Martin Gilmore Music - September 2025

Martin Gilmore Trio w/KC Groves at the Rocky Mountain Folks Festival (Photo by Bob Josjor)

Happy September!

It’s technically still summer, but fall is coming. How do I know? I played up in the mountains on the western slope the other day and the aspens were already starting to show signs of changing. There’s also more of a chill in the air, and there have been some cold rainstorms blowing through Denver. 

August was an amazing month of music, and there were so many highlights. I enjoyed seeing my friends Karyn Ann and Shauna Sweeney at our first “Seesaw Sessions” Concert Series at the SeeSaw Gallery in Englewood, Colorado. I think we will try to make those shows a regular thing, so stay tuned for that! It was especially great to play at the Rocky Mountain Folks Festival on Saturday, August 9th. My trio had a great set and were joined by KC Groves on a couple of songs and we had a small “choir” of singers join us for our last song (See photo above). It was so much fun to be on the awesome Planet Bluegrass stage, and It was especially great to catch up with so many of our friends there. 

I enjoyed playing shows at the awesome Lithic Bookstore in Fruita, Colorado; Heber City Limits in Heber City, Utah;  the Bean Broker Coffee House in Chadron, Nebraska; the Beef Beans and Bluegrass festival in Scottsbluff, Nebraska, and some other private shows with various friends. It has been an exhausting, but very rewarding and wonderful month of music! I am always so grateful to get to play music for people and make my living doing this!

I’m slightly ahead of schedule so I can hype a show this weekend!

August 31st, the Martin Gilmore Trio will be at the Gold Hill Inn in Gold Hill, Colorado at 5:30pm. This is one of our favorite venues, and you can’t hardly beat the ambiance anywhere. We are always glad to be back! Come and see us! Tickets are $10 at the door!

September 5th, I will be opening for the incomparable Matt Flinner Trio at the Dairy Arts Center in Boulder, Colorado. These guys are seriously some of the best musicians alive and it’s an honor just to be in the same musical space as them. You won’t want to miss this show! Get your tickets here!

September 16th, I will be in the Colorado Bluegrass Music Society’s Showcase room at the International Bluegrass Music Conference in Chattanooga, Tennessee! I will be joined by Morgan Blaney on bass, Nick Amodeo on Mandolin, and Chris Elliot on banjo. We will be playing a bunch of my original songs in a bluegrass style for the good people at IBMA. 

September 17th I will be doing a songwriting mentor session with folks at IBMA. If you are going to be at the conference check out their songwriting offerings and come say howdy to me! I’m also nominated for a Momentum Award for mentorship. Wish me luck!

September 25-28 I will be at the Southwest Regional Folk Alliance Conference in Austin, Texas leading some panels, and playing a few after-hours showcases. Mostly I’m just there being a SWRFA board member. Come and join us to meet some more music professionals and get to know what's happening in the folk music world of the American Southwest!

A couple of extra things as well! I will be at the Livingston Songwriter’s Festival in Livingston, Montana on October 2nd-4th. If you like scenic towns and good songwriters, this will be a place you should be. Also, I’m excited to say that I will be playing several youth concerts with the Colorado Symphony this fall. They orchestrated one of my original songs and I will be performing it with a bluegrass band and the full symphony. There might be some limited opportunity for the public to see it as well. If you are interested, let me know and I’ll see what I can do. 

I have new classes starting as well, and there’s still a small amount of space in my Progressions classes at Swallow Hill. We have a couple of spots left in the songwriting class, and one spot left in the bluegrass guitar class. If you want to do a deep dive into both of these subjects, these are great opportunities to meet other players and invest in your musical future. Send me an email if you have questions! Classes start this Tuesday!

I will also be offering my Intermediate Bluegrass Ensemble class on Wednesdays at 8pm! If you want to come and pick some tunes with folks, this is a great way to get started, try a new instrument, meet other pickers, learn new songs, etc. Really it’s just a lot of fun to play music with folks!

There’s a lot of new stuff happening on my Patreon page for folks who subscribe at the lowest paid tier. I will be starting up my Songsmith Series again in September which features a new original song each week. There are also monthly writing exercises, blog posts, top ten lists, and more. Starting in September I’ll be introducing a new tier called “Trailriders” which will feature perks focused on touring. This includes postcards from the road, travel blog & recommendations (because travelling musicians have a lot of favorite spots across the country), photo essays, and more. (thanks for the idea, Alicia Stockman!) If you’re interested in that stuff, sign up now at the $25 level. That also includes all the perks from the lower tier contributor levels as well. Patreon is a great way to support independent artists and keep them in business. It’s a great way to directly support artists, especially if you enjoy their music on Spotify or another streaming platform. Those platforms are often convenient, but they don’t always pay artist the same way that CD sales used to. That’s fine, streaming is convenient, but this is a way you can have that convenience, support independent artists, and get something extra in the process. 

Speaking of that! If you haven’t followed me on Spotify, YouTube Music, Amazon Music, Tidal, or whatever streaming platform you use, it would be super helpful to me if you would do that! There’s a lot of complexity in the music industry over these platforms, but really it’s just the way people are listening these days, and I’m sure glad that they are. I mean, CDs are great, but they took the CD players out of the new cars…so…there’s that. 

Any way that you listen to my music (or any music) is much appreciated by me, I’m very grateful to have so many awesome fans and listeners, but I thought I’d let you know about these things in case you are interested.

Oh yeah! I’ll be on Andy Sydow’s podcast “Middle Class Pop Star” on September 4th! He has some great conversations posted with musicians and music folks. He’s a great songwriter and music business thinker. You should definitely check him out, and tune into my episode!

I’m so grateful to be busy, and there’s so much wonderful stuff happening this fall that I’m excited to be working on. Thanks for your continued support and there’s a lot of new and exciting things coming!

See you down the line!

Martin