Tag: Billy Strings

Bluegrass Gospel,
Arena-Style

Posted on by Justin Hiltner

This feature ought to start with a laundry list of our subject’s accomplishments, but rootsy country hitmaker Dierks Bentley’s résumé and inventory of accolades, awards, and trophies would be far too long to include. After 30+ years in Nashville, Bentley has more than made it and his particular brand of country – down-to-earth approachability, bro-ey (while remarkably non-toxic) good-time vibes, honeyed crackling vocals, an unwavering sense of humor, and fierce love for bluegrass virtuosity – has now gained such a strong gravitational pull, it continues to shift Music Row. (For the better, of course.)

In June, Bentley released his eleventh studio album, Broken Branches, and launched an eponymous continent-spanning tour with everybody’s favorite, fellow trad country lover Zach Top, and swampgrass North Georgia duo the Band Loula in tow. Broken Branches features guests like Miranda Lambert, Riley Green, John Anderson, and more and – like all of the albums in his expansive Dierkscography – quite a few string band- and bluegrass-inspired moments, as well.

The Broken Branches Tour, which has been clipped and shared thousands and thousands of times on social media over the past several weeks, includes many hits, striking sets and theatrical tech, cameos from the infamous Hot Country Knights, and, yes, plenty of bluegrass. On the set list, Bentley and Top duet on an incredible “Freeborn Man” – we’re leaving out spoilers here so you can catch the tour’s scant remaining dates yourself and still be delighted. Bentley also performs the title track from his hit bluegrass album, 2010’s Up On The Ridge, and Logan Simmons and Malachi Mills of The Band Loula join him elsewhere in the set for a delicious bit of church.

@thebandloula the broken branches tour is in fulll effectttt 🥹🤧 y’all come see us with @dierksbentley and @Zach Top ♬ original sound – The Band Loula

Singing a Bill Monroe bluegrass gospel number in tight, intricate three-part harmony may seem like an odd choice for a big mainstream country arena show, but longtime fans and listeners of Bentley will know this is no aberration. This is the norm. Whatever the sonics of his music, from the most poppy and radio-ready country to the more Americana-coded to straight-ahead bluegrass, classic rock, and New Orleans grooves (and back again), Bentley brings bluegrass with him everywhere he goes. He brings its pickers, legends, and unsung heroes, too, uplifting them for all to enjoy.

When Mills, Simmons, and Bentley step to the center stage of an enormous auditorium or amphitheater to sing “Get Down On Your Knees and Pray,” depicted behind them on towering LED screens is a little log cabin dive bar with a neon cross steeple and a flickering “open” sign. As they lead the audience in the stark, convicting, hair-raising number – with grit and heart and endless spirit – you realize, yes, this is church. This is gospel. This is country and bluegrass, front porch music and arena music. This is Saturday night and this is Sunday morning.

It’s hard to imagine all of these intricate roots music details not only being palpable in a show of this scale, but they’re also measured, vulnerable, and intimate – traits not known as hallmarks of either country or bluegrass. It’s here that we find exactly the conglomeration of reasons why Bentley retains such widespread appeal and adoration from fans of all entry points. While neither he nor any other artist is universally loved, Dierks Bentley accomplishes being the modern country “everyman” not by diluting himself and his personality beyond recognition, but by purposefully, creatively, hilariously – and spiritually! – putting all of himself on the line in his music.

Before the Broken Branches tour launched earlier this summer, Good Country sat down backstage with Dierks Bentley and the Band Loula during a break from tour rehearsals, after the trio had just run through “Get Down On Your Knees and Pray.” We spoke about what bluegrass means in a country context, the appeal of gospel to folks of any (or no) faith, tent revivals and camp meetings, the joys and vulnerabilities of singing harmony, and much more.

Obviously, Dierks, across your entire career you’ve had a relationship with bluegrass. And not just Up On The Ridge, which we just heard you rehearse a bit of for the Broken Branches Tour. You’ve got records and posters on the wall at the Station Inn here in Nashville, you namecheck Keith Whitley on the new album. You’ve worked with the McCourys over and over, Charlie Worsham, an excellent bluegrass picker, is in your band. There are so many more bluegrass touchpoints. Your bluegrassy CMA Awards show appearance last year was very popular with our audience.

And for y’all, the Band Loula, you call yourself “swampgrass.” The harmonies clearly have the grit and the gospel of bluegrass and the timbre of how your voices blend together reminds me of bluegrass.

It might be an obvious question to ask, but I figured we could go around the circle here and get each of your takes on what does the genre mean to you? What’s your relationship with bluegrass? What does bluegrass mean to you in the constellation of country music that you make now?

