He’s been a newspaper editor, ethnomusicologist, author, tall ship captain, outdoor leader and award-winning music producer. He’s been called “The Mark Twain of traditional American music,” and has travelled more than a million miles on the back roads of our nation, gathering, learning, singing and promoting the music of our diverse cultural experience. He’s “Ragtime” Jack Radcliffe, and you don’t want to miss him when he comes to town. — facebook.com/ragtimejack

Now a resident of Massachusetts, with roots in Virginia and Tennessee, Jack, brings his piano, guitar, fiddle, voice, wit and wisdom with him wherever he goes.

Jack has been performing for more than 40 years. He was a fixture on the coffeehouse circuit in the late ‘60s and early ‘70s. His band “The New Viper Revue” pushed the genre envelopes of blues, folk, country, rock ‘n’ roll and jazz from 1972 -1976. Jack resumed his solo career in 1977, then teamed up with reed player Al Oliveira in 1983, as half of “The World’s Smallest Big Jazz Band.” He founded Wepecket Island Records, a label devoted to preserving the traditional music of America, in 2003, and continues to serve as its president and executive producer.

Ragtime Jack is a master of traditional country blues and ragtime & stride piano, and a powerful singer of songs from the “Great American Folk Scare” of the 1950s and ‘60s. He also accompanies himself on the guitar and fiddle. Jack was inducted into the Old-Time Music Association Hall of Fame in 2014 along with Joanne Cash and Patti Page. Jack’s performances always include a lot of uplifting wit, historical anecdotes and connections with local lore, wherever he performs. His background in journalism amplifies a lifelong quest for the cultural framework of his music and the places he performs.

The Chenango Sessions, hosted by Andru Bemis, is a weekly, one-hour, nationally syndicated radio program which features world-class musicians playing in intimate spaces—living rooms, galleries, and listening rooms—for small, enthusiastic audiences, mostly around Binghamton, New York. Audiences and artists are encouraged to interact, and the spirit of the live show is preserved in the radio program and recordings.