Ashby Frank
Mandolinist, Singer, Songwriter

Well it’s been a while since I started my list of “Favorite Things”, so it’s time for another entry.

I’ve been sitting here finishing up some of my tax prep work (Oh the many joys of being a self employed musician.) and I was looking over the days I was on the road last year, and the second weekend in August really stuck out. For the second year in a row, I missed the Galax Old Fiddler’s Convention. What a bummer……………….. (more…)

Howdy folks! I went back home for Easter, and just got back in last night. Hope you all had a good weekend!

Tonight the Mashville Brigade will be Josh Williams, Aaron McDaris, Randy Barnes, a fiddle player (maybe Jim), and myself.

Come see us.

Howdy folks, just wrapped up my last day of pickin’ on the new Special C album. Only thing left to do is sing.
I snapped a few pictures that I’ll put up here soon. In the meantime, check out an article by Brance Gillihan on the Bluegrass Blog about the new Mashville Brigade “Smash Hits of Bluegrass” CD by clicking right here: Mashville Brigade: Bluegrass Smash Hits Volume 1

Another day in the studio….

Here’s the pictures from the last part of the cruise, and our last port town of Saint Kitts. Wish I was still down there!

Well I’m finally getting to do what I like to do during this time of March every year…watching the ACC tournament.
My hometown team, the Wake Forest Demon Deacons, didn’t make it past the first round, but it’s still entertaining.
I remember a couple of times back in North Carolina when I was a kid, this was the week that we would get our “big snow” for the year. 1993 stands out in my head because that’s the year Georgia Tech beat UNC for the ACC championship, then UNC won the national championship a few weeks later. I think I sat up in my room and watched basketball on my little TV all weekend long and then occasionally go outside and roll down the hill on some kind of sled.
We’ve been recording all week long, had two shows in town, and I’ve been kinda sick with some sort of bronchitis, so I’m pretty tired.

The stuff we have so far sounds really good, so it’s worth it. It’s just tiring and I wish I wasn’t still kinda sick.

I’m also pretty excited about a couple of recordings that I got to hear over at my buddy Ronnie Bowman‘s house the other night. Both of them were produced by Ronnie, but they’re both very unique and equally awesome. One of them is by Junior Sisk and Rambler’s Choice, and the other by Melonie Cannon. They should both be released in the next few months.

I must say, Junior and Melonie are both good friends of mine that I’ve performed with a couple times, so I’m a little biased, but they’ve both really given some great performances for their new albums.

Junior, Ronnie, and the band, have put together one of the best traditional Bluegrass recordings that I’ve heard in a very long time. If you’re a fan of Bluegrass, and gritty real life singing and songs, you will love this new CD. Junior is the real deal, and one of my favorite singers in the world. I’m honored that they decided to record one of my songs on the album that’s called “I Did The Leaving for You”. I remember writing that song in the parking lot of a Hardee’s in Pikeville, Kentucky. It was snowing and I was going to Pikeville to record on my friend Dan Wells’ album and I was a little bit early to check into my hotel room, so I sat there are wrote a song in the parking lot after I ate breakfast. Anyway, I hope this CD establishes Junior as one of the best traditional singers and writers in the business, he deserves it.

Melonie’s CD is way more “contemporary” or whatever you want to call it, I just call good music “good music”. I was honored to get to play on one track on the CD, that’s actually a duet with Willie Nelson. I’m just doing a little bit of backup mandolin stuff, but it sure is great to get to be on a recording with Melonie and Willie Nelson. Wow. There are so many good songs and amazing performances on this CD, it should do really well for her. This is another MUST HAVE if you like good acoustic music.

Well it’s another week of recording for me starting tomorrow. I remember now that I have one more batch of cruise pictures to put up here, and I’ll do that ASAP.

Hope you folks have a good week. I’ll get some pictures from the studio up here as soon as I get them, too!

Busy week! Got home yesterday from two good gigs up north… but I haven’t had much time to rest since the long drive.
We’ve been recording all day today here in East Nashville at Brent Truitt’s studio. Going pretty well so far. I haven’t slammed my mandolin against anything or anyone. I still have some kind of a cold or bronchitis that’s wearing me down a little bit, but it’s all good. I’m going to be slammed this week, but I’ll try to find some time to post some updates.

By the way, before I forget to post it tomorrow, tomorrow night the Mashville Brigade will be Aaron McDaris, Randy Barnes, Josh Williams, and myself, PLUS a fiddler which might be Jim.

Ok, well back to the session.

It’s been nice to have some time off. Hasn’t felt like it’s been all that long though.
My parents came out here over the weekend to go to a horse sale, and it was nice having them around. Mashville was fun both Tuesdays too. So I’ve kept myself pretty busy.

Tomorrow it’s off to Benton Harbor, Michigan for a show at The Livery. They have a new beer there named after the band. According to their website Special C is a Dark Czech Lager.”Deep mahogany in color, this lager has a rich malt flavor balanced by an assertive hop character.” Pretty cool stuff.
So if you’re in the area, come on out and see us either there or in Hinsdale, Illinois on Saturday.

I have one more batch of cruise pictures to post, and I’ll get to that as soon as I can!
For all my friends here in Nashville, be careful during White Death ’08. (It’s supposed to snow three inches and people are freaking out and running the Food Lion out of milk and bread)

Talk to yall later.

So we made it back to the ship, and made another night of Bluegrass, Karaoke, Disco, and late night pizza.
The next day we docked at Saint Lucia. Saint Lucia is naturally beautiful independent nation, but the market near the port area wasn’t in the best condition and there were a lot of people trying to sell us a lot of stuff. Kinda reminded me of Jamaica.

Looking back, I should have taken the bike trip into the rain forest that a few of my buds took, but it was pretty fun to walk around the market and talk to some of the people. I didn’t spend a lot of time there, but I did take a couple of pictures. Here they are:

Our first island destination was Saint Maarten.

Saint Maarten is a small island that’s governed on one side by the Dutch government, and the other side by the French. We spent our day on the Dutch side walking through the town and on the beach. I have to say, it’s one of the coolest beaches and cleanest Caribbean Islands I’ve been to.
Not really much to report other than I had a great time on the beach hanging out with my Special C bros and some of the Grasscal crew. Here’s some pictures and a short panoramic video that I took from the day: