Look. Up in the sky. It's a bird. It's a plane. It's a...bus???

So what brilliant overpaid consultant came up with the name "Airbus" anyhow? I've always thought that's one of the more bonehead product names of recent times. "Hey, I know," said some hotshot ad guy,"Let's call it Airbus! It's like a bus, but up in the air! A flying bus! Everybody loves to travel by bus, don't they? So now they can do it up in the sky!"

Those crafty Europeans.

Polka time: This is to make up for that disco vid I posted

Words fail me

What Joe Wilson meant

Me, smiling, in hell

I'm actually in this cartoon. Sitting there in hell. I remember when this one ran in the papers. My god, the glee with which my non-banjo-playing friends pointed it out to me. Rascals. And no matter how many times I look at it, it's always funny. That's the genius of Gary Larson. He's a guitar player of course. 

A spacial great big howdy to ye

Better late than never, unless it's too late

I do love drawing bacteria. 

If you've ever done a school program, you've had this happen

Richard Thompson (not the Richard Thompson guitar genius but the Richard Thompson cartoon genius, or maybe he is a guitar genius too for all I know) draws Cul de Sac, the wonderful comic strip. He also is a gifted caricaturist and showcases all that and more on his blog.

He posted this strip recently and wow, does it resonate with me. My friend Aaron Fowler and I are putting together a presentation for Wichita area school kids about Woody Guthrie and Pete Seeger. He's Woody and I'm Pete. I'm a pale imitation, I know, I know, but anyway...

The Winfield toons - 2007

Caricatures here of super hot banjo player James McKinney and guitar master Steve Kaufman.

Here's James' website and here's Steve's.

The Winfield toons - 2006

Some sad anniversaries and one happy one came along at the same time in 2006.

The Winfield toons - 2005

We had all just watched the terrible images of New Orleans' flood. I, for one, was ready for some musical diversion and Winfield always offers that.

The Winfield toons - 2004

It's great how conservatives and liberals can come together and make beautiful music at bluegrass festivals. This was, of course, an election year. 

The Winfield toons - 2003

I love all the little kids at Winfield who pick. It's always a treat to watch them and know that there's a whole mess of great players on the way up.

The Winfield toons - 2002

This was the year of the wonderful movie, "Oh, Brother, Where Art Thou." Hence the take-off. Me again in this one with wife Karen and daughter Haley. And assorted monarch butterflies.

I loved that movie but I was irritated that they used a great Ralph Stanley song in a KKK scene. Couldn't they have found a better context for it?

The Winfield toons - 2001

The year of 9/11. 

Caricatures in this one: Dale Britton is the speaker; behind him is Andrew McAlmont and Jim Brasher (the Hank Williams of Ozawkie, Kansas); on the right with the harmonica is our late dear friend Kelly Slack who is now jamming with Bill Monroe in the clouds.

We miss Kelly especially during Winfield. 

The Winfield toons - 2000

It was one of those drought summers here in Wichita. Not like this year at all. We are a land of extremes, weatherwise, are we not...

By the way, I snuck in a caricature of Bob Redford, founding father of the Winfield festival. He always reminds me of Jimmy Martin.

The Winfield toons - 1999

Yeah, I know. What's a banjo player doing drawing a banjo joke. Can I just say in my defense that I also play guitar?

Anyhow, 1999 was the year the creationism craze hit Kansas so it was a natural for a metaphor.

The Winfield toons - 1990

I got a lot of mileage out of this cartoon. Bluegrass Unlimited magazine published it as an illustration and the Kansas Bluegrass Association used it on a t-shirt. It's my personal favorite of the Winfield toons I've drawn over the years.