howard

HOWARD MILLER

Howard, a retired Health Commission Engineer, was a Folk Festival performer( Bush Poet) and Festival Organiser before discovering the Bluegrass Music scene. He was an organiser in the first Burrawang Folk Festival in 1991 and participated in many other folk festivals. But when attending the Harrietville Bluegrass Convention in 1992, he realised that a similar event was missing from the NSW calendar and he left the Folk Music scene and commenced WinterFest in 1993.
This name was taken over by an American Festival, so to avoid confusion, a name that better reflected the location of the event was chosen, namely
AUSGRASS.
During 1993, he was offered a place in a New Enterprise Incentive Scheme at Wollongong and chose to pursue a Convention Co-ordinator and Music Recording Business Management Course. The outcome of this course was the production of the AFTERSHOCK CD release, featuring Acoustic Shock Bluegrass Band. At the end of this course he became the first person in this country specifically trained for the production of Bluegrass recordings and Conventions. This has not been a road to riches as the market for Bluegrass records in Australia is very small and has to compete with a strong and Semi Government funded Australian Country Music promotion industry, that tends to overlook Bluegrass music. Some of the best Bluegrass performers have found the only work available is as side men to established artists in Country Music, who then make good use of their instrument playing skills.

Howard at NEIS Graduation with Business Plan & Presentation - and of course, his banjo, 1993 - ITEC Centre, Wollongong, NSW

The front cover of AFTERSHOCK ,1993 Cd released by Southern Mountain Music, Howard's record company. CD001 "Picker's Choice" and CD002 " Shocking" were the extent of the releases, with sales in the several hundreds, hardly a rags to riches experience. Sales at venues were strong but the marketing was fragmented and a bad overseas promotion experience, dampened any enthusiasm. Established marketing groups resisted release in the USA and the wider exposure that was anticipated did not eventuate. 125 copies simply DISAPPEARED with a US record promoter. These CD's have miraculously reappeared after almost 15 years.
The release remains a milestone in the Australian Music scene as the first and only double CD album of Bluegrass Music to be marketed at single release prices.
The release was a group effort and "THANKS" to the friends who assisted me in this task, especially Nigel Lever and Norm Walker
THIS CD IS STILL AVAILABLE FOR PURCHASE
To order your copy of this CD

Just announced - SMM 1003
A Mpg4 video recording of the 1992 appearance of the full
line-up of Acoustic Shock Bluegrass Band at the
National Folk Festival in Canberra.
Important this is NOT a DVD it is in iPod Mpg4 format
Free with each purchase of the 2 CD set or $5 including postage

The tracks on the video are :-
1.Foggy Mountain Breakdown 2.Long gone 3. When I get to glory

Acoustic Shock Bluegrass Band - 1993

(L to R) - Marcus Holden, Nigel Lever, Martin Louie and Jim Rush

Howard then moved on to importing Bluegrass records and selling these recordings at Festivals and meetings. He became the distributor for a number of American labels and promoted a number of releases.
White Dove records with "The father of Bluegrass Gospel,
Carl Storey

The most notable of this period was Hay Holler Harvest Recording Co., and as fate would have it, Butch Robins releases, Unkle Butchy reappears in 2005 as the special guest performer at Ausgrass 2005.
He also promoted the release of "Saturday Night, Sunday Morning" by Ralph Stanley, This release sold over 1 million copies in USA and fifty here in Australia, such is the difference in the marketplace.

This business was later transferred to Norm Walker and became the basis of " Hard To Find Recordings" and Norm advanced the business to the level of an Internet based mail order business with moderate success. The business suffered by variation in currency exchange rates and the introduction of other competition, such as eBay and closed for business around 2001-2. Norm and Robin Walker and Hard to Find Records are missing from the festival scene and are oftimes mentioned as a serious loss to the events.

NEW PROJECT

Vinyl records to CD

Have you got a Stack of old vinyl Bluegrass records in storage and ever thought to yourself, " I must get out those records and listen to some of those GREAT tracks out of the 1960's, 1970's,1980's and even 1990's.

I bet you any money that you don't do it ?

Well!, that is how it worked for me until I bought a new fangled high speed computer to convert analogue video film to digital.
I then discovered that as a bonus I could easily transfer analogue sound to digital sound and burn all my LP's to CD format.

