ACADEMY OF LOCAL MUSICIANS INDUCTS WOODSONGS’ MICHAEL JOHNATHAN INTO HALL OF FAME
ACADEMY OF LOCAL MUSICIANS INDUCTS WOODSONGS’ MICHAEL JOHNATHAN INTO HALL OF FAME
The Academy of Local Musicians (ALM) is inducting Michael Johnathon into its Hall of Fame and presenting him with an ALM Music Award for his outstanding work in the music industry.
Johnathan is the founder and host of WoodSongs Old Time Radio Hour, a radio and TV show featuring interviews and music from across the globe. The Academy of Local Musician, based in Winchester, KY, strives to honor local musicians and industry professionals for their work. The organization now has 3 official chapters: Winchester, Kentucky, Nashville, and one under construction in Canada.
Past ALM Hall of Fame inductees include Bill Anderson, T. Graham Brown, Jimmy Capps, Bill Cody, Exile, Jimmy Fortune, Jan Howard, Kelly Lang, Devon O’Day, Jeannie Seely, Margie Singleton, Bobby Tomberlin and Rhonda Vincent.
“Love is the greatest transaction of the arts, and it takes a lot of work to do this thing we call ‘playing,’ but when you get recognized by something as meaningful as this award, it makes the work part drift away and the love of it all rise to the surface. Thank you!” – Michael Johnathon
The ceremony will take place on March 16th on the WoodSongs stage in Lexington, KY. Viewers can watch ALM’s Founder and CEO, Donnie Reed, present the Music Award to Johnathan on the WoodSongs live stream.
About Michael Johnathon
Folksinger Michael Johnathon is a touring songwriter, author of five published books, playwright of the Walden Play performed in 42 countries, composer of the opera, Woody: for the People, organizer of the national association of front porch musicians called SongFarmers, the full symphony performances public television special of Songs of Rural America and is the creator and host of the live audience broadcast of WoodSongs Old Time Radio Hour.
WoodSongs airs on 500 radio stations including the legendary WSM AM the home of the Grand Ole Opry, public TV coast-to-coast, American Forces Network in 177 nations and the RFD-TV Network nationwide with a radio and TV audience of over two million fans each week.
He grew up in upstate New York along the shores of the Hudson River. At 19 years old, he moved to the Mexican border town of Laredo, Texas and found a job working as the late-night DJ on a small radio station. One night, he played ‘Turn, Turn, Turn’ by Roger McGuinn and The Byrds. As the song played, he recalled seeing the songs writer, his neighbor Pete Seeger, performing in his Dutchess County hometown in New York. By the time the song had ended, he decided to pursue a career as a folksinger.
Two months later, he bought a guitar and a banjo and settled into the isolated mountain hamlet of Mousie, Kentucky. For the next three years, he traveled up and down the hollers of the Appalachian Mountains knocking on doors and learning the music of the mountain people. Soon enough, he began performing concerts at hundreds of colleges, schools and fairs. He performed two thousand Earth Concerts, plus benefits for the homeless, farm families, and shelters helping battered women and children. In all, he sang to over two million people in one four-year stretch.
Now settled in the foothills of Appalachia, the Kentucky-based songwriter is a log cabin- dwelling tree-hugger at heart. Billboard Magazine headlined him as an “UnSung Hero” and he
has been featured on CNN, TNN, CMT, AP, Headline News, NPR, Bravo and the BBC.
His latest 176-page book WoodSongs 4 was released in 2019 and his latest album, Legacy, in March 2020.
