CD-250 "The Patuxent Banjo Project"

During and immediately afterWorldWar II, tens of thousands of rural folks relocated from the Appalachian and Piedmont regions of southwest Virginia,West Virginia, the western Carolinas, and east Tennessee to the greater Washington-Baltimore area bringing their cultural preferences and sometimes talents as well. The main  attractions came from expanding employment opportunities in the building, manufacturing, and service trades.

Those with musical ability could find supplemental and part-time jobs on the flourishing club scene. Country music parks such as New River Ranch and Sunset Park were not all that far away and within driving distance of not only the D. C.-Baltimore region but also greater Philadelphia. Musical prowess could also be displayed at the talent contests in Warrenton, Virginia or journey southward to the Old Dominion Barn Dance in Richmond. Local deejay Don Owens stimulated interest in bluegrass music by encouraging local musicians to visit recording studios. The most fortunate of these forged successful part-time, and for a few, full-time careers. This monumental project is designed by coproducers Mark Delaney & Randy Barrett—noted players in their own right—to highlight the impressive banjo work exemplified by these forty banjo pickers who took part in making the Greater Washington-Baltimore area one of the major regional concentrations of bluegrass music in America. It achieves the goal that the producers and TomMindte set out to accomplish. In so doing, this constitutes a major sound document in the history of a major musical genre.

Ivan Tribe