Album Notes

After 10 years, Paul Brown is back with a new recording, Red Clay Country. Don't miss this outstanding collection of songs and tunes from Virginia and North Carolina. Included on this release are songs that Paul learned from his mother and others. Paul is joined by Matt Brown, Terry McMurray, Mike Seeger, and John Schwab. Paul Brown is not only one of today's most sought after banjo players, but he is also a fine fiddler and singer. This CD presents Paul Brown, front and center for the first time. Paul Brown started playing banjo at age ten, and has spent years learning music from some of the last fiddle, banjo, and guitar players to emerge before the age of radio and recordings. He’s a skilled, good-humored performer with a collection of old time songs and tunes from northwest North Carolina, and central and southwest Virginia. Some of these songs came from his mother, who learned them in the 1920s and 1930s from older musicians near Bedford, Virginia. He studied banjo intensively with the late Tommy Jarrell of North Carolina, one of the greats of old time southern fiddle and banjo. And over more than three decades, he’s played with a long list of outstanding old time musicians young and old, from Andy Cahan and Mike Seeger in the Bent Mountain Band to Benton Flippen and the Smokey Valley Boys. Paul has produced numerous acclaimed recordings of senior and younger traditional musicians. He’s performed and presented at festivals nationwide, and taught at traditional music camps since the 1970s. Through it all he’s demonstrated a love of old time mountain songs and tunes played in the older styles.