As you can see, this news is almost a month old but I just heard about it yesterday.

Many thanks to Karen Impola, Charity Nebbe and everyone at Iowa Public Radio for your wonderful advocacy of local music and of folk music in general.

Karen has positioned Iowa artists in the first half of her list of ten featured songs:

Karen Impola’s top folk music picks for 2017

1. Catfish Keith – “Shake Sugaree” – Mississippi River Blues

2. Al Murphy – “Steamboat Quickstep” – Hogs in the Cornfield

3. Keith Reins & Tara McGovern – “The Twa Sisters” – Folk Songs You Never Sang in Grade School

4. Raldo Schneider – “That Thing” – Churchills’ Blues

5. Medicinal Purposes – “Badazz” – That’s What I’m Talkin’ About

6. Rhiannon Giddens – “At the Purchaser’s Option” – Freedom Highway

7. Joel Mabus – “We’ll Understand It Better Bye and Bye” – Different Hymnals

8. David Rawlings – “Yup” – Poor David’s Almanack

9. Usher’s Island – “Felix the Soldier” – Usher’s Island

10. The Early Mays – “Chase the Sun” – Chase the Sun

Click through to read the rest of the article and to listen to music samples and discussion between Charity Nebbe and Karen Impola.