Peter Feldmann, Richard Greene, Joti Rockwell

"Exploring the elegance of old-time music"

Peter Feldmann: Peter: A singer and multi-instrumentalist with extensive experience throughout California and the West, Peter Feldmann has been presenting bluegrass, folk, string band, and related musics since the early 1960s. Besides actively performing bluegrass and old time music with a variety of groups, he is also known as a bluegrass historian, collector, music consultant, teacher, and producer, both of live concerts and radio/tv programs throughout the area. He is the founder of the Santa Barbara Old Time Fiddler's Convention and the original Bluebird Café in Santa Barbara, a music club highly influential on the Southern California music scene. His tribute CD to Uncle Dave Macon, Grey Cat On the Tennessee Farm, was named to the nation's Top Ten Bluegrass albums of 2005 by the Chicago Tribune, and he is the 2008 recipient of the "Music Legend" award by the Topanga Banjo/Fiddle Association.

Richard Greene: referred to by Bluegrass Unlimited as "one of America's most influential fiddlers" and "one of the giants of modern fiddling," first attained prominence with Bill Monroe and the Blue Grass Boys in 1966 as one of Monroe's first "northern" band members. He then went on to found the folk-rock group Seatrain, pioneering the first use of the electric violin in rock music. His return to acoustic music and collaboration with David Grisman in the early 1970s occasioned the invention of "New Grass" or "New Acoustic" instrumental music, which is now a mainstay throughout the world's acoustic music festivals. As one of Los Angeles's premier string session players (having performed with Dolly Parton, Brian Wilson, James Taylor, Rod Stewart, Bruce Springsteen, and Sting, among others), he founded the pathbreaking jazz-folk-rock-chamber group the Greene String Quartet, and his multiple "Grass is Greener" recordings feature him leading groups that include the most accomplished musicians in the bluegrass world. He is also active as a composer, arranger, transcriber, and teacher, having given workshops and master classes both across the United States and abroad, and he is the 2009 recipient of the "Music Legend" award by the Topanga Banjo/Fiddle Association. He has received a Grammy Award for Best Instrumental Performance of the Year and multiple IBMA (International Bluegrass Music Association) awards, and his 1997 solo album "Sales Tax Toddle" is a Grammy nominee for Bluegrass Album of Year.

Joti Rockwell is an Assistant Professor of Music, having joined the Pomona College faculty in Fall of 2007. He has taught courses in music theory, American popular music, and music and natural order, and he has presented and published research in the areas of American music, mathematical music theory, popular music, rhythm and meter, genre, and analysis. His Ph.D. from the University of Chicago featured a dissertation examining the sonic and discursive foundations of bluegrass music, and prior to his graduate work, he performed full-time as one half of the acoustic duo Rockwell Church, touring extensively across the United States and recording five albums, one of which was for the notable Nashville label Compass Records. He remains an active performer of roots music, bluegrass, and contemporary concert music on the acoustic guitar and mandolin, and he also performs in Pomona's Balinese gamelan.

Video: The Travelin' Blues, from a concert at Pomona College.