Instructor and Jam Leader Bios:
Chris Berry has been playing country blues and old-time country music on guitar and banjo for about 35 years. He’s been a fixture at the Old-Time Social and LA-area festivals for almost that long. Find him with his band Sausage Grinder or on YouTube at @banjochris.
Traditional fiddler and banjoist David Bragger has become a ubiquitous figure in traditional American folk music. He is a musician, documentarian, UCLA ensemble director, 78rpm record collector, musical festival director and co-founder of the independent folk label Tiki Parlour Recordings. Having learned the “old-time” art of fiddling directly from two generations of traditional masters, David has been passing down these archaic musical secrets and sounds to fiddlers and banjo players worldwide.
His critically-acclaimed debut CD Big Fancy instantly put him on the traditional music map and paved the way for his groundbreaking sophomore release, “King’s Lament–Old-Time Fiddle Duets.” David has also recorded and performed with artists as diverse as Brad Leftwich & Linda Higginbotham, Hog-eyed Man, Rafe Stefanini, Bad Religion, Social Distortion, Paula Poundstone, Greg Graffin, and also provided the banjo and fiddle solos for the western feature film “Gone Are The Days.” David has also produced, directed and recorded over 30 CDs and video projects for Tiki Parlour Recordings
Dee Farnsworth works in animation as a Visual Development Artist. She loves bluegrass and old time harmony and plays mandolin in Smoke Holler band.
Kelly Marie Martin plays old time American music on guitar, banjo, and upright bass. Her solo album The Last Kind Word is available on bandcamp along with an album of duets with accordionist Erin Schneider, Trials, Tribulations, and Tune Sandwich with quintet Echo Mountain. An erstwhile touring bassist with San Francisco-based band Skillet Licorice, she is also a guest on their Tiki Parlour Recordings release, All Sorts Orchestra. She hosts a First Thursday Jam at 1642 and was a founder of the Social!
Susan Platz, originally from Illinois, has been singing and playing the violin all her life. She holds a degree in music from Lawrence University, and became a permanent member of the band Sausage Grinder after years of studying Old-Time fiddle with David Bragger in Los Angeles. She is a powerful singer and has taught Old-Time yodeling workshops at festivals around the country. When she’s not playing music, Susan is a pediatric occupational therapist and has been serving children with special needs and their families for over 7 years.
Tom Sauber has played oldtime, bluegrass and Cajun music for over sixty years, learning personally from numerous great older generation players, and has performed and taught extensively throughout the U.S. and internationally.
Born and raised in Romney, West Virginia, multi-instrumentalist, Ben Townsend has studied Appalachian traditional music extensively. With banjo mentors such as Riley Baugus and Ron Mullennex, and Fiddle mentors the likes of Dave Bing, Joe Herrmann, and Earl White, Townsend has studied a variety of old-time traditions ranging from the archaic, haunting fiddle of his home to the Round Peak music of North Carolina and Virginia to the Bluegrass styles of East Kentucky and Ohio.
As a member of The Fox Hunt, Old Sledge, The Iron Leg Boys, The Hackensaw Boys, The Hillbilly Gypsies, and now as a solo performer Ben Townsend has traveled across the country and around the world spreading his unique take on West Virginia regional old-time music. He has shared the stage with acts varying from Ralph Stanley of Clinch Mountain, VA to the Henry Girls of County Donegal, Ireland to the Taiko drummers of Yamagata Prefecture, Japan, and the rowdy Aussies at the Yarra Junction Fiddler’s Convention in Victoria, Australia.
Townsend is also a devoted teacher of the music of his region both online and in person. He has been involved in the Augusta Heritage Festival in Elkins, West Virginia as a staff musician, teacher, and coordinator, and has also worked as an instructor at The Allegheny Echoes Festival in Marlinton, West Virginia, Common Ground on the Hill at McDaniel College in Maryland and The Upper Potomac Fiddle Festival in Harpers Ferry, West Virginia just to name a few. A lesson series Towsend maintains can be found at Patreon.
Currently, Ben is working on new projects combining tradition and technology to challenge the boundaries of performance art and music. Under the name Tabernacle, he combines synthesis and found materials with traditional instrumentation to create both albums and performances of evolving ambient music. He also performs as a fiddler in a 4 piece instrumental ensemble called Ice Mountain that blurs the lines between Appalachian history and contemporary jazz and heavy metal. All of his most recent works can be found on Questionable Records a small label he curates
Joe Wack began playing guitar, banjo, and fiddle during his younger years in W. Va., living in the country and working as a spoonmaker. Having moved to Los Angeles in ‘93, he is retired from a career in animation, plays music with his wife and friends, and hosts the monthly Audubon Old Time Jam in Debs Park.