Kevin Gregory, president of the Columbus Blues Alliance, wrote this, and published it in the Columbus Blues Paper. It's about my Memphis experience! I cannot thank Kevin enough for everything he has done for me,  and I hope that I make everyone at the CBA proud. Enjoy!

Reposted from: http://www.blues.org/about/news.php4?Id=758

Why we do this…
The title above is the Jeopardy-style “answer”
to this article. Less than a year ago, none of us in Central Ohio ever
heard of the then-14-year-old Micah Kesselring. Colin John, while
gigging at a restaurant in southern Ohio met the youth and recommended
he contact us. Not too long after that, he began showing up at the
biweekly jam along with his parents, where he played slide on his
Stratocaster to a very receptive crowd. His real talent and passion
were in playing slide on the Dobro and resonator, though. To say Micah
is truly gifted for his age is an understatement. He’s good to the
point of making adults my age that cannot play anything angry with
jealousy.After getting to know him, we encouraged him to enter
our solo/duo competition, which was won by LeFever. It did start things
rolling, though. It was around that time we decided to send someone to
the 2009 IBC as part of the Blues Foundation’s new Youth Showcase and
it seemed to the Officers and Trustees that Micah was the most logical
choice; he was young, good and only one person (making it more
affordable). So we got him all signed up and he immediately started
working on new material.Prior to the IBC, I noticed Cassie
Taylor was not only coordinating the Youth Showcase, but moderating a
Youth Roundtable the morning of the second semi-finals day. I strongly
encouraged him to “rub elbows” with her since she is on the
Foundation’s Board and is the daughter of the legendary Otis Taylor. I
figured she would be the one contact that could help him learn as much
as possible. In hindsight, I can say I positively hit that one on the
head!So, Friday morning arrives and Micah attends the
roundtable. I later find out that he didn’t really even have to
introduce himself. Having made friends with her online and shared some
of his material, she was a fan before they saw each other. The
roundtable went very well – Micah got to meet other youth acts, and the
short seminar ended with a promise from Cassie to come see Micah at
Blues City Café. Not only did she stay for his entire set, but there
was a palpable buzz with a few of the industry folks that were there.
Bruce Wheeler (Heritage Music Festival) even came to see him, but was
too late. He did stop and talk to Micah and his father Mark, though,
and gave them his business card (I don’t even have his card, damn it!).
Once Micah was finished, Cassie moved on to the other Showcase venues
to see other performers, clearly indicating she came there to see him
specifically.That afternoon, I spotted Ms. Taylor and introduced
myself in order to thank her for the wonderful encouragement for Micah
and pulling the Showcase together so well. It was a good thing I
stopped her – she was looking for Micah in order to invite him to
dinner at the Majestic with the other Youth performers and the Perry
Family (Homemade Jamz Blues Band). My cell phone was out and in
operation before she finished her sentence and the arrangements were
made. Things were definitely happening, although I doubt any of us
Columbus blues fans could have anticipated the string of events that
would result.By the end of the evening, Micah had met many
important people (most of whom he knew nothing about) and was among a
select group of Youth performers to be asked to participate in a
last-minute jam session at the Old Daisy. A few hours later, there he
was – on stage with Taya (drums) and Kyle Perry (bass), a few other
Showcase acts and BMA Nominee Gina Sicilia (vocals) and her
BMA-nominated guitarist Dave Gross. That was merely the first day,
though. The very next morning, Cassie urged Micah to meet him at the
IBC host hotel for some important news. I think it’s fair to say that
none of us expected what happened next.Of all the Youth Showcase
performers (and they were really good – I saw several of them), Cassie
and the venue coordinators felt that Micah represented something they
were looking for. He had the talent, drive and ambition they needed. He
had the personality and appearance that others needed. Remember that
although it’s the blues, it is still the music BUSINESS, and they have
been in search of someone good enough to be a success that can also
relate to others his age (do you hear those cash registers ringing,
yet?). With her industry contacts, Cassie was able to secure funding
for a scholarship to send young Mr. Kesselring to the Port Townsend
Blues Festival, where he would learn from Corey Harris of all people.
Keep in mind this “award” did not even exist as recently as the
previous twelve hours! Oh, and by the way, he was going to have it
presented to him on stage at the Orpheum, during the finals and right
before the other awards were given out!That’s not all of it,
either:
He met several other industry folks that are very much interested in
him. He made friends with the entire Perry family and was invited to
their home in Mississippi so he could lay down some slide tracks with
them. He’s been texting and calling them ever since. He had dinner with
Sean Carney to talk business, followed by an impromptu jam at Pig on
Beale with Sean. As we strolled down Beale to see about squeezing into
the Rum Boogie for Bob Marolin’s legendary post-IBC jam, he was
introduced to the folks responsible for the Eutin Blues Festival in
Germany and several others that I can’t even remember (Sean knows
everybody, you know).As
it came to be time to hit the road and head back to Columbus, I
reflected on the 25th IBC and all we’d seen and done the past four
days. The one that stuck with me most was the overwhelming appreciation
and tearful excitement shown to us by Micah and his parents. The IBC
was a different world from theirs, in South Bloomingville, Ohio. I
don’t know what any of them thought might happen this year, but it
certainly was not all this. If you had asked me just a month ago why I
and my good friends spend so much time doing stuff for a nonprofit
organization, for no pay at all, the answers would be varied but
inevitably “canned”, borrowed or just made up. After feeling the pride
of seeing Micah on stage at the Orpheum and being so happy for him and
his family; after hearing he and his parents’ repeated appreciation
expressed to the CBA and knowing all that could very well be waiting
for him just a short time from now, I can say that This is exactly why
we do this…this is what, in the end, will keep the blues alive (and
well), for the forseeable future.
Kevin Gregory

