Wednesday, July 23rd, 2025
7:00 pm
Sherman’s Park, Dance Hall
Sponsor: Doug & Nancy Purcell
Tickets:
$25 General Admission
Free general admission for students 17 and under!
Caroga Arts offers FREE admission to concert goers 17 and under for all Caroga Arts presented concerts at Sherman’s.
Vendor: Stump City Brewing
https://carogaarts.org/michael-cleveland-flamekeeper
With the sweet and good things in life, there is always darkness. This is a lesson that GRAMMY-winning fiddler Michael Cleveland knows all too well. In 2021, two of his dearest and oldest friends passed away—Bill Wolfe and Eddie Wells, two of the best local bluegrass musicians in his hometown of southern Indiana. These two were among the people who inspired him to pick up the fiddle at just four years old, so their passing hit hard. “More than ever, losing both of them made me realize that life is short and is also what you make it,” says Cleveland. “It made me really stop and think of all the people in my life who have influenced me in life and music, and to not take anything for granted.”
With his sixth solo studio release, LOVIN’ OF THE GAME, veteran fiddle virtuoso Michael Cleveland seizes his opportunity at this one wonderful life and swings for the rafters. The album hums with energy, showcasing Cleveland’s inclusive musical nature. It is a blend of genres that places value in the process over the output. In this release of control, Cleveland presents the sound of artists working together in the act of creation without concern for preconceived notions of what “should” be—the sound of genuine musicianship.
Built on a rock-solid foundation of bluegrass prowess, LOVIN’ OF THE GAME showcases the power of fusion. The album proves the phrase “greater than the sum of its parts.” On each track, Michael Cleveland partners with an all-star community of musicians, lifting the unique voices of each collaborator. One moment, he joins two-time IBMA Guitar Player of the Year Billy Strings for a loopy dialogue between fiddle and guitar, delivering a spacey jamgrass rendition of the ’80s rock classic “For Your Love.” The next, Cleveland breaks our hearts with “I Wish I Knew Now What I Knew Then,” a country waltz filled with longing, featuring Vince Gill’s crooning vocals and Cleveland’s lonesome fiddle.
Collaboration is the foundation of the album, extending beyond the studio. Though “Sunny Days Are Comin’ Once Again” sounds like a dust bowl-era Appalachian tune, it was written in the heart of the COVID-19 shutdowns of 2020. Featuring Jeff White and Dan Tyminski in tight vocal harmony, the song came to Cleveland via songwriter Greg Poulos, who hired Cleveland to produce and perform on his recording. Cleveland credits sessions like these with keeping him grounded and motivated during the darkest days of the pandemic. When it was time to make his album, he couldn’t resist recording it himself.
Similarly, the instrumental “Contact” emerged from Cleveland’s connection with Matt Carson, another visually-impaired musician who taught him how to use the recording platform, ProTools. This knowledge allowed Cleveland to record “Contact” with no live sessions. Musicians Cody Kilby, Barry Bales, and Béla Fleck each contributed from different locations—Kilby recorded the guitar, followed by Bales with bass, then Fleck with banjo, and finally Cleveland adding fiddle and mandolin. Despite being recorded across time and space, the track captures the vigor and ingenuity of each contributor.
“People know me as a traditional bluegrass fiddle player, which is what I love to do,” says Cleveland, “but this album is more than just the pure tradition. It’s a little bit of a departure for me.” Nowhere is that more evident than in the lonesome and moody “One Horse Town,” a cover of the 2012 release from Southern rock band Blackberry Smoke. Featuring vocals from Charlie Starr of Blackberry Smoke and Cleveland’s longtime Flamekeeper bandmate Josh Richards, this track is filled with tender melancholy as it reflects life in a town too small to sustain itself. Cleveland’s fiddle anchors the listener in the listlessness of an arrested life.
Cleveland releases the spell with the final track, “The Lovin’ of the Game,” a joyful, hard-driving spin on The Johnsons’ up-tempo cover of the Judy Collins classic. Michael Cleveland & Flamekeeper’s rendition brings the vigor that makes audiences fall in love with bluegrass. “The song is about prospectors and gamblers,” says Cleveland, “but for me, the ‘loving of the game’ has always been loving being a part of the musical community and all that being a musician has brought to me.”
Michael Cleveland is the most awarded International Bluegrass Music Association Fiddle Player of the Year, with twelve wins. He is a six-time winner of the IBMA Instrumental Performance of the Year, and his band, Michael Cleveland & Flamekeeper, has won Instrumental Group of the Year seven times. In 2019, Cleveland was the subject of the documentary Flamekeeper: The Michael Cleveland Story, and his album TALL FIDDLER won the GRAMMY for Best Bluegrass Album. Cleveland was inducted into the National Fiddler Hall of Fame in 2018 and received the National Endowment for the Arts National Heritage Fellowship in 2022. His new album, LOVIN’ OF THE GAME, was released by Compass Records on March 3, 2023.
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