“A LEADER IN THE BURGEONING MOVEMENT TO WELCOME AND HIGHLIGHT QUEER VOICES IN BLUEGRASS.” - NPR Music Justin Hiltner is a banjo player and songwriter based in Nashville, TN. His high-energy, Scruggs-style picking is unique in its combination of traditional aesthetic and progressive, outside-the-box thinking. Having a dynamic, variable voice on the banjo has given him opportunities across genres, not simply in straight-ahead bluegrass or “newgrass” alone, but also in folk, country, singer/songwriter, and Celtic. His original songs don’t fall neatly into any of these genre labels, but are instead focused on their stories - which are intensely personal, while relatable and accessible. Over the course of his seven years in Music City he’s toured, performed, and collaborated with bluegrass greats such as Roland White, Laurie Lewis, Jim Lauderdale, Ronnie McCoury, Molly Tuttle, and Missy Raines. In 2016 he was nominated for the International Bluegrass Music Association’s Instrumentalist Momentum Award. An activist and proponent of inclusion and visibility in roots music, he produced the first ever showcase of diversity in bluegrass, now an annual event at IBMA’s business conference, and he authors the eponymous “Shout &amp; Shine” interview series, which focuses on underrepresented and marginalized identities in roots music, for The Bluegrass Situation. <br>