Here's the Article from the Guitar Player May 2008 Issue. Kinda late, but thought you all might enjoy.

Micah Kesselring



RIFFS: Myspace Hordes
Editor Boy's Big Eight
Page 30

Micah Kesselring, South Bloomingville, Ohio  "Dobro Blue"

"Kesselring is just 14 years old, and his facility on slide and Dobro is impressive. He even had the gumption to record an album. This is good listening, and even though there are a few pitchy parts, and the melody doesn't develope much, he has a long time to grow. Keep an ear on this kid. "

Vol.42 No.5 May 2008

Copyright Guitar Player Magazine 2008

Check this out! Columbus Dispatch Life and Arts section!

Enjoy,
Micah Kesselring

http://www.dispatch.com/live/content/life/stories/2008/06/19/1A_GUITAR_KID.ART_ART_06-19-08_D1_SCAGPDJ.html?sid=101

.. --> begin creation date --> .. --> end creation date --> COLUMBUS DISPATCH


SOUTH BLOOMINGVILLE, Ohio -- He plays guitar six or eight hours a day, so much that his fingers used to blister. The blisters turned to calluses over time, though, and he doesn't notice them much anymore.

Micah Kesselring, 14, has heroes most kids his age have never heard of (such as guitar gods Duane Allman and Dickey Betts) and a dream they've never considered: leaving his Hocking Hills home and heading to Nashville, Tenn., an oasis of slide guitar and record contracts.

He's moving toward that dream in baby steps.

In February, Kesselring cut his first album, Dobro Blu e, a self-produced, acoustic solo collection of mostly original songs. A few months later, his MySpace page was featured in the May issue of Guitar Player magazine.

Last week, Arizona Jeans announced that Kesselring was among four winners of a music contest conducted by the company. His song Jam for Duane, a tribute to Allman, can be heard on the Arizona Jeans Web site.

Kesselring doesn't make too much of the accolades -- nor of himself. When he talks, he's a sheepish teen.

When he plays, though, he is something else.

"I can express myself a lot differently (with the guitar) than I can anywhere else," he said, sitting under a gazebo at Getaway Cabins, where his mother, Lisa, works. "I can just really express how I'm feeling."

He had just ripped through an electric-slide guitar rendition of Statesboro Blues, written by Blind Willie McTell in the 1920s and made famous almost 50 years later by the Allman Brothers.

He doesn't move much when he plays. His hands flicker up and down the instrument -- his left middle finger capped with a small glass bottle to produce that slide sound.

Beyond that, there's only a pursed lip here, a flared nostril there.

He's a perfectionist, said his father, Mark.

"When he decides he's going to play this song, it isn't that song in a weird way," Mr. Kesselring said. "It's lick for lick."

Nick Collura noticed something similar when he recorded Kesselring's album at Insea Sound Shop, which Collura owns in Nelsonville.

