driving bluegrass, swing, and even some Southern Appalachian clog dancing. And in the words of Dolly Parton, with whom she toured and recorded: "Claire has one of the sweetest, purest and best lead voices in the music business today."
www.clairelynch.com/

You know the name. Maybe you saw him in Deliverance, Star Trek: the Next Generation, Law & Order, RoboCop or any of more than 100 major movie and TV credits. But while acting is his day job, music is his first love. As a singer-songwriter, Ronny Cox is a study in easygoing amiability and unforced charisma. He charms crowds with self-teasing humor, tart progressive insight, and a lulling Southwestern folk sound. With seven albums under his belt he has nothing to prove, but plenty to say.
www.ronnycox.com

Sold-out tours and standing ovations give testimony to the electricity and excitement generated by these three great individual fiddle stylists. Kevin Burke (Ireland), Christian Lemaitre (Brittany) and Andre Brunet (Quebec) combine their talents, musical traditions, and spontaneous humor for an evening of dazzling energy and subtle grace. Called "three of the finest folk violinists anywhere" by The Washington Post, these traditional masters showcase their regional repertoires and together conjure an experience of breathtaking performances.
www.herschelfreemanagency.com/celtic/celtic_fiddle_festival.html

After 30 years of music-making, mostly apart, Mollie O'Brien and Rich Moore are enjoying a fresh harmonic convergence onstage. Mollie pulls the audience in with that come-on-in voice that ranges between a call-down-thunder testifying wail to an intimate bluesy whisper, to sweet jazzy trumpet-miming scat that would do Louis Armstrong proud. The normally mild-mannered Rich channels his inter emcee and emerges onstage telling tales and making quips. As a guitarist, he's not in it for the notes. He'll deliver a gourmet guitar solo - full and intense, but his musical grace lies in the delicate dance between singer an accompanist.
http://www.mollieobrien.com

Lissa Schneckenburger celebrates the release of her new CD "Dance" at an IMT Next to the House concert in Takoma Park, Md.

The traditional music of New England can be as warm and comforting as a winter fire or as potent and exhilarating as a summer thunderstorm. Fiddler and singer Lissa Schneckenburger is a master of both moods, a winsome, sweet-voiced singer who brings new life to old ballads and a skillful, dynamic fiddler who captures the driving rhythm and carefree joy of dance tunes old and new.

Recently, Lissa has been closely studying the roots of the Downeast traditional music that she first heard as a young girl. Her latest project is a pair of CDs dedicated to reintroducing some wonderful but largely forgotten songs and tunes from New England that she uncovered through archival research at the University of Maine and elsewhere. "Song", released in April 2008, contains ten timeless ballads that go back as far as the eighteenth century that she set to carefully crafted modern arrangements.

"Dance", to be released in September, will feature fiddle tunes. "There is currently a lot of focus on traditional American music from the South", she explains, "and many bands are exploring and recording that repertoire, but no one is getting to hear all the amazing traditional music from the North. This is my attempt at getting some of that music out there for people to enjoy."

Raised in a small town in Maine and now living in Vermont, Lissa grew up with music. She began playing fiddle at the age of six, inspired by her mother's interest in folk music and a family friend who was a professional violinist. Soon she was studying with influential Maine fiddler Greg Boardman and sitting in with the Maine Country Dance Orchestra. By the time she was in high school she was playing concerts on her own, specializing in the sprightly New England dance tunes that combine influences from the British Isles and Quebec with homegrown twists that have been evolving since Colonial days. Another of her major influences was the diverse musical community that she found at fiddle camps, where she had a chance to play with and learn from a wide variety of musicians including noted Scottish fiddler Alasdair Fraser. In 2001 she graduated from the New England Conservatory of Music with a degree in contemporary improvisation, and since then has been performing around the US and internationally for a growing audience of enthusiastic listeners. She has recorded eight CDs, (five solo and three with various groups).

Visit Lissa's website at http://lissafiddle.com/ or join her on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/pages/Lissa-Schneckenburger/19495378918?ref=ts.

Mike + Ruthy, the folk-rock duo formerly of The Mammals, announced the release of Million to One on July 27th, 2010. The album is the latest in a growing discography that continues to push the boundaries of the genre. The story behind the making of Million To One is as compelling as the album's songs themselves. Where most bands limit fan involvement to the occasional live show "stomp, clap and sing-along," and post-show merch table pleasantries, Mike + Ruthy took things a two-step further. They issued a massive fan-list call-out inviting the full breadth of their fanbase to help make what's being called their "folk-rock masterpiece."

