Staying connected: Josh Mayo might be the hardest-working promoter of local music. For the past three-and-a-half years, Mayo has been hosting weekly open mics, giving new artists exposure, and welcoming respected players to the stage. He didn’t skip a beat during recent shutdowns, putting the showcase online and continuing to welcome a wide range of guests, from Sam Colony, Hi Castle, and The Musical Suspects (Matt Horn Ferguson and Andy Rowland), to Karen Collins, Susan Munson, Tyler Dick, and Joe Kaltenbach. “I’ve been blessed to know so many of my favorite musicians in this sweet town of Charlottesville,” says Mayo. The series is back to live performances for a small patio audience, while remaining online.
Related stories
Page numbers
Landscape photographer Karen Duncan Pape turns her lens to the page in “De-Circulated,” an exhibition of reconstructed covers of banned books on display at McGuffey Art Center through January 28. “Growing up in Southwest Virginia, books were extremely important to me, as they exposed me to other worlds and broadened my perspective,” says Pape. “I […]
Black Fiddlers
Take a deep dive into the culture and legacy of African American violinists in director Eduardo Montes-Bradley’s Black Fiddlers. The 60-minute documentary shares the stories and sounds of Black men and women throughout American history, like the late old-time fiddler Joe Thompson (pictured) and 18th-century Richmond virtuoso Sy Gilliat, an enslaved man whose opera melodies […]
Maura Shawn Scanlin
Boston-based fiddler Maura Shawn Scanlin is putting her own inventive twist on traditional Celtic tunes. An award-winning musician, Scanlin incorporates classical chamber music and traditional sounds from the American South, along with Irish and Scottish fiddle playing into her fluid compositions. Scanlin is touring her new self-titled record with Conor Hearn on guitar, Adam Hendey […]