"The boy was very focused -- had a plan," he said. "We'll call him a one-take wonder, if you will -- which you don't see much in this trade, for sure."

His skill level, Collura said, stands out.

"There's a lot of good talent in here, but Micah sure is on the top of that list."

Kesselring, who finished his freshman year at Logan High in May, is the youngest of four children. He inherited the music gene from his father, who has drummed since he was a boy.

At 9, Micah got his first guitar: an Epiphone Les Paul Jr. that he played and played until the fret board blew out. Within a year, he could slash through Stairway to Heaven note by note on a 12-string.

"I never really thought I was that good at guitar," he said. "I just had a bunch of people telling me I'm really good. I thought everybody picked it up at that level.

I guess I was doing pretty advanced stuff at 10 or 11 years old."

He dipped into the Southern rock pool about the same time, and, with a nudge from his dad, discovered the Allmans and the slide.

He hasn't come up for air since. He loves the slide, but his favorite is another old-time stringed instrument: the dobro.

Kesselring has a few other interests: He plays right field during baseball season, has a girlfriend, does well enough in school -- but otherwise just jams day after day, usually on the family's back porch.

Sometimes his dad sits in on the drums. Sometimes his friends play with him, although they usually get bored with the marathon sessions much as Kesselring tires of their lack of expertise.

Mostly he fiddles by himself.

Kesselring, who performs solo twice a month at Millstone BBQ in Logan, is looking to write more songs, to spend less time absorbing the creativity of others and more time letting loose some of his own.

"There's a bunch of little things that keep on happening that are building up to something big, I hope."

amccullough@dispatch.com

Check this out! Two different headlines, the Logan Daily used "Laurelville's Guitar Hero" and The Athens Messenger used "Unique Sound Garners Area Teen National Attention"

Enjoy!
Micah Kesselring


http://athensmessenger.com/main.asp?Search=1&ArticleID=11076&SectionID=1&SubSectionID=273&S=1

Unique sound garners area teen national recognition

MERIAH WILLIAMS
For The Athens Messenger

LAURELVILLE - Just hearing the Delta blues-style tunes emanating from the Dobro resonator guitar paints a mental picture of the musician that proves, for most, to be a far cry from the Logan High School sophomore soulfully cranking out the notes.

"You incorporate this stuff from the '60s and '70s with stuff from the '20s and '30s and you get this kid with a new blend for the millennium," Mark Kesselring said of his son, teenage prodigy Micah Kesselring.

Just 14 years old, Micah has already garnered national attention - first with a mention in May's edition of Guitar Player magazine, and most recently by being one of four musicians featured as background music in Arizona Jean Co. commercials.

At the start, the contest for the jeans commercial was open to worldwide entries, from which 10 finalists were chosen. The contest then opened up for public vote, resulting in the final four winners. Micah's winning entry, "Jam for Duane," is featured at www.azjeans.com.

Micah's write-up in Guitar Player magazine stemmed from visits to his MySpace page, www.myspace.com/micahkesselring.

"They heard my music on MySpace and put it in the magazine so others could hear it," Micah said. The site features tracks that Micah both wrote and recorded.

Micah's guitar playing days started when he decided one day, at age 9, to pick up a guitar and learn to play.

"I'm self-taught. I've never had one lesson in my life," he explained. "I just listen to the music and then learn to play it."

Micah's music is "a fusion of blues, slide/Dobro, jazz and rock. It kinda sounds like The Allman Brothers Band meets Jimi Hendrix meets slide/dobro. Nonetheless, it sounds good," according to a statement on his MySpace page.

"I think there's something special about the acoustic slide playing. It just attracts everybody. There's just something special about it," Micah explained.

"Modern music has never really appealed to him. I guess that comes from what he's heard around our home, what his mother and I have played," Mark Kesselring said. "(Slide guitar) left the forefront for a while, but it never really did die out, especially around Appalachia and in the South, in places like the back woods and small towns."

With such a unique taste in music, Micah finds himself keeping unexpected company.

"All the people I play guitar with are all three times my age. Nobody my age is on my level of playing," he explained.

In February, Micah recorded his first album, "Dobro Blue," at Insea Sound Shop in Nelsonville, with the help of owner Nick Collura.

"What we do here is record old-school analog, and I think he really dug it, because he's a little old-school himself," Collura said.

"He did a few cover tunes, but what we were really impressed with here at the shop were his originals. There's one tune on that album that's really smokin'," he said.

