Pickin’ In The Park 2010 Free Bluegrass Festival

Saturday, May 15, 2010 9:30 AM – 6:00 PM

Hagan-Stone Park

5920 Hagan-Stone Park Road

Pleasant Garden, NC 27313

This event is FREE to the public and held in a beautiful family-friendly outdoor setting. It is generously sponsored by many of our fine Triad-area organizations. Click here for more information on festival schedule and events.  This year’s festival features music all day from many fine local performers plus two shows from the popular bluegass band, Constant Change.

Constant Change

Constant Change was formed in January of 2002 by a group of North Carolina musicians in their twenties with a passion for bluegrass music. For the first several years the band lived up to its name, as various hot young pickers came and went. But once Brian Aldridge (banjo) and his brother Daniel (mandolin) stepped in to join founder Clifton Preddy (fiddle), the nucleus of a special band was in place. When singer/guitarist Dan Wells came aboard in 2004, the group zoomed into focus on the radar screen of “bands to watch.” The last piece of the puzzle fell into place with the addition of bass player Gary Baird in early 2006.

The members of Constant Change grew up immersed in the fertile North Carolina bluegrass scene, students of its traditions. Clifton Preddy has been playing fiddle since he was three years old, and was influenced by his great-uncle, who was a well-known old-time fiddler. Brian and Daniel Aldridge are the sons of mandolinist/singer Mike Aldridge, who has played with some of the most popular bands in the state, including A.L. Wood & the Smokey Ridge Boys, the Bass Mountain Boys, and Al Batten & Bluegrass Reunion. As a youngster, Dan Wells learned to sing in a mountain church house, just as most of the first generation bluegrass masters did. Gary Baird was surrounded by the sounds of bluegrass while growing up, and has been playing with bands in the Roxboro area for 20 years.

The first Constant Change CD, “Making Cents,” was released in 2003. That same year, the band won 2nd place at the SPBGMA (Society for the Preservation of Bluegrass Music in America) Awards in Nashville. In 2005, eager to have a recording showcasing the new lineup, Constant Change recorded “Live at the Peppermill.” This live show featured heartfelt renditions of classic songs learned from the band’s heroes, the Stanley Brothers, Flatt & Scruggs, Bill Monroe, the Osborne Brothers, and Jimmy Martin.

By the time the group recorded its third CD, “Kentucky Comes to Town,” in early 2007, Constant Change had made tremendous strides. Their sound had matured and coalesced, the members had become comfortable in their roles, and they had come up with a stellar set of obscure and original songs, seven of which were written by band members.

With “Hills of Home,” released in 2009, Constant Change has truly arrived. The material is a well-crafted mix of obscure gems from their Carolina mentors, country ballads, stirring gospel harmonies, high-lonesome classics, and a couple of terrific originals. The instrumentation is precise, crisp, and dynamic. The tight vocal harmonies are sometimes smooth, sometime edgy, tailored to enhance the presentation of each song.

All five members of Constant Change are proficient as either lead or harmony singers, allowing for great variety in their music and stage show. Dan and Brian handle many of the lead vocals, and both are powerhouses. Brian glides and soars through the more contemporary material, while Dan’s specialty is the hard-edged, high-lonesome sound. In addition, Daniel and Brian are multi-instrumentalists. Clifton and Daniel lay down some stunning twin fiddling, and Brian often adds dazzling Scruggs-style finger picked guitar on the gospel quartets.

This band’s youthful energy and eclectic taste has gained it fans of all ages and backgrounds… including bluegrass legend Curly Seckler! Constant Change was chosen to back Seckler on a taping of the PBS television show Song of the Mountains in May of 2009. Seckler was amazed that such a youthful band would be so well versed in his music, and said he couldn’t have asked for better. The show, which also featured Constant Change performing its own material, is set to air nationwide in the spring of 2010.

Constant Change is on the move. After almost four years with the same stellar lineup, the band has graduated from playing local gigs to touring up and down the East coast. Now, with the release of “Hills of Home,” Constant Change is poised to burst upon the national scene as one of the hottest “new-traditional” bands around!