The Floyd Radio Show

The Floyd Radio Show
November 2 @ 7:30 pm | $12.00
Join us for The Floyd Radio Show on Saturday, November 2, 2019 at 7:30 pm. The Floyd Radio Show celebrates American roots music through various musical guests, comedy skits and jokes, stories, jingles and more. This month’s guests include string band Five Mile Mountain Road, renowned acoustic blues guitarist, singer and songwriter Scott Ainslie and folk trio After Jack. Tickets are $12 in advance, $15 day of show.

Five Mile Mountain Road

Five Mile Mountain Road brings you old-time music with a fresh approach. From the old-time sounds of Charlie Poole and the fiddle music of Clark Kessinger, to first-generation Blue Grass music and original arrangements of western swing, to ragtime and jazz, Five Mile Mountain Road presents an authentic old-time experience reminiscent of the music once heard at dance halls and theaters in days gone by.

The origin of Five Mile Mountain Road came from the meeting of fiddler Billy Hurt, Jr. and guitarist Brennen Ernst while working in The Karl Shiflett and Big Country Show. Billy and Brennen immediately discovered a common love for old music, particularly old-time fiddle music, ragtime, and early jazz. Upon meeting banjoist Seth Boyd in 2015, the nucleus of Five Mile Mountain Road was formed.

Fiddlin’ Billy Hurt sets the pace with the fiddle. A journeyman old-time and blue grass fiddler from Franklin County, Virginia, Hurt is widely known as one of the finest fiddle players in the business. Brennen Ernst, a native of Lucketts, Loudoun County, Virginia, is a multi-talented instrumentalist and provides powerful lead and rhythm guitar and rousing piano playing to help shape the unique Five Mile Mountain Road sound. Franklin County native Seth Boyd comes from a well-known musical family and drives the music with his expertise on multiple styles of old-time banjo. Caleb “Duke” Erickson from Rockford, Illinois, also plays rhythm guitar, along with Travis-style and flat-picking lead guitar. J. C. Radford, also a Franklin County native, is an accomplished bass player and writer of the band’s theme song “Five Mile Mountain Road”. All the members of the band contribute vocals and also write original material that help make up the band’s repertoire.

The band records for the Patuxent label. Five Mile Mountain Road preserves old-time music and pays homage to their heroes, while still adding their unique perspective.

Scott Ainslie

Scott Ainslie’s mother found him at the family piano picking out melodies from the records she listened to during the day when he was three years old. He’s been a musician all his life.

A Phi Beta Kappa and honors graduate of Washington & Lee University, Ainslie came of age during the Civil Rights era, and cultivated a powerful affinity for cross-cultural exchange. He has studied with elder musicians on both sides of the color line – in the Old-Time Southern Appalachian fiddle and banjo traditions, as well as Black Gospel and Blues. He plays this music with affection, authority, and power.

Armed with a variety of instruments – vintage guitars, a fretless gourd banjo, a one-string, homemade diddley bow (aka cigar box guitar) and carefully chosen historical personal anecdotes of his encounters with senior musicians across the South – Ainslie brings the history, roots music, and sounds of America alive.

Ainslie has spent more than 30 years looking for the right story, the right set of facts, the right piece of history, to introduce a song. He offers a personality, a moment in history, a vignette to entice you into a song and to give that song a chance to wake and breathe among us like a living thing.

On stage, in educational teaching concerts, workshops, and school residencies, Ainslie explores the African and European roots of American music and culture. His easy, conversational way with audiences and cross-disciplinary approach to the music consistently garners rave reviews from presenters, audiences, students, and teachers, alike. He is a masterful and thoughtful historian, storyteller, and musician.

Ainslie transcribed the original recordings and published a book on Delta blues legend Robert Johnson [Robert Johnson/At The Crossroads (Hal Leonard, 1992)], and has an instructional DVD on Johnson’s guitar work [Robert Johnson’s Guitar Techniques (Hal Leonard, 1997)].

Ainslie has six solo CDs to his name and maintains an active recording, performing, and teaching schedule that carries him around the country, to Canada, and to Europe.

His most recent recording is an award-winning collection of songs played on a 1934 Gibson archtop, “The Last Shot Got Him.” The CD has received strong reviews from listeners and critics, alike, and among other honors, was chosen as the Album of the Year (a Tammie Award from the Times-Argus, Montpelier, VT).

Ainslie has received numerous awards and grants for his work documenting and presenting traditional music. He has been a Public Fellow at UNC-Chapel Hill, and received grants from the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA, a federal agency in Washington DC) and the Folklife Section of the North Carolina Arts Council.

A leader in both the North Carolina and the Virginia Visiting Artist Programs, Ainslie served the citizens of these states in rural community college-based residencies from 1986 through 2000.

As a traditional musician with expertise in Piedmont and Delta Blues as well as Southern Appalachian fiddle and banjo traditions, Ainslie has specialized in performing and presenting programs on the European and African roots of American music and culture in community and educational settings. His performances present a wonderful palette of sounds and stories that will delight the ear, awaken the mind, and satisfy the heart.

After Jack

After Jack is an all-female “hot folk” vocal trio from Virginia’s Blue Ridge Mountains. With infectious energy and vivid lyrics, the group’s sound is equal parts old-time square dance, gospel revival and feminist celebration. Original members Emily and Rachel Blankenship-Tucker met while working as actors in a professional theatre company. The couple has been making music together as After Jack since 2011. In 2019, they welcomed Catherine Backus, the trio’s newest member, who adds her own powerhouse songwriting and musicianship.