Sierra Hull: Mandolin DVD

Published by Brance on February 18th, 2010
Filed under CD and DVD releases
Tags: AcuTab, mandolin

Set to be released in March of 2010, the new Sierra Hull DVD, Secrets Songs & Tunes, is now available only through AcuTab Publications and directly from Sierra herself.

The project is a 2 disc instructional DVD set featuring instruction from one of bluegrass music’s brightest young stars. Sierra teaches the mandolin solos from her CD Secrets, as well as a few instrumental tunes she had previously recorded.

From the back cover of the DVD:

Sierra teaches these songs carefully and in great detail. She and John discuss each solo before it is demonstrated by an all-star band, and then she breaks it down, piece-by-piece. Even though a few of the solos are fairly difficult, the way she teaches puts them within the reach of most pickers.

Even at this relatively young age (we filmed 2 years ago and Sierra was only 16 at the time), Sierra proved to be a professional in the studio. Shooting this project was easy, due in large part to Sierra’s preparedness coming into the studio. She knew the material and went through it easily. Editing was made easy because, well…she just doesn’t make mistakes!

Here’s the trailer we put together for the finished product. Remember, the two disc set includes 4 hours of instruction!

Jim Van Cleve Fiddle DVD

Published by Brance on September 19th, 2009
Filed under CD and DVD releases
Tags: AcuTab, fiddle, Jim Van Cleve

Recently finished and just released, the new 2 disc fiddle instructional DVD from AcuTab Publications, Jim Van Cleve: become a more complete fiddler.

This two DVD set includes some great material on learning to find the melody in any key, transpose to another key, finding your place in the band, etc. And of course, Jim teaches several of his acrobatic tunes!

Shooting this DVD was a lot of fun, and we edited two trailers for it. One is completely serious and intended to show you what’s on the DVDs, the other was just for fun and gives you a brief glimpse behind the scenes at the fun we had in the studio.

The product is available from AcuTab for $50.

First, the real trailer.

Now the fun trailer!

New Site for Huber Banjos

Published by Brance on August 21st, 2009
Filed under Studio News

In colaboration with John Lawless at AcuTab, we recently went live with a brand new website for banjo manufacturer, Steve Huber. We spent a lot of time in development, and we’re very pleased with the results of our labor. The site got a complete redesign from the ground up and now includes a fully functional online store.

Go give the site a look and if you’re a banjo player you just might find Steve has something you “need”!

Live at Peaceful Bend

Published by Brance on February 17th, 2009
Filed under CD and DVD releases
Tags: guitar

Robin Kessinger, Robert Shafer & Mark Cosgrove: Live at Peaceful Bend was released back in the fall (of 2008), and I just never got around to blogging about it.

The DVD features a live performance by three guitarists who have all won the prestigious National Flatpicking Championship in Winfield, KS.

Robin Kessinger, Mark Cosgrove, and Robert Shafer combine their talents on 13 tunes, some traditional, some original. Here’s the press from the product page at FlatpickingMercantile.com.

The National Flatpicking Guitar Championship, held each September since 1972 in Winfield, Kansas, is the most prestigious flatpicking event in the country. Every person who has won this event is a master guitarist of the highest order. In this concert performance DVD, filmed at the Peaceful Bend Americana Music Festival in Steelville, MO, Flatpicking Guitar Magazine and SimpleFolk Productions present three of the National Flatpicking Guitar Championship’s most respected past champions: Robin Kessinger (1985 champ), Mark Cosgrove (1995 champ), and Robert Shafer (1983 and 2000 champ).

In this concert, these three masters of the acoustic guitar perform as a trio, and in different duo configurations. While the National Champions, in general, are known for their skills at flatpicking fiddle tunes, these three display their virtuosity and versatility in this concert by providing a variety of guitar instrumentals ranging from fast fiddle tunes, to slow waltzes, and tunes that highlight other various rhythms and styles from their vast repertoire. Guitar players will appreciate the left and right hand close-ups that are prevalent throughout this DVD.

There are a total of 13 tunes presented on this DVD:

Forked Deer
The Third Eyebrow
When You and I Were Young Maggie
Dorothy’s Waltz
Round Island
Angeline the Baker
Turkey in the Straw
Jerry in Jamaica
Good Morning Isaac
Sweet Bunch of Daisies
Sally Goodin’
Daley’s Reel
and Bill Cheathum

Included on the disc is a slideshow of photos taken over the course of the weekend, covering both the concert and the workshops and jams. You can purchase the DVD from Flatpicking Mercantile.

Here’s the trailer for the DVD.

