October 29, 2016 rebroadcast with Sam Bush, Billy Collins, Cantus, and Hilary Thavis

Sam Bush was just 11 when he got his first mandolin. By the time he was 17, he had won the title of National Junior Fiddle Champion for three years running. And he had made his recording debut, Poor Richard's Almanac. Often called the King of Newgrass, the Grammy Award winner was founder of cutting-edge bands like New Grass Revival and Strength in Numbers. He has also been the go-to sideman for Lyle Lovett, the Flecktones, and dozens of others.

Billy Collins was twice appointed United States poet laureate and also served as New York State poet laureate. In 2004, he was selected as the inaugural recipient of the Poetry Foundation's Mark Twain Award for humor in poetry. The poems in Questions About Angels; Picnic, Lightning; Sailing Alone Around the Room; Nine Horses; The Trouble with Poetry; Ballistics, and his other best-selling books have sparked a firestorm of interest in the art. Aimless Love (Random House) is his latest collection. Voyage (Bunker Hill Publishing) is his first book designed for young readers.

Twin Cities-based Cantus is recognized as one of America's finest professional male vocal ensembles. The artist-led group is known for adventurous programs that cover many periods and genres -- chant to spirituals, art song to folk song, Bach to the Beatles. The Washington Post characterized their sound as having both "exalting finesse" and "expressive power." Song of a Czech, their newest recording, focuses on the works of Antonin Dvořak and Leos Janaček. The singers: Aaron Humble, Paul Rudoi, Gary Ruschman, Shahzore Shah, David Walton, Adam Reinwald, Matt Tintes, Chris Foss, and Samuel Green.

Funny how things come together. Born in Rome, Italy, to parents from Minnesota, Hilary Thavis grew up loving music -- especially folk music -- from Woody Guthrie to Italian folk singers like Fabrizio De Andre and Francesco De Gregori. But it was the blues that ultimately captured her attention. Trouble & Truth is the 2011 recording from her band Gaia Groove. Now making her home in the Twin Cities, Hilary is working on a solo album of original songs.

Garrison Keillor was born in 1942 in Anoka, Minnesota. He went to work for Minnesota Public Radio in 1969, and on July 6, 1974, he hosted the first broadcast of A Prairie Home Companion in St. Paul. He is the host of The Writer's Almanac and the editor of the Good Poems series of anthologies from Viking.

Keyboardist, composer, and arranger Richard Dworsky is music director for A Prairie Home Companion, where he is often called upon to improvise on the spot -- in styles ranging from classical to bluegrass and everything in between. He has accompanied Garrison Keillor on U.S. and European concert tours and has collaborated with numerous other performers, including Al Jarreau and Kristin Chenoweth.
Chet Atkins called Pat Donohue (guitar) one of the greatest fingerpickers in the world today. And he writes songs too -- recorded by Suzy Bogguss, Kenny Rogers, and others. Nobody's Fault and Vicksburg Blues (a collaboration with Butch Thompson) are the most recent of Pat's albums.
Gary Raynor (bass) has performed with the Count Basie band, Sammy Davis Jr. - with whom he toured for several years - and the Minnesota Klezmer Band. He teaches jazz bass at the McNally Smith College of Music in St. Paul.
Peter Johnson (percussion) has played klezmer music with Doc Severinsen and jazz with Dave Brubeck. He was a drummer for The Manhattan Transfer and for Gene Pitney. He has toured the world, but he always comes back to home base: Saint Paul.
When Richard Kriehn turned 10, his mom bought him a mandolin; at 19, he'd won the Buck White International Mandolin Contest. He went on to play with the Nashville Mandolin Ensemble and bluegrass group 1946. On the classical side, he has performed with numerous orchestras and was principal second violin for the Washington/Idaho Symphony.

One minute he's mild-mannered Tim Russell; the next he's George Bush or Julia Child or Barack Obama. We've yet to stump this man of many voices. Says fellow APHC actor Sue Scott, "He does a better Ira Glass than Ira Glass." A well-known Twin Cities radio personality and voice actor, Tim appeared in the Robert Altman film A Prairie Home Companion and the Coen brothers' A Serious Man.

Since 1992, Prairie Home fans have heard Sue Scott play everything from well-intentioned moms and ditzy teenagers to Guy Noir stunners and leathery crones who've smoked one pack of Camel straights too many. She recently climbed back on stage in a variety of theater roles. She is well known for her commercial and voice-over work on radio and television, as well as movie roles, including the part of "Donna" in Robert Altman's A Prairie Home Companion.

Sound effects man Fred Newman is an actor, writer, musician, and sound designer for film and TV. Turns out, no one is more surprised than Fred that he's made a career out of doing what he used to do behind the teacher's back -- crossing his eyes, making sounds, and doing voices. He readily admits that, growing up, he was unceremoniously removed from several classrooms, "once by my bottom lip."