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Steve
Chiasson, the "founding
father" of the group, is a veteran of the club scene,
and has been
singing,
playing guitar
and
honing
his
songwriting
craft since starting his first garage band in 1965. He has
won a number of songwriting awards, and several of his songs
have been recorded and released by various independent artists.
Steve also plays bass and runs Forest Audio Services in his
hometown
of Wellington, Maine.
Chris
Prickitt is an accomplished banjo player with a flair for
both Scruggs-style and good old-fashioned clawhammer.
He has appeared with The Kennebec Valley Boys,
The Northern Valley
Boys, The Pleasin' Keys, and The Reely Clever
Good As Ever Band. Chris plays guitar, fiddle, bass, mandolin,
and accordion and can call a fine contra dance in a pinch.
He also mentors the Abbott Hill Ramblers, a highly acclaimed
youth bluegrass group out of MSAD #46 in Dexter.
Nel
Kennedy plays bass, guitar, mandolin, and autoharp. She
cut her musical teeth on bluegrass, folk and country-rock,
and spent a good bit of her early career with the well-known
Misty
Mountaineers. Nel recorded three albums with the Mistys,
as
well as one with her husband, Joe, as a member of the band
Breakneck Mountain. She and Joe produced
and
promoted
the
Breakneck Mountain Bluegrass Festival in Crawford, Maine, from
1984 to 1995.
Joe
Kennedy, harmonica player extraordinaire (who also
plays bass, as well), has worked hard to develop a style
of playing
that really fits the type of material the band performs -
especially bluegrass. He has performed and recorded with
Bluegrass Supply Company, The Kennebec Valley Boys and Breakneck
Mountain.
He helped form the Bluegrass
Music Association of Maine (BMAM), chaired their board
of directors
for the
first three years, and currently
serves as their historian, archiving and
cataloging a wide variety of materials related to the history
and development of bluegrass music in the state of Maine.
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Evergreen
has performed at...
Thomas
Point Beach Bluegrass Festival, Brunswick, ME • The
Common Ground Country Fair, Unity, ME • Northwest
Park Coffeehouse Series, Windsor, CT • WERU Full
Circle Fair, Union, ME • Grand Lake Stream Folk Arts
Festival, Grand Lake Stream, ME • Ossipee Valley
Bluegrass Festival, Cornish, ME • The Maine Festival,
Thomas Point Beach, ME • Vermont
Bluegrass Family Festival, Essex Junction, VT • Center
Theatre, Dover-Foxcroft, ME • Red Rooster Bluegrass
Festival, St. Stephen, NB, Canada • Smith Meeting House
Bluegrass Festival, Gilmanton, NH • Stonington Opera
House, Stonington, ME • Acres Of Wildlife
Bluegrass Festival, Steep Falls, ME • Skye Theatre,
South Carthage, ME • UU Coffeehouse, Waterville, ME • Wild
Blueberry Festival, Machias, ME • Perkinstock Bluegrass & Old-Time
Festival, Penobscot, ME • New Year’s By The Bay,
Belfast, ME • Windsor Fair,
Windsor ME • Left Bank Café, Blue Hill, ME • Harbor
Days, Stockton Springs, ME • Music in the Gazebo, Greenville,
ME • Grand Auditorium, Ellsworth, ME • Halloween
Bluegrass Festival Guilford, NH • Colby College, Waterville
ME • WoodenBoat
Show, Rockland, ME • Penobscot Theatre, Bangor, ME • Old
Town Library Concert Series, Old Town, ME • Home on
the Grange, Lee, ME • The Herbert Grand Hotel, Kingfield,
ME • Detroit
Bluegrass Festival Detroit, ME • Elias Performing Arts
Center, Madison, ME • “Mainely
Bluegrass” (MPBN TV) • Buttermilk Hill Old Time
Music Festival, Belgrade, ME • Downeast House Concert
Series, Brewer, ME • St. Margaret’s Church, Belfast,
ME • Wooden Canoe
Festival, Medway, ME • Breakneck Mountain Bluegrass
Festival, Crawford, ME • Sugarloaf, USA • Marsh
River Theatre, Brooks, ME • White’s Beach Bluegrass
Festival, Brunswick, ME • Piscataquis Heritage Festival,
Dover-Foxcroft, ME • Wayside
Theatre, North Dexter, ME • Athens Fair, Athens, ME • Borders
Bookstore, Bangor, ME • Winterbreak Bluegrass Festival,
Lewiston, ME • Rangeley Fiddler’s Convention,
Rangeley, ME • Maine Boats & Harbors Show, Rockland,
ME • Hill Country
Hoedown, Wellington, ME • Orono Days, Orono ME • HOPE
Festival, Brewer, ME • Beyond Easy Street Coffeehouse,
Pittsfield, ME • Hebron Pines Old Time Music Show,
Hebron, ME • Moose
River Coffeehouse, Dover-Foxcroft, ME • Garland Days,
Garland, ME • Winterport Blueberry Social, Winterport,
ME • St. Albans Town Hall, St. Albans, ME • Exeter
Harvest Days, Exeter ME • Piscataquis Valley Fair,
Dover-Foxcroft, ME • Lompoc Café, Bar Harbor,
ME • LakeFest, China
Lake, ME • New Moon Café, Bangor, ME • DexterFest,
Dexter, ME • Farmington Fiddle Festival, Farmington
, ME • University of Maine, Orono, ME • Labor
Day Free Fair, Harmony, ME • The Grange Coffeehouse,
East Sangerville, ME • Lake
George Fiddle Festival, Canaan, ME • Orrington Grange
Coffeehouse, Orrington, ME • Last Friday Coffeehouse,
Winter Harbor, ME
...and numerous
local benefits, weddings, and other special events
A
Brief History of the Band
In the summer
of 1986, Steve and his family were enjoying a concert at
the Hill Country Hoedown in Wellington when Ron Warren
(a stranger at the time) approached him with a proposal. "Someone
told me you're a guitar player. Well, I'm a bass player,
and I've got this great mandolin player (Joachim "Jake" Maier)
lined up. Would you be interested in playing some music
together?" And just like that, "The Greens" were
born. The band took its name from an old country song -
the political party of the same name was unknown at the
time - and began performing at coffeehouses and such around
the area.
In the fall of
1989 Steve, who was working on his teaching degree at the
time, began a student teaching assignment in Chris Prickitt's
8th grade classroom at the Dexter Middle School. It didn't
take long for them to discover their musical common ground,
and shortly thereafter Chris became a member of The Greens.
In
1991, when Ron left the band to pursue other interests,
the hunt for
a new bass player led to Nel Kennedy's doorstep. As
luck would have it, Nel came as a package deal - her husband
Joe jumped right in with both feet. Ron's departure also
prompted the search for a new name for the band. It needed
to be different, and yet still retain some link to the
group's past. Many suggestions were floated, and "Evergreen" rose
to the top.
Shortly
after recording Roots & Branches in 1997, Jake Maier
left the band. For a while things sounded pretty empty
without that mandolin "chuck" helping
to drive the rhythm, but there were just no other players
in the neighborhood. Compensating adjustments were made
to the arrangements and, except for occasional guest artists,
Evergreen has performed as a quartet ever since.
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