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WFHB's annual Acoustic Roots Festival conveniently falls on National Tourism Week - and we are (also conveniently) a sponsor of the event... so, we've put those two things together and will be giving away tickets to the show throughout the week of May 7-11, leading up to the Acoustic Roots Festival on May 12. One lucky person will win our grand prize, which includes an overnight stay at the Grant Street Inn and $50 in gift certificates to Grazie! Italian Eatery!

Tourism is a driving force for economic development in Bloomington and throughout much of the country and even the world! Our local tourism industry encompasses not only hotels and traditional attractions such as museums and wineries, but also the many unique restaurants in town, our vibrant downtown area, Indiana University, Lake Monroe, local shops, art galleries and more! To everyone involved in Bloomington's tourism industry - we salute you and thank you for helping to make Bloomington a fabulous place to visit! 

So, some of you are saying "Free tickets are awesome, but what the heck is the Acoustic Roots Festival?" This annual live music event is held outdoors at Upland Brewing Company and features some of the area's very best musicians in the Americana, Roots and Folk genres. This family-friendly, laid-back musical celebration is a great way to experience live music in Bloomington and sample some great food and drink from one of our local brew pubs. Here, let me show you what I mean...

The WFHB Acoustic Roots Festival, 2011

My family attended the Acoustic Roots Festival last year and had a great time.
We played with some hay...

 We made some new friends...

We listened to some great music from
Davy Jay Sparrow and His Well-Known Famous Drovers, and others...

We watched the sun go down and snuggled in to enjoy the evening.

The Ticket Giveaway

Looks like fun, right? So, what do you have to do to get those free tickets? Simple - just leave us a comment on this blog post and tell us about your experience with tourism in Bloomington.

If you're a visitor, what's your favorite reason to visit?

If you're a local resident, what do you always recommend to people when they visit?

Good luck! Hope to see you at this year's Acoustic Roots Festival! 

Music reviewers tend to gush a bit when describing performances by the European Union Youth Orchestra, an incredible group of young people who will be performing at the Indiana University Auditorium on April 22.

"...astonishing how high the standard of the European Union Youth Orchestra is." -Volkskrant

"The EUYO's appearance was at the same time both a successful finale and a highlight of this year's festival." Neues Deutschland

"A fresh and contagious sense of enthusiasm spread like magnetism from the stage to the stalls and the audience." L'Eco di Bergamo

This grouping of 14-24 year old musicians, founded in 1976, is the only orchestra in the world to contain members from all 27 European Union countries. It is meant to represent the European ideal of a community working together toward social understanding, while at the same time providng up-and-coming musicians with an invauable professional development experience. 

We've got two tickets and a restaurant gift card for one lucky winner. Just tell us about your favorite musical experience in Bloomington in the comments section of this post and we'll choose a winner this Friday afternoon. Good luck!  

How are you planning to usher in 2012? No plans yet? Well, look no further! We've compiled a handy list of fun New Year's weekend events to help you decide. Whether you're looking for something fun to do during the day with the family, or an adults-only evening, you'll find it in Bloomington!

Don't forget to enter to win a Bloomington New Year's Eve Getaway! One lucky winner will receive an overnight stay, tickets to the IU vs Ohio State basketball game, restaurant certificates, VIP seating at the Bluebird and an exclusive meet and greet with Reverend Peyton and the Big Damn Band. The prize will be awarded on Dec. 28, so enter now!

All Ages Events 

The Cardinal Stage Company's heartwarming production of the musical Annie will have you feeling festive no matter what your age! Show times throughout the weekend.  

Whoosh! Amazing Air is on the agenda at Wonderlab - learn about the fun-tastic properties of air through play. Open New Year's Eve; closed New Year's Day.

Sports fans of all ages can cheer on the IU Hoosiers as the women's basketball team eakes on Michigan State on Dec. 30 and the men's team clashes with Ohio State on Jan. 31. Tickets available at IUHoosiers.com.

Rhino's All Ages Club presents their Rockin' New Year's Eve show featuring Xenosound and 'Til Seas Run Dry, beginning at 8 pm. Admission is only $5.

Adults Only  

The almost-local Reverend Peyton's Big Damn Band will be on hand with their huge sound to ring in the New Year at The Bluebird. Show starts at 9 pm; tickets are $15.

The Players Pub will ring in the New Year with the funk, rock 'n soul of B-town based favorites The Dynamics! Show starts at 8 pm; tickets are $15.

The Bishop Bar will be throwing a Twist Party, featuring the swingin' sounds of The Vallures and DJ Bongo, plus free "cheap-o party favors." Admission is $5. 

