Serving Waitsburg, Dayton and the Touchet Valley

Where the (blue)grass grows

The Touchet Valley Acoustic Music Project has deep roots in Waitsburg, stretching into more than 20 years of inspiring musicians of all ages.

When Kate Hockersmith convinced me to join her music group after school in 2010, I never thought I'd be writing about it in The Times more than a decade later.

I spent much of my childhood inspired by the Blue Mountain Troublemakers, a bluegrass band led by Hockersmith, who traveled as far as Sasayama, Japan (Walla Walla's sister city), to perform. Walking into the Hockersmith home as a peewee 4-H'er, I was awestruck by the music flowing out of the basement.

The Troublemakers formed in 2003, after Hockersmith's son, John, watched 'O Brother, Where Art Thou?' and talked his friends into watchin...

 

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