Dierks Bentley: When I think about bluegrass, obviously it’s the music and all that, but really it’s just people with acoustic instruments gathering to play and sing together. I never really did a lot of stints on my own, solo. Probably I’m not good enough, but bar gigs where I was just doing cover songs never really interested me. I always liked being in a band. I love the way this instrument talks to that instrument, this voice talks to that voice, and this voice gets added and– “Whoa!”

Like the Osborne Brothers, they’re switching harmonies. Sonny is singing the high tenor, then the next thing you know, he is on like a low baritone part. The voices, the way they move around. That’s the main thing, that’s what drew me in when I walked into the Station. And there were guys my age. I always thought bluegrass was kinda like Hee Haw stuff. I walked in and I was like, “Oh my God, there’s guys my age.”

It was about just playing songs together. And they were doing a lot of Merle Haggard songs, George Jones songs mixed in. Johnny Cash songs mixed in with Stanley Brothers, the Osborne Brothers, and all that too. So it was just, “Wow.”

It’s more about the community of people congregating through and with their instruments. And using those to have fun – and drinks as well. [Laughs] Lotsa drinks, a lot of moonshine back then. The real stuff! No label on it.

Not 30 proof. [Laughs]

DB: That’s what it means to me and that’s what I hear in [The Band Loula’s] music, a lot of, if you want to call it, “front porch” picking music. Picking their roots – you know, deep, Southern gospel-y kind of roots, the mixing of that, and those voices together.

That’s what bluegrass has always been to me. It’s about the community as much as it is about the instrumentation and the bands. It’s the great community of people.

(L to R): Logan Simmons and Malachi Mills (of the Band Loula) confer with Dierks Bentley during rehearsals for the Broken Branches Tour. Photo by Zach Belcher.

Logan Simmons: I’ll say something that comes top of mind for me. I spent my whole life going to tent revivals. It’s not just, “I go and it’s summer camp, ’cause somebody made me.” It’s like the pinnacle of who I am.

I really believe that it’s the pillar of my family. We go for about 10 to 15 days every year. It’s beside my nanny’s house, and all it is, red-back hymns and bluegrass. The service happens every night and you go for about an hour and a half before service starts, before preaching starts, to hear bluegrass, gospel bands.

That’s how I learned harmonies, hearing all my godmothers and aunts sing the wrong ones around me. [Laughs] And you’ll hear somebody over there, Linda’s like [sings operatically and off-tune] and she’s not on it at all. But I was at least learning something and I feel like with my roots in general, it already infused that bluegrass sound into my life.

Then when Malachi and I became friends and started making music together. He has a lot of Motown roots. I think, blended together, the blues and bluegrass just made something beautiful. And, on top of that, the family harmony we have together. We’ve been friends forever, half our lives.

Malachi Mills: It all comes back to blues, yeah. And just like you said, that cross-pollination of the different genres. North Georgia is like the southern point of Appalachia. Like she said, it really influences the music we make by our harmonies. That’s the biggest thing we take from it. I love bluegrass music, but I’m not like a bluegrass buff. I would lose at bluegrass trivia. [Laughs] But it’s just in our bones and in the harmonies that she was talking about. Growing up in church and everything influences the way that we sing together and the notes that we pick whenever we’re singing harmonies. One of the biggest things that I love about bluegrass is the rhythm and pocket. And the intonation of the instruments. Bluegrass players choose to be intentional about [all of] it, the pocket, the timing, the tuning. It’s all so dead on. The details matter when you’re making records.

Dierks Bentley and band give Good Country and members of the media an exclusive sneak peek at their Broken Branches Tour set at rehearsals in May 2025 in Nashville. Photo by Zach Belcher.

I think that’s one of the reasons why it’s striking that y’all have this bluegrass song as part of this big, arena-sized stage show. Because for me, translating those details in such a big space and in such a broad format could be really hard.

Then I hear and see y’all singing in three parts with a neon cross behind you and suddenly yes, this is church. This is what it is. Any close-singing harmony vocals are great, but when it really sounds like bluegrass to me is when you can hear the reeds of your voices match up when you’re harmonizing. That was a really beautiful moment.

Could you talk a little bit about capturing those details for a big audience in big rooms like this – or even outside, in amphitheaters. How do you take a Bill Monroe gospel song and translate it to that space?

DB: Well, there’s “Bluegrass” Ben Helson out there walking the hallways. Ben and a couple other guys in the band have played with Ricky Skaggs. Ben played with Ricky and Tim [Sergent] still plays with Ricky. I always say, if you can graduate from the Ricky Skaggs school of bluegrass and country music, you’re probably a pretty good musician. He also played with Rhonda Vincent.