Some of my recent successful transfers are:-

The Don Reno Story, Earl Scruggs Revue, Tony Rice, The Bluegrass Albums 1 to 4, East Virginia, Live in Holland, Skyline, Brian Bowers,Traditional Bluegrass,The Stonemans, Emma Smith, Deliverance, The Carter Family and 169 other Bluegrass LP's along with the artwork.

The Convention and the Boot Camp has remained the main focus in Howard's activities in regards Bluegrass music and although he owns numerous musical instruments, the time to become proficient in at least one has, until now, somehow managed to evade him.

His other interests are Apple/ Macintosh computers, fishing, farming and poetry/song writing and the newest, DVD editing and authoring of the many hundreds of hours of film taken at Ausgrass Conventions.

MC at Ausgrass 2004

CURRENT PROJECT
In Poetry, his work has reached semi finals in International Poetry competitions.
He is working on a eBook named 'The First Book of Stryme", where every rhyme tells a story, this release contains rhymes/stories from experiences in his life and some of his mothers unpublished poetry and is due for release 2005/6.

NEW PROJECTS

One of his projects that has been on the drawing board for some years is the multi DVD release called" The Best of Ausgrass" a pictorial and musical record of the many years the Ausgrass Bluegrass Music Convention has been running.

The means and the time to edit hundreds of hours of video tape and thousands of photographs has not made itself clear, so the project hangs about in a cupboard in the Computer room.

NEWS - The computer and video encoder has arrived and the mammoth task has begun.

Watch this page for updates.

.

Howard is now a full time Farmer and Grazier and with his wife,
Rosemary, own a four hundred acre sheep and cattle farm, called Mymms Farm
in the Borambola valley area, near Wagga Wagga, Southern NSW

He says the location is as close to the beautiful Shenandoa
Valley of Virginia, USA., as he is going to find in Australia and he does in fact
sow down his best bottom land to Kentucky Bluegrass, which
makes the best hay there is, Howard says, ask my contented cows,
" Sweet enough to have with milk for breakfast ."

TO VISIT MYMMS FARM

Keep an eye out for this sort of scene, as Howard struggles
with life, "his mates"? and the Five String Banjo.

L to R, Phil Parnel, "Howard, the bunny", Maurice Kurtz.

"There's a rabbit in the log and I ain't got a dog"
How'll I get him, I know ! Harrietville 2004

Howard, a retired Health Commission Engineer, was a Folk Festival performer( Bush Poet) and Festival Organiser before discovering the Bluegrass Music scene. He was an organiser in the first Burrawang Folk Festival in 1991 and participated in many other folk festivals. But when attending the Harrietville Bluegrass Convention in 1992, he realised that a similar event was missing from the NSW calendar and he left the Folk Music scene and commenced WinterFest in 1993. This name was taken over by an American Festival, so to avoid confusion, a name that better reflected the location of the event was chosen, namely AUSGRASS. During 1993, he was offered a place in a New Enterprise Incentive Scheme at Wollongong and chose to pursue a Convention Co-ordinator and Music Recording Business Management Course. The outcome of this course was the production of the *AFTERSHOCK CD* release, featuring Acoustic Shock Bluegrass Band. At the end of this course he became the first person in this country specifically trained for the production of Bluegrass recordings and Conventions. This has not been a road to riches as the market for Bluegrass records in Australia is very small and has to compete with a strong and Semi Government funded Australian Country Music promotion industry, that tends to overlook Bluegrass music. Some of the best Bluegrass performers have found the only work available is as side men to established artists in Country Music, who then make good use of their instrument playing skills.	Howard at NEIS Graduation with Business Plan & Presentation - and of course, his banjo, 1993 - ITEC Centre, Wollongong, NSW