Ann Mayo Muir has had a long and lustrous career as a recording artist and touring musician, most often performing with the legendary folk trio, Bok Muir & Trickett. In those years she distinguished herself as a singer, arranger and multi-instrumentalist, recording two solo albums and more than twelve critically acclaimed albums with the trio. While the fiddle has fallen away, Ann now accompanies her warm alto voice with a small Celtic harp, flute, whistle, Nyckelharpa (a traditional bowed Swedish instrument), and her beloved baritone ukulele. And she's been composing - stunning instrumental music - and quite different than what you've heard in our work together. Some pieces feel American, many have a European twist and a couple have run off with the Gypsies. Ensemble Galilei, a highly respected Celtic/Early Music Crossover group, arranged the pieces, and it is a sinuous, snappy, energetic delight of interpretation, with many shifts and surprises, happily suited to Annie's unique vision. With so many tastes and textures, this CD is a feast for the musical gourmet.
www.annmayomuir.com

A genial giant from the Dingle peninsula in County Kerry, Breanndan Begley is a well known and accomplished performer of Irish traditional music on the button accordion, touring at home and in Estonia, Finland, Sweden and France. He is a member of the 'Boys of the Lough', first touring with the band as a guest in the 1980's in the USA, and a full-time member since 1997.

Brendan's exciting dance music, sensitive emotional playing of slow airs on accordion, and his singing in his native Irish make him a great favourite. He is acclaimed in Ireland for his TV presentations of traditional music on the Irish language channel TG4.

Dublin-born fiddler Caoimhin O Raghallaigh is rapidly becoming known as one of the most interesting and creative musicians in traditional music. Since the widespread success of his 2003 'Kitty Lie Over' album with Mick O'Brien, he has performed in the United States, Canada, Alaska, Asia and all over Europe. Irish performances in 2006 included Farmleigh House, West Cork Music in Bantry, the National Concert Hall, the Kilkenny Arts Festival, Liberty Hall, and a tour for the Improvised Music Company.

His concerts have been broadcast on RTE Radio 1 and LyricFM, including a performance at the Masters of Tradition 2004 festival for West Cork Music. Recent television appearances include 'The Highland Sessions', 'The Raw Bar', 'Ceird an Cheoil', 'Se Mo Laoch' and 'Other Voices', and musicians he has recently worked with include The Waterboys, Iarla O Lionaird, Peadar O Riada, Breanndan Begley.

Visit Brendan and Caoimhin's website at http://www.stateofchassis.com/bb.

World renowned West Virginia guitarists, Robert Shafer and Robin Kessinger, are both winners of the National Flatpicking Championship. Robert has won multiple state and national guitar championships over the years, and has a Bob Thompson Signature Model guitar named after him. Robin has also won many state championships in addition to the national contest and has been featured on PBS and BBC television specials and NPR radio shows, and is on the teaching staff at Steve Kaufman's Flatpicking Camp, the Augusta Heritage Workshops and at the Allegheny Echoes Workshop. These two guitar aces join forces for an evening of unforgettable blazing guitar duets and solos.

http://www.myspace.com/robertallenshafer

Renowned for her warm, engaging stage presence, Sarah McQuaid is a versatile and beguiling performer. In addition to her own elegantly crafted originals, she interprets traditional Irish and Appalachian folk songs, Elizabethan ballads, 1930s jazz numbers, surprise covers and lively guitar instrumentals with panache and poignance.

Her deliciously earthy voice delivers a powerful emotional punch that's matched by her distinctive, eloquent guitar style. Add this to a real rapport with her audience, and you have all the ingredients of a great night out.

Sarah's first two CDs, "When Two Lovers Meet" and "I Won't Go Home 'Til Morning" were recorded in Trevor Hutchinson's Dublin studio and produced by Gerry O'Beirne. Both also guest on the album, alongside percussionist Liam Bradley, Maire Breatnach on fiddle and viola and Baltimore's Rosie Shipley on fiddle.

Sarah re-released the two albums in a double-disc package to coincide with her first US tour. The double CD became the No. 1 album, and Sarah the No. 1 artist, on the folkradio.org chart for February 2010. Now busy preparing for her upcoming tours and concerts in Ireland, the UK, Europe and the USA, Sarah is currently assembling material for her third solo album, provisionally titled "The Plum Tree And The Rose", which will once again be produced by Gerry O'Beirne with Trevor Hutchinson engineering.

Born in Spain, raised in Chicago and holding dual Irish and American citizenship, Sarah spent 13 years in Ireland and now lives near Penzance, Cornwall, in the southwest of England.

As might be expected of one who has led such a peripatetic existence, Sarah developed a taste for the road early on: From the age of twelve she was embarking on tours of the US and Canada with the Chicago Children's Choir. At eighteen she went to France for a year to study philosophy at the University of Strasbourg, where her performance at a local folk club drew a rave review in the Dernieres Nouvelles d'Alsace, saluting the "superbe chanteuse d'outre-Atlantique qui fit passer comme une vibration emotionnelle dans une salle conquise" (superb singer from across the Atlantic who caused an emotional vibration to pass through a conquered hall)!

In 1994, Sarah moved to Ireland, where she became a weekly folk music columnist for the Evening Herald and a contributor to Hot Press magazine. She is also the author of The Irish DADGAD Guitar Book, described by The Irish Times as "a godsend to aspiring traditional guitarists," and has presented workshops on the DADGAD tuning at festivals and venues around the globe.

Visit Sarah's website at http://www.sarahmcquaid.com/ and join her on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/sarahmcquaidmusic.