Ron Block DVD

Published by Brance on November 24th, 2008
Filed under CD and DVD releases
Tags: AcuTab, banjo

Just today we finished editing the new AcuTab DVD featuring Ron Block. The DVD is titled Ron Block – A Fresh Look At Bluegrass Banjo, and is available for purchase from AcuTab’s online store.

Shooting this DVD was a lot of fun. Ron is a great player, and a great person. He is very detail oriented and his DVD ended up being so long we had to decide between cutting out a bunch of stuff, or making it a two disc set. The discussion and material were so good we just couldn’t bring ourselves to cut much out, so we ended up with a two disc set that runs just over 3.5 hours in total length.

It includes nearly an hour of discussion between Ron and AcuTab’s John Lawless. Topics covered in the discussion include Ron’s background, influences, practice routine and tips, Ron’s unique take on positions and scales for banjo, dynamics, bends, tone and setup.

Following the discussion is 2.5 hours of Ron teaching, in detail, his breaks to seven songs from the Alison Krauss & Union Station repertoire.

To give you a taste of what it looks like, we put together this 5 minute trailer for the DVD set.

Adora Productions

Published by Brance on October 6th, 2008
Filed under Studio News

Last year, my wife and I formed of a sister company to Clear Blue Productions. Adora Productions is a wedding movie production service. We’re based here in Pulaski of course, but we anticipate much of our work will be done in both Roanoke and the Christiansburg/Blacksburg areas of Virginia. We are willing to travel to further locations, but additional travel expenses will be applied beyond the normal pricing.

We plan to do only a limited number of wedding movies each year so as to not interfere with the production schedule here at the studio.

Our goal is produce wedding documentaries. This means we will focus on being unobtrusive and documenting what happens during the wedding day. This will include all the big things you expect to see in a wedding video, but might also include little moments we capture that the couple might never have seen otherwise.

We will be delivering the finished product on DVD of course, but also offering and iPod ready version for those that so desire.

We produced a number of wedding movies this summer and will soon begin booking for next year. You can view trailers of the completed wedding movies in our gallery.

We’re excited about working together on this new venture. Please visit Adora Productions and pass it along to anyone you know who might be interested.

New DVDs coming

Published by Brance on October 6th, 2008
Filed under Studio News

We’ve been hard at work and have a number of new DVD releases in the works. Soon to be released is a new flatpicking DVD featuring three Winfield winners, a Ron Block banjo DVD from AcuTab, a Jim VanCleve fiddle DVD from AcuTab, a Sierra Hull mandolin DVD from AcuTab, and another Ron Stuart fiddle DVD from AcuTab.

We also have plans to film a couple more great things before the end of the year.

I’ll post about each of these projects as they are released in the coming couple of months.

Live at the Station Inn

Published by Brance on May 30th, 2008
Filed under CD and DVD releases
Tags: Andy Falco, Chris Eldridge, guitar, Josh Williams

Here’s a video clip from a project I completed last year, but never posted any footage of.

This was a live concert event with Josh Williams, Chris Eldridge, and Andy Falco. The DVD is available from Flatpicking Mercantile.

Here are the guys performing the fiddle tune, Cherokee Shuffle.

Bill Evans: The Banjo In America

Published by Brance on March 24th, 2008
Filed under Studio News
Tags: banjo

I produced a series of video clips for banjo player Bill Evans recently. The clips aren’t instructional in nature, they are simple performance pieces. But Bill’s not necessarily playing the banjo in each one.

Bill has been conducting a tour for some time now called The Banjo in America. During the course of a concert on this tour, Bill plays a variety of different instruments which are historical predecessors to the modern 5-string banjo.

For more information about The Banjo in America, read this blog post I published over at The Bluegrass Blog.

Here is one of the clips. In this one, Bill is playing an African Akonting. Pretty cool sound!

Be sure to visit Bill’s YouTube channel to see the other videos. There are six in total, including two he plays on his 1937 Gibson flathead -75.

Get To Know Your Acoustic Guitar

Published by Brance on March 19th, 2008
Filed under CD and DVD releases
Tags: AcuTab, guitar

Not long ago we finished up the latest AcuTab release, Get To Know Your Acoustic Guitar. This DVD is an exploration of the care and maintenance of an acoustic, steel-stringed guitar. The on-screen personality is renowned guitar builder and repair specialist, Marty Lanham.

Marty is extremely knowledgeable about what makes a guitar work. And on this DVD he explains a lot of the physics behind the guitar and lets you, the owner, know how to care for your guitar, when to have it serviced by a professional, and what to look for when purchasing a new guitar.

We traveled to Nashville and recorded this in Marty’s repair shop. He had a number of vintage Martins and other guitars on hand to use as demonstrations during the presentation. If you are into the guitar, you’ll want this DVD. It’s available from AcuTab.com for $35.