I’m a big Del McCoury fan. They did [“Get Down on Your Knees and Pray”] and Del has such a cool version of it. We were just kinda thinking of songs to do with these guys that would be great using their voices. Like [they] said, they’re the blues and bluegrass. I’m still trying to figure out their sound. It’s such a unique mixture; it’s so Americana in the way that in this country we have this melting pot of stuff. We thought it would be cool to do a little three-part thing, so that one came up.

Marty Stuart also did a really cool version of that song. But Ben [Helson], our guitar player really came up with that [arrangement], leaning into the swampy stuff they do. Gave it that feel, a little Southern – I don’t know what the vibe is there, but that telecaster is playing and it just has a cool kind of dirty, bluesy vibe to it. Then working up the harmonies, there’s just something about hearing a cappella bands.

I remember seeing Billy Strings at a bluegrass festival years ago and the band all stopped – no one knew who he was back then. Bryan Sutton had told me who he was, so I was where he was. He played like a Thursday set in the middle of the day. They had just done three songs and then they stopped and did a four-part harmony thing. There’s just something about it that’s so powerful. It goes straight to your soul.

The oldest version of entertainment there was was probably harmonizing. Finding people, seeing how your voices sound together, it’s a weird, cool thing. Singers talk about it all the time, in any genre of music about how seeing how we sound together is an intimate thing.

It’s vulnerable and it’s immediately establishing that community that you’re talking about. “We may not be a band, but now we’re a thing.”

DB: I feel like I blend well with anybody, because I’m like the condition. I sing it pretty straight here and allow the people around me to really do their stuff. I’m just gonna hold the line. There’s like nothing special about my voice, but it’s good to blend with ’cause other people have these amazing voices. They can do a lot of movement and a lot of great vibrato. I’m like the dumbest Del McCoury School of Bluegrass [student], just find that note and put everything into it. [Laughs]

Not to mention, introducing people to bluegrass as well – I love that. You have a chance to be a bridge to your heroes and that is always fun. People have been that to me, Marty Stuart probably the biggest. You get into Marty Stuart’s music and you find out who he likes, and then, whoa! He brings you back there. So [I hope] this turns somebody onto Bill Monroe. That’s pretty cool.

Dierks Bentley has a quiet moment on stage during rehearsals for the Broken Branches Tour. Photo by Zach Belcher.

Country – a lot like blues, R&B, and the early days of rock and roll – it has this often tempestuous and inspiring relationship between the fun of Saturday night and the conviction of Sunday morning. So seeing y’all sing that song in front of the depiction of a church as a dive bar, complete with a neon cross and a flickering “open” sign – to me that’s “a little bit holy water, a little bit Burning Man” epitomized. You guys are embodying that relationship between the sacred and the secular here. And that duality is all over your new album, too, Dierks.

MM: I’ll say, I think that one of the biggest things that contributes to that is the goosebump, hair-standing-up-on-your-arm feeling. It’s knowing that you have a part in something and whenever you sing and play bluegrass music together, you have to give way to one another on stage. So it’s the whole stage saying we’re doing this very intentionally in unity, in harmony.

And everybody in the crowd, whether they know that or not, they feel it. That’s what I think people feel. Even if you’re not a believer and maybe the message that’s being said [doesn’t apply], but you still resonate with serving each other. With being present, which is a strong energy. I think that’s what makes me excited about playing this song. I don’t know what’s gonna happen emotionally for me whenever that moment happens, ’cause it’s gonna be so much of that unified energy.

DB: Unified energy is a good way of putting it. It’s unified and it really is energy.

We’re pretty involved with the church. I have an older daughter who’s involved in the church and another middle daughter who doesn’t believe it like I did. But there’s something divine that you just can’t ignore, whether you believe it or not – just look at a sunset, look at a flower, look at a fish, look at so much unnecessary beauty in the world. There’s just some energy that exists and you can’t deny it when you sing a song like this. It just taps [something] on anybody. Recognizing how small you are in this world and the power of whatever version of prayer you do.

LS: I liked how you said it joins secular and holy together and that actually made me think of the tent revival, as well. I think growing up in Appalachia, like Malachi said – I wish I could just teleport you there so you could experience!

DB: That would be cool, a tent revival – I can’t even imagine.

I haven’t been to a camp meeting or revival in so long!

LS: Everybody’s invited to camp meeting. I don’t know if you’d love it. Our tent – I say tent, it’s like a shack on a square, it’s like a big square, four sides. So we’ll say, “Are you on the upper line or the lower line?” We’re on the upper line, which is not a good thing. It’s like you think upper line is like uppity people or something, but it’s not. Our shack is the oldest and [most] untouched of the whole campground. It was built in 1846.

DB: Wow!

