Two talented acts have just been added to the spectacular lineup that is the 23rd Annual Targhee Bluegrass Festival – Danny Barnes and Mike Marshall’s Big Trio.

Danny Barnes review by Rolling Stone Magazine: Texas country rocker Danny Barnes likes to do wild things with his banjo — check out the explosive picking on his old band the Bad Livers’ turbocharged hillbilly version of Iggy Pop’s “Lust for Life.” Barnes’ seventh solo album, Pizza Box, is a collection of banjo-based songs set against big rock (“Road”), Memphis-style horns (“Sparta, TN”), barnstorming juke-joint blues (“Misty Swan”) and even a shuffling, hip-hop-style beat (“Sleep”). Barnes is a clever lyricist with a punk-rock past who understands the raw simplicity of a good country tune: The album’s title track is a wistful ballad in which Barnes confesses in his sweet, vulnerable Texas drawl, “Basically it’s so elemental/Us Southern boys are sentimental.” Enough said.

Mike Marshall’s Big Trio Bio: Once again, acoustic statesman Mike Marshall presents us with his newest incarnation of instrumental wizardry. This time, he’s tapping into the next generation of up-and-coming string virtuosos – 16 year old Alex Hargreaves and bassist Paul Kowert. Mike spent the past year creating a body of music specifically for this group, writing with its members’ unique talents in mind.  The astounding abilities of the Trio’s young musicians, whose minds are open to so many musical styles, allowed Mike to compose with complete freedom – incorporating his love of traditional American roots musics and combining these musical influences with Western classical music, Latin, Indian, and free improvisation. Together, the Trio has created its own unique New Acoustic American instrumental music that will point the way for generations to come.

The eclectic string strokers dubbed “the most important folk group to emerge from Boston since the early 60′s,”  Crooked Still have confirmed for the 23rd Annual Bluegrass Festival.

Pulled straight off their website:

Their relentless touring schedule neatly mirrors their ongoing journey through the winding corridors of traditional American song. With circumstance removing nearly every distraction, the quintet of DiMario, cellist Tristan Clarridge, banjoist Gregory Liszt, fiddler Brittany Haas and O’Donovan honed in on their unique refraction of roots music, recording their most personal, visionary album yet: Some Strange Country.

“The music is not just ‘alternative bluegrass’ or whatever people used to call it,” Haas remarks. “It’s at another level now: artful, but still grounded that funky, string band thing.”

Check out a song sampling on their myspace page.

Well it’s snowing (hard) outside our offices at the base of Targhee today – a shock to the system  after two days of spectacular spring weather.  So it goes in Wydaho in the off-season.  With just a few months break between busy summer and winter seasons the valley is pretty quiet, but The Knotty Pine Supper Club in Victor is throwing one last live music hurrah . . .

On Tuesday, April 27 Jamaican reggae artists Wailing Souls W/Prezident Brown will perform at 10 pm.  Tickets are $20 in advance and $22 at the door.

Nothing like a little live reggae to help us indulge our inner beach-seekers . . . even with fresh snow on the ground!

After an internal discussion, and reaching out to the participating bands, we are going to move forward without additional controls (like requiring your email address) on the voting process.  We will continue to monitor the voting on the back end to ban illegitimate voters and remove their votes from the total count.

So if the voting fluctuates a bit in the next few weeks, that’s why.

We’ve gone in and cleaned the current tally of those illegitimate votes – the new and current band standings are on the right.

Voting will end May 15.  Remember to vote just once per computer.

Questions?  Thoughts?  Leave a comment below and we’ll follow up.

Yep, we noticed.

In the quest to keep the voting process simple we didn’t close all of the back-end loopholes before launching the vote.  We’ve been tracking IP addresses to keep an eye on any suspicious voting activity and, based on the current vote status, will sit down on Monday to determine how to proceed.

Stay tuned for more info on Monday.  Thanks!

It’s official, Alejandro Excovedo has agreed to play in the Saturday night lineup of amazing artists for this year’s Targhee Fest! Escovedo was a founding member of the pioneering San Francisco-based punk band The Nuns in the mid-70’s.

He has since been on a solo career gaining quick attention from the media, appearing in several high-profile publications including Rolling Stone, Vanity Fair, The New York Times, USA Today, PASTE, HARP and Entertainment Weekly. He has also appeared on Conan O’Brian, The Today Show, The Tonight Show and performed at the Democratic National Convention in Denver.

As artists like this continue to join the ranks of an already stellar list of bands, it’s hard not to get excited for Targhee Fest. The stokage meter continues to rise and the wait seems longer and longer, but fear not. Your favorite local music scene site provides appeasement:

Equal Eyes is supposed to be playing the Trap for closing weekend at Grand Targhee, but the season has been extended due to all the rad powder they’ve been getting! In case you haven’t heard, Targhee recently had some of the most epic powder days of the season! A couple days ago, the powder was light, fluffy and consistently knee – thigh deep. Riding a couple days ago was like floating on a cloud all the way down the mountain! I digress…

Anyway, Equal Eyes is still on the schedule to play this weekend, with the added bonus of looking forward to the next week of hikeless skiing (unless you’re planning on going up mary’s)! So come party at the Trap tomorrow at 8:30PM and pray to the snow God’s they give us another amazing week of powder.

Also, if you happen to be one of those lucky people who can actually make the music the rest of us listen to, you have a couple more days to sign up and get your big break! The Battle of the Bands Sign up period is almost over.

After sign-ups, the Targhee music team will select the top 20 bands to be listed on a special page where you and your friends can vote for the top 5 bands! These lucky bands will compete at a Battle of the Bands Competition at the Spud Drive-in Saturday, June 5. The winner of the Spud throw down will be selected to open Targhee Fest 2010! Not to mention the top five bands competing at the spud will be paid $250 and the band that opens Targhee Fest will be paid $500! Pretty good considering all you have to do is sign up and play some music.

Starting today you can enter to win a full weekend’s lodging with tickets to Targhee Fest included! Don’t fret if you’re not the lucky grand prize winner, an additional 99 registrants will win a chance to purchase their Targhee Fest weekend tickets at $99! Which is about $40 less than the regular price. The drawing ends Wednesday, April 14th and regular priced Targhee Fest Tickets go on sale Thursday, April 15th!

The lineup for the 6th Annual Targhee Fest looks pretty good with Moe, Los Lobos, Michael Franti and Spearhead, Steve Kimock’s Crazy Engine, Grace Potter and the Nocturnals, Shawn Colvin and David Lindley already confirmed!

They just announced this drawing this morning, so sign up early and make sure you have your chance to win!