	The front cover of *AFTERSHOCK ,1993 Cd released by Southern Mountain Music, Howard's record company. CD001 "Picker's Choice" and CD002 " Shocking" were the extent of the releases, with sales in the several hundreds, hardly a rags to riches experience. Sales at venues were strong but the marketing was fragmented and a bad overseas promotion experience, dampened any enthusiasm. Established marketing groups resisted release in the USA and the wider exposure that was anticipated did not eventuate. 125 copies simply DISAPPEARED with a US record promoter. These CD's have miraculously reappeared after almost 15 years. The release remains a milestone in the Australian Music scene as the first and only double CD album of Bluegrass Music to be marketed at single release prices. The release was a group effort and "THANKS" to the friends who assisted me in this task, especially Nigel Lever and Norm Walker THIS CD IS STILL AVAILABLE FOR PURCHASE To order your copy of this CD Just announced - SMM 1003* A Mpg4 video recording of the 1992 appearance of the full line-up of Acoustic Shock Bluegrass Band at the National Folk Festival in Canberra. Important this is NOT a DVD it is in iPod Mpg4 format Free with each purchase of the 2 CD set or $5 including postage The tracks on the video are :- 1.Foggy Mountain Breakdown 2.Long gone 3. When I get to glory
Acoustic Shock Bluegrass Band - 1993 (L to R) - Marcus Holden, Nigel Lever, Martin Louie and Jim Rush	Howard then moved on to importing Bluegrass records and selling these recordings at Festivals and meetings. He became the distributor for a number of American labels and promoted a number of releases. White Dove records with "The father of Bluegrass Gospel, Carl Storey The most notable of this period was Hay Holler Harvest Recording Co., and as fate would have it, Butch Robins releases, Unkle Butchy reappears in 2005 as the special guest performer at Ausgrass 2005. He also promoted the release of "Saturday Night, Sunday Morning" by Ralph Stanley, This release sold over 1 million copies in USA and fifty here in Australia, such is the difference in the marketplace. This business was later transferred to Norm Walker and became the basis of " Hard To Find Recordings" and Norm advanced the business to the level of an Internet based mail order business with moderate success. The business suffered by variation in currency exchange rates and the introduction of other competition, such as eBay and closed for business around 2001-2. Norm and Robin Walker and Hard to Find Records are missing from the festival scene and are oftimes mentioned as a serious loss to the events.
NEW PROJECT Vinyl records to CD Have you got a Stack of old vinyl Bluegrass records in storage and ever thought to yourself, " I must get out those records and listen to some of those GREAT tracks out of the 1960's, 1970's,1980's and even 1990's. I bet you any money that you don't do it ? Well!, that is how it worked for me until I bought a new fangled high speed computer to convert analogue video film to digital. I then discovered that as a bonus I could easily transfer analogue sound to digital sound and burn all my LP's to CD format.	Some of my recent successful transfers are:- The Don Reno Story, Earl Scruggs Revue, Tony Rice, The Bluegrass Albums 1 to 4, East Virginia, Live in Holland, Skyline, Brian Bowers,Traditional Bluegrass,The Stonemans, Emma Smith, Deliverance, The Carter Family and 169 other Bluegrass LP's along with the artwork.
The Convention and the Boot Camp has remained the main focus in Howard's activities in regards Bluegrass music and although he owns numerous musical instruments, the time to become proficient in at least one has, until now, somehow managed to evade him. His other interests are Apple/ Macintosh computers, fishing, farming and poetry/song writing and the newest, DVD editing and authoring of the many hundreds of hours of film taken at Ausgrass Conventions.	MC at Ausgrass 2004
CURRENT PROJECT In Poetry, his work has reached semi finals in International Poetry competitions. He is working on a eBook named 'The First Book of Stryme", where every rhyme tells a story, this release contains rhymes/stories from experiences in his life and some of his mothers unpublished poetry and is due for release 2005/6.	NEW PROJECTS One of his projects that has been on the drawing board for some years is the multi DVD release called" The Best of Ausgrass" a pictorial and musical record of the many years the Ausgrass Bluegrass Music Convention has been running. The means and the time to edit hundreds of hours of video tape and thousands of photographs has not made itself clear, so the project hangs about in a cupboard in the Computer room. NEWS - The computer and video encoder has arrived and the mammoth task has begun. Watch this page for updates. .
Howard is now a full time Farmer and Grazier and with his wife, Rosemary, own a four hundred acre sheep and cattle farm, called Mymms Farm in the Borambola valley area, near Wagga Wagga, Southern NSW He says the location is as close to the beautiful Shenandoa Valley of Virginia, USA., as he is going to find in Australia and he does in fact sow down his best bottom land to Kentucky Bluegrass, which makes the best hay there is, Howard says, ask my contented cows, " Sweet enough to have with milk for breakfast ." TO VISIT MYMMS FARM	Keep an eye out for this sort of scene, as Howard struggles with life, "his mates"? and the Five String Banjo. L to R, Phil Parnel, "Howard, the bunny", Maurice Kurtz. "There's a rabbit in the log and I ain't got a dog" How'll I get him, I know ! Harrietville 2004