(Blitzen Trapper) We headed to the Revival Stage last night to catch the later half of Blitzen Trapper’s set. We watched with dropped jaws as the band rocked through songs from their latest album, American Goldwing. We were pleasantly surprised to find the band’s live renditions of these songs to be much heavier and electric [...]

Mountain Sprout rustles feathers and rouses the Waka crowd 6/1/2012 Wakarusa music Festival As the afternoon began winding down yesterday and people began heading back to their campsites to prepare for the nightly headliners, the wild bluegrass group that is Mountain Sprout took the smaller Revival stage (just across the field from our American Songwriter [...]

American Songwriter will be posting live updates from the Wakarusa music festival in Ozark, Arkansas Weir, Robinson, & Greene Acoustic Trio Wakarusa 5/31/12 After entering into the beautiful Wakarusa grounds, surrounded by Ozark Mountains of Arkansas, we quickly set up camp and made our way to the main stage just as the sun began to [...]

(Laura B. Whitmore) This year the Music Masters Camp Series presents for the first time ever, The Women’s Music Summit, August 27-31. Taking place in the beautiful Catskills Mountains of Woodstock, New York at the Full Moon Resort, the Women’s Music Summit has everything imaginable to offer the female artist for a perfect four-day getaway. [...]

It’s time to prepare your wallets for the summer tour season – Phish, Wilco, and Bruce Springsteen have all announced new summer tour dates over the past few days. Check them out below. To heat up your summer just a little bit more, Phish have announced that they will be playing two sets during their [...]

It would be an understatement to say that Luther Dickinson  (North Mississippi Allstars, Black Crowes) has been keeping busy lately. And on May 8 it will all pay off as he will be releasing three separate records. The first, Hambone’s Meditations, is an instrumental guitar record featuring pieces in the style of John Fahey’s “Tacoma [...]

R&B singer Frank Ocean has encountered legal trouble over his song “American Wedding” off of his debut 2011 mixtape Nostalgia, ULTRA, which utilizes the entire master recording of the Eagles’ 1977 hit “Hotel California” as its backing track. Ocean posted on his personal blog yesterday, “Don henley(’s label—Rhino) is apparently intimidated by my rendition of [...]

This year’s lineup for the Newport Folk Festival features an impressive medley of artists. Bursting at the seams with talent, the roster ranges from the likes of veteran songwriters like Jackson Browne and Patty Griffin to the rising southern rock gods and goddess of Alabama Shakes to the 2011 critically acclaimed indie artist tUnE-yArDs. The [...]

It’s been just over a month since the nation got its first glimpse of President Obama’s pipes when he broke into song singing Al Green’s classic, “Let’s Stay Together,” at a fundraising event in Harlem. Obama took to the mic once more last night during an intimate taping of PBS’s “In Performance at the White [...]

On January 24th, Spirit Music Group obtained all of the publishing rights to The Who’s immense catalog via the band’s chief songwriter, Pete Townshend. The catalog includes approximately 400 songs, which encompasses the entirety of Townshend’s writings over the last 50 some odd years. Although neither of the parties has disclosed how much the deal [...]

The Sing Me A Story Foundation, a brilliantly-conceived program designed to bring songwriters together with youth advocacy groups across the globe, was inspired by the maxim: “As a global community, we are only as healthy as our children.” The foundation offers an online platform that allows youth groups worldwide to upload stories written and illustrated [...]

Grammy-Award winning songwriter Rodney Crowell and New York Times best-selling author Mary Karr have announced a collaborative album, Kin, Songs By Mary Karr and Rodney Crowell, which is due June 5, 2012 on Vanguard Records. Joe Henry produced the album, and Norah Jones, Vince Gill, Lucinda Williams, Lee Ann Womack, Rosanne Cash, Chely Wright, Kris [...]