April 5, 2008 rebroadcast with Brad Paisley, Jean Redpath, Ron Padgett, and Kimberly Williams-Paisley

When Brad Paisley was about eight, his grandfather gave him a guitar and a piece of advice: "Anything that's going wrong in your life, you can pick this guitar up and it'll go away. Seems grandpa was right. At 12, Paisley wrote his first song. His school principal heard it and invited him to perform at a Rotary Club meeting. That's when a radio program director who was in the audience asked Brad to appear on WWVA's Jamboree USA. Brad was a hit. He hasn't stopped wowing music moguls and fans alike. In 2001, he was inducted into the Grand Ole Opry, and he has been honored with numerous awards from the Country Music Association, the Academy of Country Music and more. This year, he took home a Grammy for Best Country Instrumental Performance. 5th Gear (Arista Nashville) is Paisley's most recent album.

The Edinburgh Evening News may have put it best: "To call Jean Redpath a Scottish folk singer is a bit like calling Michelangelo an Italian interior decorator." Indeed, this song collector, vocalist and M.B.E. (Member of the British Empire) is a pivotal figure in traditional music. She arrived in the U.S. in 1961, fresh out of university with $11 in her pocket. Soon she was living in Greenwich Village, sharing quarters with '60s folk legends like Ramblin' Jack Elliott and Bob Dylan. A hootenanny appearance at Gerdes Folk City led to bookings and a rave review in the New York Times. Now, 40 albums and thousands of performances later, Redpath is still exploring the wealth of Scottish oral tradition, and she continues to win raves from fans worldwide. Her latest CD is By Request (Jean Redpath Records).

Each week, millions tune in to watch Kimberly Williams-Paisley play the part of "Dana" on the hit TV sitcom According to Jim. But many remember her from her big-screen role as the young bride in two Father of the Bride movies. And a select few may still recall her directing debut-- the 1989 Rye (New York) High School Musical Revue. She made her first Broadway appearance in Alfred Uhry's The Last Night at Ballyhoo, and she has performed in The Vagina Monologues, All in the Timing, and on the London stage in David Mamet's Speed-the-Plow. Inspired by a news story about children with xeroderma pigmentosum -- a rare genetic disorder causing inability to tolerate sunlight -- she wrote, directed and starred in the award-winning short film Shade. It featured original music by Kimberly's husband, Brad Paisley.

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, arranger, and longtime Prairie Home Companion music director Richard Dworsky has collaborated with such diverse musicians as Yo-Yo Ma, James Taylor, Brad Paisley, Kristin Chenoweth, and Sheryl Crow. He has provided music for documentaries on HBO and PBS, and has released many recordings of original material, including his latest, All In Due Time.
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. Blue Yonder 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.
Arnie Kinsella hails from Staten Island, and holds a B.A. in percussion performance from Brooklyn College. In addition to his tenure on A Prairie Home Companion, he has performed with Vince Giordano and the Nighthawks, and has recorded and performed with The Manhattan Rhythm Kings, and Leon Redbone. Andy Stein (violin, saxophone) has far-flung musical leanings: He was a founding member of Commander Cody and His Lost Planet Airmen; he collaborated with Garrison Keillor to create the opera Mr. and Mrs. Olson; and he has recorded with dozens of artists, from Itzhak Perlman to Nellie McKay.

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."