Bob and Tom Show all-star Mike MacRae will have you laughing the night away at The Comedy Attic, Dec. 29-31. Shows at 8 pm Thursday, 8 and 10:30 pm Friday and Saturday.

Enjoy the Dinner & Dance Spectacular at Eagle Pointe Golf Resort, featuring dinner at Talon's from 5-10 pm and live entertainment in the Eagle's Nest from 9 pm to 1 am. Dinner is $29.99 per person; $10 cover charge for live entertainment.

Happy New Year everyone!

It's a "Winning Wednesday" on the B-town Blog. We've got come complimentary tickets to the Taste of Bloomington on June 18th and you may be our luck winner!

The Taste of Bloomington is one of B-town's favorite summer festivals, combining great food from over 50 of the area's best restaurants, live music on two stages, local wine and micro-brews and children's activities from Bloomington Parks and Recreation and WonderLab! The Taste of Bloomington is held at Showers Common, next to City Hall, from 3-11 pm.

While you're in town for the Taste, be sure to stop by the Arts Fair on the Square, where you can mingle with local and regional artists and pick up some wonderful gifts for friends and family (or yourself!). The Arts Fair on the Square is held on the courthouse lawn from 10 am to 6 pm.  

Now, how do you get those tickets? Leave us a comment on this blog post and share your favorite summer festival experience in Bloomington and you're entered to win! Yep, it's that easy - we'll contact the winners via email.

The schedule is out for this year’s Tuesday Lunch Concert Series! Each concert is listed on the visitbloomington.com online calendar, but if you’d like to see it all at a glance, this blog post is for you.
The Tuesday Lunch Concert Series, brought to you each year May through September by Bloomington Parks and Recreation, is an annual tradition in Bloomington. 

This concert series provides a lunchtime oasis of live music in the middle of hot summer days for Bloomington residents, Indiana University students staying through the summer and visitors to the area, so grab some lunch from one of downtown’s fabulous restaurants and enjoy an hour of free musical entertainment at Peoples Park, on Kirkwood Avenue just a block west of IU’s iconic Sample Gates. 

May 4   Sharlee Davis & Will Devitt (acoustic originals)
May 11   Offramp Quartet (original modern jazz)
May 18   Gordon Bonham Blues Band (Delta Blues/acoustic country)
May 25   Zion Crossroads (dreadneck roots rock)
June 1   Bated Breath (original Blues Rock)
June 8   David Gohn Band (original rock/roots)
June 15   Fortunate Son (roots/blues/retro)
June 22   Craig & Lori Brenner (swing/jazz/blues music)
June 29   Andy Cobine & Danny Deckard Duo 
                (jazz/blues/bossa nova)
July 6   Pan USA (interactive steel drum music)
July 20   Hornbones (trombones – classical/swing/ jazz)
July 27   Steve Sobiech (world guitar/Chapman Stick)
August 3   Bobbie Lancaster (original singer/songwriter)
August 10   Splinter Group (funky jazz)
August 17   Monika Herzig Acoustic Project (modern eclectic jazz)
August 24   Kid Kazooey & The Ballroom Roustabouts 
                   (story singing/dance music)
August 31   Creek Dogs (lively folk)
September 7   Lazy Saints (modern folk/country/jazz)
September 14   The Mizfits (acoustic jazz/blues)
September 21   Jason Ficket & His Band (blues)
September 28   Kaia (a capella world music)

Robert Earl Keen headlined at the Bluebird in Bloomington on Feb. 11 with Bobby Bare Jr. opening the show.  We started off with a bite to eat and cocktails at Grazie (I think Grazie has the best calamari in town and martinis are half-price on Thursday evenings.  Deadly.).  The 'Bird and Grazie are located near each other just off the square downtown so we walked over to the show after we ate.

Bare Jr. took the stage at 9 PM playing by himself with his acoustic guitar, harmonica, no shoes and a tambourine strapped to his foot.  Hailing from Nashville, he didn't disappoint as his playing, singing and usual humorous banter with the crowd were in full swing.  After his second song, he asked a few rude, talkative people if they would like him to play more quietly so that he wouldn't interrupt their conversations.  I say right on!  I never understand why people want to pay $20 to go to a show and disrupt the performers by yakking the whole time.  Go to a good old watering hole if that's what you want to do.  Highlights of his set included the incredible "I'll Be Around" and "Valentine."  He also performed a tune written by Shel Silverstein recorded by the Pixies for a Silverstein tribute record Bobby is producing.  I look forward to that.

