Alex Sturbaum
As a solo artist, Alex performs original songs interwoven with traditional music. Alex has performed at festivals throughout the Pacific Northwest, and delights audiences with heartfelt songs, contagious enthusiasm, and friendly banter. They are also active as a teacher, and in the studio as a producer and session musician. Alex has released four solo albums: "River Run Wide" (2017), "Loomings" (2020), "Atlantic Dreams (2021), and "Slash" (2022).
Countercurrent
Countercurrent (Brian Lindsay on fiddle and Alex on guitar) is a contra dance and concert band based in the Pacific Northwest. Their music features lyrical fiddle, driving guitar, foot percussion, and harmony vocals. They have toured extensively and performed for weekends, festivals, and dances throughout the country, and always get the same response: "How does so much sound and energy come from just two people?"
The Engine Room
The Engine Room is a contra dance band with unstoppable groove and energy. With Noah VanNorstrand on feet, fiddle, and mandolin, Kelsey Wells on fiddle and banjo, and Alex on guitar and button accordion, they have been delighting dancers all over the country since 2022.
Natterjack
Natterjack is a Seattle-based dance band featuring Hayden Stern on fiddle, Ezra Jane Landsman on guitar and bouzouki, and Alex on button accordion, bouzouki, and bodhran. The trio lay down a complex, layered soundscape, and can still go quite hard when the situation requires.
One Dollar Whiskey
With Alex and Brian performing as Countercurrent, Alex and Penka Jane performing as the Try-Works, and Penka Jane and Brian performing as Dear Crow, it was perhaps inevitable that a trio would eventually form. One Dollar Whiskey performs driving square-dance tunes and joyous Americana harmonies with fiddle, banjo, guitar, and vocals.
Olympia Jamgrass Collective
The Olympia Jamgrass Collective is a project in which Alex forms a different psychedelic bluegrass band every month. Based at the Cryptatropa in Olympia, WA, Alex draws from a roster of the PNW's best bluegrass musicians and fills out a five-piece ensemble for a monthly show featuring hard-driving bluegrass and freeform instrumental jamming.
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The Vashon Sessions
Alex is the producer of The Vashon Sessions, an annual collaborative music project whose goal is to bring together some of the Pacific Northwest’s best folk musicians to create something new. Produced by Alex, the Vashon Sessions is a recording project that emphasizes musical connection, spontaneity, and the blurring of genre boundaries.
Raise the Rafters
Alex serves as director of Raise the Rafters, an annual event dedicated to fostering the next generation of singers and of people interested in traditional folk songs, singing styles, and their cultural context. Each autumn, we gather to sing, teach and learn from each other, sing, share songs and ideas, sing, make friends, talk about the tradition and its future, and sing some more! There are concerts and workshops from staff artists, spaces for attendees to teach workshops, discussions, song shares, and more! RTR is an intergenerational event and welcome anyone regardless of age, experience, or background.