Rich has taught literally hundreds of students to play banjo, both face-to-face and worldwide through Internet lessons. He studied with Tony Trischka, and is a six-time winner of the Lowell Bluegrass Banjo contest and a two-time New England banjo champion. Rich is in his 26th year as a member of the perennial New England bluegrass band Southern Rail, with whom he has recorded six CDs. In the 1990s, Rich founded WayStation, a band that combined folk and blues material with bluegrass instrumentation. WayStation toured for eight years and recorded a successful CD. Along the way, Rich found time to fill the banjo chair with local favorites Adam Dewey and Crazy Creek and The Bogus Family, recording two CDs with each, and played memorable sets with Peter Rowan, James Monroe, and the Arlington High School orchestra. Rich has been on the faculty of Banjo Camp North for twenty of its twenty-one years. The book Banjo Camp includes one of Rich’s workshops, alongside articles by Pete Seeger, Tony Trischka, Bill Keith and Pete Wernick. His book, Bluegrass Banjo from All Sides, was released in September 2012 by Mel Bay Publishing. Rich has given banjo workshops at many New England bluegrass festivals. He is a student of classic era 5-string banjo and has compiled a CD of fingerstyle banjo music from the turn of the 20th century. Rich has taught banjo as an adjunct faculty member at Phillips Andover Academy, and currently teaches for the Boston Bluegrass Union, Concord Conservatory of Music, Tufts University and local teaching studios at Wood and Strings Music.