IN THE SPOTLIGHT – JANA JAE

When I typed “girl with the blue fiddle” into an internet search engine, it brought up Jana Jae. She had told me in our recent phone conversation how she acquired that title. First, a bit about her background. Born in 1943, Jana started playing violin at age two. Her parents attended New York City’s Juilliard School, a performing arts conservatory with an acceptance rate of eight percent. “I was their first child,” she says, “and they couldn’t wait to get me started. At age five, I played Hungarian Dance # 5 on the Ted Mack Amateur Hour.”

IN THE SPOTLIGHT – GENE WATSON

It’s been almost eight years since I spotlighted Gene Watson in my newsletter (https://dianediekman.com/dianes-country-music-newsletter-2-july-2014). When I arranged a phone interview recently, I asked about his health, as he had cancelled his November show in Sisseton due to illness. “All the illnesses I’ve been through finally culminated in double pneumonia, and I’m trying to get over that,” he told me. He takes a stool onstage so he can sit down and catch his breath between songs. “But we’re doing it,” he says, “and we’ve been playing sell-out houses and the jobs just keep coming in.”