Folksinger and storyteller John McCutcheon to perform benefit concert at Kenyon College

GAMBIER, Ohio (March 18, 2005) Folksinger and storyteller John McCutcheon will perform at 7:00 p.m. on Friday, April 1, in Kenyon College's Gund Commons Lounge. Donations will be taken to benefit the Kenyon and Knox County chapters of Habitat for Humanity. A spaghetti dinner, also to benefit Habitat, will be held prior to the performance beginning at 5:00 p.m. in the dining hall of Gund. The cost of the dinner is $5.

McCutcheon is the master of a dozen different traditional instruments, including the hammer dulcimer, the autoharp, guitar, banjo, and fiddle. His twenty-four recordings have garnered many honors, including five Grammy nominations.

A summa cum laude graduate of Minnesota's St. John's University, McCutcheon bypassed a college lecture hall for the classroom of the eastern Kentucky coal camps, union halls, and country churches. His apprenticeship to many of the legendary figures in Appalachian music imbedded a love of home-made music and a strong sense of community and rootedness. The result is music, both traditional and from his own catalogue of original songs, that has a mark of place, family, and strength.