"We called him the 'one-take wonder.' Some people come in here and we just have to keep going over it and over it, but this boy came in here prepared."

Although Micah just recorded his first album, he did his first paid performance at 13.

"My first paying gig was at the Millstone (restaurant in Logan), and I still play there every other weekend, either on Friday or Saturday," he said.

Micah can also play drums, banjo and keyboards and "pretty much anything with strings," but the guitar holds a special place in his heart.

"I can express myself a lot differently with guitar than with anything else," he said. "I can play with a lot of emotion, and you can hear the emotion."

mwilliams@logandaily.com

Hey guys, with your help, I am one of the 4 winners who won the AZ Jeans Music Contest. The link for the AZ Jeans Jukebox is at : www.azjeans.com

Check out my track, "Jam For Duane" featured on the page!

Thanks again guys, your the best, Enjoy!

Micah Kesselring

Hello guys, I am one of the Ten finalists to be selected out of millions who have entered.

Please vote for me, as I need your HELP. Every vote counts.

If this works out, I could get noticed. I would be on a World Wide Commercial.

Anything you can do to spread the word helps.

Do this for me PLEASE. EVERY VOTE COUNTS!

I NEED HELP!

The link is at: http://extras.azjeans.com/?ID=contest

Voting ends May 23, 2008. You can vote once a day. Every vote helps, please do this for me, every day if you can.

THANK YOU SO MUCH

Micah Kesselring

New video of Beth Keith & Micah Kesselring doing Pat Monahan's "Her Eyes" at Beth's house on Feb.24.08. Enjoy!

"Her Eyes" Beth Keith (Pat Monahan cover)

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Lyrics:
She's not afraid; she just likes to use her night light
When she gets paid, true religion gets it all
If they fit right.

She's a little bit manic, completely organic
Doesn't panic for the most part.

She's old enough to know, and young enough not to say no
To any chance that she gets for home plate tickets to see the Mets.
Like everybody, she's in over her head,
Dreads Feds, Grateful Dead, and doesn't take meds.

She's a Gemini Capricorn
Thinks all men are addicted to porn.
I don't agree with her half the time,
But, damn I'm glad she's mine.

Her eyes, that's where hope lies.
That's where blue skies
Meet the sunrise.
Her eyes, that's where I go
When I go home.

She got the kinda strength that every man wishes he had.
She loved Michael Jackson up until he made Bad.

Tells me that she lives about a hundred lives,
Scares me to death when she thinks and drives,
Says cowboy hats make her look fat,
and I'm so glad she's mine.

Her eyes, that's where hope lies.
That's where blue skies
Meet the sunrise.
Her eyes, that's where I go
When I go home.

She doesn't know the word 'impossible'
Don't care where I've been and doesn't care where we're goin' to.
She takes me as I am, and that ain't easy.
She's beautiful. So beautiful.

And sometimes I think she's truly crazy.
And I love it.

Her eyes, that's where hope lies.
That's where blue skies
Always meet the sunrise.
Her eyes, that's where I go
When I go home.

Her eyes, that's where hope lies.
That's where blue skies
Always meet the sunrise.
Her eyes, that's where I go
When I go home.

She's not afraid
she just likes to use her night light.

Vocals: Beth Keith (http://www . myspace . com/bethkeith)
Guitar: Micah Kesselring (http://www . myspace . com/micahkesselring)
Camera: Seth Vermillion and Dustin Reynolds.

Recorded: Sunday, February 24th, 2008.


Copyright Patrick Monahan, Columbia Records, 2007

To Whom It May Concern;
Beth Keith and Micah Kesselring are collaborating! On Vocals and Piano will be Beth Keith, and on Acoustic Guitar will be Micah Kesselring. Right now we are planning to record a couple songs, mainly just home demos, covers, etc. We may record a CD if it works well, most likely consisting of some originals, and some covers. We are working on a new song, called Annie's Tune, and I am working on a new song called Afraid To Fall. Not sure if Afraid To Fall will be on it, but the project might develop into a couple originals by me, a couple originals by her, a couple we wrote together, and some covers. The style of music is Acoustic/Alternative/Rock, and sounds pretty good! I will be sure to post any knew details as soon as we are 100% sure that it's going to work out.

Thanks for supporting!!!

Beth Keith & Micah Kesselring

www.myspace.com/BethKeith