Stompin’ Dave brings another great night of music from the USA to Bridport’s Electric Palace on Wednesday 16th November. Following a packed night at The Marine Theatre, Lyme Regis and a sell out at Dorchester Arts Centre for Dave with The Whitetop Mountaineers, from Virginia, this time it’s the turn of Appalachian Roots from North Carolina.
Appalachian Roots is a duo show featuring Ira Bernstein and Riley Baugus. Their performances are a dynamic mix of traditional dance, song, and instrumental music from the southern Appalachian region of the US, with a few international twists thrown in. Concerts include percussive flatfooting and buckdancing, rhythm tap dancing, French-Canadian step dancing, English clogging, South African boot dancing, hambone, fiddle tunes, and fiddle sticks by Ira; southern Appalachian songs and ballads, old-time banjo and fiddle tunes, and mountain preaching by Riley; and a good dose of fiddle and banjo. Appalachian Roots is an old-time music and dance variety show chock full of humour and skill.
Born and raised in the suburbs of New York City, Ira Bernstein began dancing traditional Appalachian clogging and flatfooting, and playing the fiddle as a college student in 1978 in Philadelphia where there was a vibrant old-time music and dance community. He later went on to perform with the highly influential Fiddle Puppets, and the American Tap Dance Orchestra. Ira has performed in concerts and at festivals all across the U.S. and Canada, as well as in sixteen other countries around Europe and Asia. He has shared the stage with many of the world’s greatest tap and step dancers, including the legendary Gregory Hines and has appeared numerous times on television and in theatrical productions. Ira has repeatedly won first place in the Mount Airy Fiddler’s Convention old-time flatfooting competition.
Riley Baugus is a North Carolina native who began singing and playing music at an early age. Raised in a household where recordings of old-time music were often played, he developed a love and appreciation for traditional, southern Appalachian music. Riley began honing his musical skills with close friend and neighbour, fiddler Kirk Sutphin, by visiting elder traditional musicians in and around Grayson County in the Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina and Virginia. He often visited, played with, and learned from fiddlers such as the legendary Tommy Jarrell, Robert Sykes, and banjo player Dix Freeman.
Riley has played with numerous old-time stringbands, including The Red Hots, Backstep, and the Old Hollow Stringband, and currently plays with the Dirk Powell Band, and Polecat Creek. He has also taught banjo, guitar, and fiddle at music camps throughout the U.S., and has toured in Europe with The Farmer’s Daughters, Dirk Powell and Tim O’Brien, The Konnarock Critters, and Ira Bernstein. Riley makes his home near Winston-Salem, North Carolina, where he builds old-time, open-back banjos, and is part of a thriving musical community. His singing is featured on the soundtrack to the recent Academy Award winning film Cold Mountain.
Support comes from Stompin’ Dave himself who has organised this concert. Recently described in the Daily Telegraph as “a master…a formidable musician and a true original.” The performance starts at 8pm with doors opening at 7pm. For tickets please call or visit Bridport Music (01308) 425707 or Bridport TIC (01308) 424901. For online ticket sales visit the website www.stompinstore.com
