Launched in the shadow of 9/11 in a struggling mountain town, Bristol Rhythm & Roots Reunion has bolstered the music of its region, launched careers, and helped Bristol itself recover from the small town atrophy of the late 20th century. Working in tandem with the city's Birthplace of Country Music Museum and its in-house Radio Bristol, the Reunion has become a key Americana festival and an anchor for a place central to country music history. The 20th anniversary comeback edition, after a year scrubbed by Covid, called for a road trip.

Kathy Mattea has lived in Nashville since before 1980, but she’s never stopped loving or speaking up for her home state of West Virginia. Now the Grammy-winning country and folk artist is taking on a new role as cultural ambassador for the state, having been announced Thursday as the new host of the nationally distributed show Mountain Stage, which has been produced in Charleston since 1983, one year before the release of Mattea’s debut album.

The jangle pop branch of the rock family tree was on my mind as news of two upcoming albums crossed my path from bands I’d enjoyed very much during two different chapters of my life. From here in Nashville, The Delevantes hit the studio after a nearly 25-year break from recording as a duo. Their disc A Thousand Turns will arrive Sept. 17. From my North Carolina teen-hood, The Connells announced Steadman’s Wake, set for Sept. 24, the first album the Raleigh outfit had composed since 1998.

With a song title that sounds like an anthem for these times, "Some Things Are Coming Back Again" is actually a pre pandemic composition.

Splitting time between Nashville and Montana, Sterling Drake is a modern day singing cowboy.

A cybersecurity lawyer at a law firm tied to the Democratic Party is the second person to be charged in special counsel John Durham's investigation into the origins of the FBI's Trump-Russia probe.

When CBS announced a new show where activists would take part in competitions, critics said the format made a mockery of actual activism. Now, the show will drop the competitive element.

Democrats will try the same budgetary process from four decades ago when first-year President Ronald Reagan used reconciliation to achieve his "revolution" in federal fiscal policy.