Bobby Bare Jr:

One of America's finest writers and singers, particularly of story songs, Robert Earl Keen was next and his two+ hour show was fantastic.  His music just sucks you in and makes you forget about everything else in the world but what's going on up there on that stage.  I think that's the way it's supposed to be.  The Austin native played acoustic guitar the entire time and had a four-piece band with him consisting of a lead guitarist (the amazing Rich Brotherton), bass guitarist, drummer and pedal steel player (wailing out that lonesome sound as good as it gets).  They played several new songs and many of his better known ones such as "Feeling Good Again," "What I Really Mean," and "Corpus Christi Bay."  A good portion of the crowd knew all the words and sang along to many of them.  I think my favorite song of the night was actually a Todd Snider cover, "Play A Train Song."  He ended the show with his anthem made famous by the Highwaymen, "The Road Goes On Forever."

Robert Earl Keen:

while you were sleeping...

your babies grew...

uh oh...

uh oh…

last night elvis perkins (www.elvisperkinsindearland.com) played at the video saloon here in b-town.  "the vid" is part of black's mercantile and located downtown at walnut and 7^th street.  black's is a cool independent market and the vid is a great room to see a show – very intimate and you can stand just a few feet from the stage. 

elvis played songs from his new record, "doomsday," as well as older stuff from "ash wednesday" and "elvis perkins in dearland."  his band is called dearland and they were fabulous.  not only did the drummer play sitting at his drum kit, but he strapped on a drum to his chest in sort of a one-man-band fashion and danced all over the stage banging on that thing.  crowd was way into it.  the organist switched between his organ, electric guitar, an accordion type piano thing and best of all, he literally blew us away with his trombone.  unbelievable!  the bass player also played several instruments including a saxophone or something that looked like a clarinet.  they were all simply great.

opening the show was aa bondy (check him out here on daytrotter -- www.daytrotter.com/dt/a-a-bondy-concert/20053389-3737554.html).  he and his talented band were worth the price of admission (only $10!) alone.  he played stuff from his latest record, "when the devil's loose," as well as "american hearts."  there was some sort of greek pub crawl going on and you could see it on the sidewalk behind the band.  aa kept turning around and looking at the crazy college kids running by.  he was funny.  only in b-town.  :)

We saw the 68-year-old phenom known as Bob Dylan (www.bobdylan.com) last night at the IU Auditorium (www.iuauditorium.com and see paragraph below) from the 2nd row.  He played a marvelous & tight 17-song set highlighted by The Man In Me, Baby Blue, Hwy 61 & Thunder On The Mountain. New songs I enjoyed were Beyond Here Lies Nothin' & Jolene (did in the encore along with Rolling Stone & Watchtower). Bob can still bring the rock-n-roll & his band is as good as it gets. It was obvious they were having a blast up there. 

Built as a Federal Works Agency Project under the Roosevelt Presidency and opened on March 22, 1941, the Indiana University Auditorium--located in the heart of Indiana University's Bloomington campus--has been host for the last sixty years to the world's top performers, from the Metropolitan Opera and Les Miserables to Bill Cosby and Mikhail Gorbachev. The Auditorium is also home to Thomas Hart Benton's "Century of Progress" murals, painted for the 1933 Chicago World's Fair, the priceless Dailey Family Memorial Collection of Hoosier Art, and two Robert Laurent sculptures.

I totally recommend going to a show at the auditorium.  It's a wonderful venue.

I went to see Sufjan Stevens at the Buskirk-Chumley Theater (www.buskirkchumley.org) on 9/28.  First of all, there is no finer small theater in the country to see a concert.  Built in 1922, the BCT is on the National Register of Historic Places and there's not a bad seat in the house.  It's located just off the downtown square at 114 E. Kirkwood. 

Sufjan was wonderful.  He tours about once every 100 years or so and I know people came from as far away as Maryland to see this show.  There was a line 3 blocks long to get in the door.  I want to call it a cult-like or almost religous following.  You could have heard a pin drop between songs as the crowd waited for the next one to start.  He played several new yet-to-be released songs, stuff from Seven Swans, Illinois and Michigan and probably others, I'm not sure.  My girlfriend (photo below courtesy of Rachael Jones Crouch) is way into him and was blown away by his performances of "Jacksonville" and "John Wayne Gacy" from the Illinois record.  She sang every word with him as much of the crowd did.  Sufjan is an artist.  I don't know what else to call him.  He can play any instrument and words just don't do justice to the wall of sound or beautiful musical noise he was was creating on stage.  www.sufjan.com.

Saw another excellent WFHB live radio show at Russian Recording here in B-town on Sept. 2.  Secretly Canadian recording artists, the Early Day Miners played a cd release show for their upcoming new one called The Treatment.  WFHB does this live broadcast on the first Wednesday of each month at Russian Recording.  I highly recommend it.