2018-19 Guide To Yellow Springs

19 Y e l l ow S p r i n g s N ews the Guide to YelLow Springs y 2018 - 1 9 By JennIfer berman Always a trailblazer, Antioch College counts a number of progressive American milestones among its accomplishments: inclusion of women in college, first out - door education center in the Midwest; first liberal arts college to have a work-study program, and many more. Appropriately, Antioch hosted the very first bluegrass concert on a college campus. On March 5, 1960, the Osborne Broth- ers, rising stars of a rising scene, played their bluegrass music to a packed Kelly Hall at Antioch College. The concert would prove seminal. That evening, when the Osborne Broth- ers played some early folk hits like “Pretty Polly“ in the radical, new bluegrass style, they struck college-audience gold, and pro- pelled the genre into a heyday that lasted through the 1980s. Soon after the concert, Yellow Springs would find itself one locus of the bluegrass movement, even today inspiring a new generation of locals to pick up their banjos, mandolins and fiddles to keep the music alive.  Why Antioch? For one, bluegrass — a music genre as unique to America as jazz — was a rebellious musical evolution, similar to its revolutionary host, Antioch College, according to local bluegrass historian Fred Bartenstein, author of “The Bluegrass Hall of Fame, Inductee Biographies 1991–2014” and internationally syndicated bluegrass radio programmer. “Bluegrass was an innovation, much like rock ‘n’ roll — a reaction against music the way it was being played,” Bartenstein said in a recent interview. “It was a very novel and oppositional form.” Antioch also helped launch the college bluegrass scene because of its radio station, WYSO, which hosted many bluegrass and old-time music shows over the years. “Bluegrass has become a staple of WYSO’s imagery,” Bartenstein said. “People who listen to WYSO all the time are exposed to bluegrass. It has become the soundtrack of Yellow Springs.” What exactly is bluegrass? Bluegrass is an evolutionary branch of Southern country music — although it wouldn't be called that until the late ’50s, when Bill Monroe and his Bluegrass Boys came to define the genre, according to Bartenstein. The music is distinguished by highly synco - pated rhythms that emphasize the off beat. Players trade solos, or “breaks,” much the way y  A bluegrass first AT Antioch collEge  y • Photo by Ann Milovsoroff, courtesy of Fred Bartenstein The Osborne Brothers at Antioch College, March 1960: the very first bluegrass concert at a college campus. Sonny Osborne, banjo; Bobby Osborne, mandolin; Jimmy Brown, Jr., guitar. Continued on page 20 %%% jazz musicians do. Singers generally employ tight, sweet harmonies over the instrumenta - tion, one hallmark of which is the “high lone - some” harmony, traditionally sung by a tenor. Instrumentation is usually guitar, banjo, mandolin and bass, and occasionally a fiddle. Each is played in a distinct style: the banjo is picked “Scruggs style,” with picks on the thumb, index and middle finger; notes are rolled from one finger to the next in quick succession. The mandolin’s quick, cheerful chops keep up the tempo with the upright bass. Guitar and fiddle fill out the sound. Eight local artists producing elegant, functional, contemporary pottery. Located in Kings Yard Yellow Springs, OH 937.767.1666 www.YellowSpringsPottery.com Hours: Mon–Fri 12–5:30 Sat 11–5:30 Sun 12–5:30 Over 40 combined years of LOCAL residential & commercial real estate experience. www.YellowSpringsProperties.com Let Our Connections Work for You! Minerva Bieri 937.430.0843 Realtor Sam Eckenrode 937.470.1867 Senior Sales Associate, Realtor Ready to sell or buy in or out of Yellow Springs? Call us!