Dear bluegrass friends:
Here’s what your IBMA Foundation for bluegrass music has done during the past year to help make the future brighter for bluegrass. Will you help us with a Strings for Dreams Bluegrass Raffle ticket purchase or a donation, so we can continue next year! Go to www.stringsfordreams.com before midnight tonight, April 30. Tickets are only $20 for 20 chances to win. The live streamed drawing will be at noon Eastern Time at the IBMA Foundation Facebook page. See you there!
5 Bluegrass in the Schools Mini-grants to schools in KY, NC, NY, and WV, including one school for the blind
5 bluegrass-related college scholarships (7 scholarships coming in 2025-26!) For students in Tennessee, Kentucky, Delaware, and Pennsylvania
9 Fletcher Bright Memorial Grants for Young Musicians for lessons and camp tuition assistance at Rocky Grass Academy, Brevard Music Center (banjo camp), the Michigan Academy of Folk Music (lessons), the Idaho Bluegrass & Banjo Camp, the ETSU Bluegrass Camp, and The Ashokan Center Bluegrass Camp.
6 Terry Baucom Bluegrass Education grants for students of all ages, for assistance with studies at Brevard Music Center (banjo camp), the Idaho Bluegrass & Banjo Camp, the Midwest Banjo Camp, and Live Oak Fiddle Camp
1 – An Emcee Masterclass – part 2 seminar at World of Bluegrass 2024, with an audio recording available on the Foundation website
1 – A “Demystifying Grant Writing” webinar free to the public, with video and amazing handout available on Foundation website
1 (for 10) – A Bluegrass College Band Showcase at the 2024 World of Bluegrass in Raleigh, featuring 10 student bands from Colorado, Kentucky, Ohio, Massachusetts, North Carolina, Tennessee, and Washington state. (We anticipate 14 bands in 2025 in Chattanooga, with a new inter-college jam session & pizza networking event.)
13 project grants in 2024 to support for afterschool Junior Appalachian Musician (J.A.M.) at five programs in Tennessee, Virginia, and West Virginia. Plus: an education grant to the European Bluegrass Music Association for the European BG Summit in Prague, Czech Republic; the Jam Pak Bluegrass grant to learn to repair & maintain donated instruments in Arizona; a youth bluegrass camp in Louisville, Kentucky; a bluegrass education program and camps in Santa Fe, New Mexico; the “Hazel Dickens at 100” program at the Savannah Music Festival in Georgia; a bluegrass songwriter program for high school students in Asheville, North Carolina, to help deal with effects of Hurricane Helene; educational videos created by and for Chinese bluegrass musicians; support for the Free Strings educational program in 50 schools; and a donated banjo for a new high school bluegrass band in West Virginia
8 Arnold Shultz Fund grants to encourage participation in bluegrass by more people of color, including grants to The Banjo Gathering for educational presentations in Maryland and California, an educational grant to the Black Banjo Reclamation Project (based in California), a bit more to help with educational bluegrass music videos produced by Eric Shi for musicians and new students in China—in addition to increased intercultural connections, the Jam Pak summer bluegrass camp in Arizona, an educational grant for a bluegrass program introducing bluegrass instruments to musicians in Uganda, the Kaia Kater artist in residency program/songwriting workshop in Georgia, an education & marketing grant to the first bluegrass festival in Bangkok (Thailand), and fiddle lessons for two young Kenyan musicians.
1 – AND MORE!
We appreciate your support at www.stringsfordreams.com today even if you don’t need another banjo! (Our prize this year is a fine sounding 1980 Deering Advanced Maple Blossom banjo. We hope it goes to someone who will enjoy playing it. If you win and you’re not a banjo picker, with your permission we could see that the banjo gets into the hands of a young person learning the banjo who could really use a good instrument!)
Thank you for being a part of the IBMA Foundation’s efforts to make the future of bluegrass music brighter!
-Nancy Cardwell,
IBMA Foundation executive director
Note: we operate under North Carolina gaming laws, which specify raffle participants need to be U.S. residents age 18 or older. If raffles are not legal in your state, you may not enter. IBMA Foundation staff, board members, and our families and staff members are not eligible to enter.
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