State Department Trips
Africa, December 2009 to January 2010...
On December 26 Big Hillbilly Bluegrass begins a month-long tour of five African countries as musical and cultural ambassadors. We will play in Mauritania, Togo, Benin, Republic of Congo and Central African Republic.
This trip -- our first to Africa -- will be our fifth for the U.S. State Department. These tours include Azerbaijan, The Republic of Georgia, and Armenia in 2005, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan and Georgia in 2006, and Moldova, Croatia, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, Dominican Republic and Georgia in 2007. No strangers to performance under adverse conditions, BHB is the only American band ever to perform in the international "Frozen Conflict" zones of Abkhazia and Transneistria.
Read a testimonial letter (PDF format) from Ambassador Tracey Ann Jacobson, Dean of the School of Professional and Area Studies at the George P. Schultz Foreign Affairs Training Center of the U.S. State Department, here. If you need a free PDF reader click here.
For a video preview of our Africa trip from Voice of America click here.
We're definitely going to have a lot of pictures to post when we get back. See you then!
Past trips...
In 2005, 2006 and 2007 the U.S. Department of State sponsored Big Hillbilly Bluegrass to travel to eastern Europe, Asia and the Dominican Republic to spread the sounds of bluegrass. Here's our photographic record of those journeys. Click on any photo to see the pictures.
