Thanks to everyone who came out to the Masters Weekend - we'll see y'all next year! 

The 20th annual Bluegrass Masters Weekend will be November 5-7, 2010.

Reserve your rooms now for your bluegrass weekend
at Lutsen Resort on Lake Superior!

Each year the North Shore Music Association sponsors a great weekend for bluegrass musicians and fans. Friday is check-in, registration and jamming, Saturday is workshops, more jamming and an evening concert by our featured group, and Sunday is...more jamming before check-out. It's a pickin' weekend in a relaxed setting, and a wonderful opportunity to connect with your bluegrass friends.

         

2009 Featured Dobroist Rob Ickes with mandolinist Mike Compton

Born and raised in the San Francisco Bay area, Rob Ickes (rhymes with "bikes") comes from a musical family. His grandparents played old-time fiddle music, and Rob trained his young musical ear at their weekly jam sessions. Although his family wanted Rob to play fiddle, the instrument didn't interest him. Then, at the age of thirteen, Rob was exposed to the Dobro playing of Mike Auldridge, and the sound immediately caught his attention. Soon after, Rob got his first Dobro, and he has been playing music ever since.

Rob moved to Nashville in 1992 and joined Blue Highway, the highly esteemed bluegrass band, as a founding member in 1994. He is recognized as one of the most innovative Dobro players on the scene today, contributing signature technique and greatly expanding the boundaries of the instrument's sonic and stylistic territory. He won the International Bluegrass Music Association's Dobro Player of the Year award for a record-setting eleventh time in 2009; IBMA notes that he is the most awarded instrumentalist in the history of the IBMA awards.

As an active session player and touring musician, he has collaborated with a wide range of musicians, including Charlie Haden, Merle Haggard, Earl Scruggs, Tony Rice, David Grisman, Alison Krauss, Willie Nelson, David Lee Roth, Dolly Parton, Patty Loveless, Peter Rowan, Claire Lynch, and Mary Chapin Carpenter.

The youngest dobro player on The Great Dobro Sessions (Jerry Douglas & Tut Taylor, producers), which won the 1994 Grammy for Best Bluegrass Album, he was also on the Alison Krauss & The Cox Family album, I Know Who Holds Tomorrow, which won the 1994 Grammy for Best Southern Gospel. His most recent release is a dobro-piano jazz album, Road Song (ResoRevolution 2009); he has also released four acclaimed solo albums on Rounder, eight albums with Blue Highway (Rounder, Ceili, Rebel) and a self-titled CD with Three Ring Circle, comprising Rob, Andy Leftwich and Dave Pomeroy (Earwave).

Rob is also a gifted resonator guitar teacher; in 2007, he founded ResoSummit, a three-day annual instructional event in Nashville, featuring leading Dobro players and luthiers as faculty.

Schedule:

Friday, Nov. 5
Saturday, Nov. 6
Sunday, Nov. 7

Lodging: 

Lutsen Resort 1-800-258-8736 Lutsen, MN.
(18 miles south of Grand Marais on Hwy. 61) lutsenresort.com
When making your reservation, be sure to mention you're there for the bluegrass master's weekend, for a special package deal!

Remember, no matter what the featured instrument, given the ensemble nature of bluegrass, it's a great time for all. It's also a wonderful opportunity for families and friends to get together and get away to Lutsen Resort and the north shore of Lake Superior, stunning at any time of year. See you in November!


The 2007 Master's Weekend featured the amazing vocal harmonies of 3 Fox Drive.
Each year, the focus is on a different bluegrass instrument...