Larry Bellorín hails from Monagas, Venezuela and is a legend of Llanera music. Joe Troop is a GRAMMY-nominated bluegrass and oldtime musician from Winston Salem North Carolina. Larry was forced into exile and wound up in North Carolina. Joe, after a decade in South America, got stranded back in his stomping grounds in the pandemic. Larry worked construction to make ends meet. Joe’s acclaimed “Latingrass” band Ché Apalaché was forced into hiatus.
Then Larry met Joe. Currently based in the Carolina piedmont, both men are versatile multi-instrumentalists and singer-songwriters on a mission to show that music has no borders. As a duo they perform a fusion of Venezuelan and Appalachian folk music on harp, banjo, cuatro, fiddle, maracas, guitar, upright bass, and whatever else they decide to throw in the van.
Their appearance at Carytown’s Révéler Experiences, recorded in the summer of 2025, is now all the more poignant and important given the difficult new challenges facing Larry’s Venezuelan homeland. We were glad to partner with Secret Planet Richmond in presenting this bilingual coming together of shared cultures.
