SIDE BY SIDE

SUSAN T. REID and PAUL BLUESTEIN

Susan T. Reid and Paul Bluestein each have been playing string instruments for more than fifty years – just not together until recently. Susan started as a guitar player in her teens, did some fiddling around (the string kind) later in life with help from Eileen Ivers and eventually took up the banjo, which her friend Pete Seeger taught her to play. She comes from a love of American, Celtic, and other world music traditions and released an album of selected favorites titled “Bridges to Home” in 2016. Paul Bluestein got his first guitar (a Sears Silvertone) when he was 16 and learned to play by listening to the folk singers of the 60’s and then the folk-rock of the 70’s. Performing together as the duo Side by Side, they have blended very different genres of music into a delicious stew they call “North Country” that tastes of Appalachia and Greenwich Village with a sprinkle of Long Beach, California. Bon Appetit!