LS: So there’s holes in the roof and like, my bunk bed, I get water drops on my head if it rains. There’s hay floors, there’s no air, and there’s a lot of us, so it’s all packed in there. But camp meeting is where I learned my first Bible verses and where I smoked my first joint. [Laughs] So it all marries together how you said, like holy and secular at the same time. I think of that picture of going to the gospel tent revival, going to camp meeting, singing those red-back hymns, doing all those things – but then also learning the grit of growing up.

I just loved when you said joining those things together, because that was such a representation of my upbringing. Yeah, it’s a little bit holy water, a little bit Burning Man. It’s definitely Saturday nights and Sunday mornings – and the tent revival is where I feel like those two worlds are so evident.

Dierks, in all you’ve done across your career there are all these bluegrass moments. The country that you “grow,” it’s mainstream, it’s radio-ready, but it’s like there’s bluegrass in the “soil” you grow it in, so you can always taste bluegrass in everything you do. Like on the new record, “Never You” with Miranda Lambert feels that way and “For As Long As I Can Remember”–

DB: There’s a little “Circles Around Me” by Sam Bush [reference] there at the top of that song.

Oh my gosh, yeah! Exactly what I’m talking about.

You said a little bit earlier turning people onto your heroes always feels great, but for you, from your own perspective being that guy that used to just hang out at the Station Inn and now being the Dierks Bentley and going on tour in sheds and arenas and amphitheaters… Why do you keep bluegrass with you?

Dierks Bentley: It is selfish in a lot of ways. I have such a great band and I just take so much joy watching them do cool stuff that I can’t do. It’s like our guitar player, Ben, he’s just an unbelievable flat picker. Charlie Worsham’s in our band and Charlie won the CMA Musician of the Year. He is just an incredible musician. Dan [Hochhalter] is an incredible fiddle player. Tim is so underutilized. Our steel guitar player – who plays banjo and everything else – he’s one of the best singers to me. Hearing him is like hearing Merle Haggard. He sings like nobody else, but he’s also so underutilized. And Steve’s been playing with me since 1999.

It’s just a great group and we love bluegrass music, featuring that, and having the music part of the show. I like being in a band setting, so just getting to be around it and hear these instruments swirling around me playing, I think it’s just cool.

I got a chance to play ROMP Festival last year and I feel lucky to be friends with guys like Jerry Douglas and Sierra Hull and have them come up on stage and play with us. I still think bluegrass music is the punk rock of country. It’s just the coolest genre of music there is.

It’s gotta be centering or grounding to a certain degree just to have that as something you can go back to, to feed yourself and fill yourself back up even while you’re touring.

DB: Absolutely. In the show we go from playing Tony Rice to John Michael Montgomery. We play bluegrass with the Hot Country Knights with costumes on. It’s just it’s all very selfish! It’s like, “How can I have a lot of fun in the next 90 minutes?”

I wanna do our radio country. I want people singing songs back, because that’s a great feeling. I want to get a little bluegrass in there. Just see if we get away with that. Then, can we try to get canceled on the way out? [Laughs] I dunno. It’s really fun for me. And having these guys [out with us] and getting to harmonize with them, it’s gonna be really fun. Check back in a few months, see how it turned out.

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All photos by Zach Belcher.

Dierkscography

Posted on by Justin Hiltner

In 1994, a not yet 20-year-old Dierks Bentley threw all caution to the wind when he packed up his dorm room at the University of Vermont with hopes to never return. Bentley’s relocation would not only forever change the course of his life – it would go on to catalyze his tremendous impact on roots music at large.

After a trip with his father to Nashville made quite the impression, Bentley decided to complete his college degree at Vanderbilt, dedicating his studies to English (the major most proximal to songwriting). After graduating, Bentley continued to foster both his musical education and career; his day job entailed archiving old country performances at The Nashville Network (in fact, his diligent field work even got him banned temporarily from the Grand Ole Opry), while his evenings were filled with bar gigs and songwriting sessions. After five years of grunt work, 2003 saw Bentley release a self-titled album with Capitol Records. His first single, “What Was I Thinkin’,” made waves on the country charts. Since then, Bentley has been responsible for the release of 20 No. 1 country singles and 10 additional studio albums, the latest of which, Broken Branches, arrived in June.

While Bentley’s career has seen major commercial country success, his deep respect for expansion and immersion has made him a beloved fixture within bluegrass, as well.

Of his instrumental move to Nashville, Bentley has shared, “I moved to Nashville in 1994 – I was trying to find that seed of truth, that authenticity, that thing ‘country music’ that I had in my head. And I got here and it was definitely different than I expected it to be. It’s big business, a lot of money.

“Luckily, for me, I found a little bar called the Station Inn where bluegrass music existed – and I found what I was looking for. Just the sound of a five-piece bluegrass band blew my mind. And they’re not trying to take meetings all the time and meet producers, and get their foot in the door. It’s funny, I moved to Nashville looking for country music, but I found bluegrass.”

Whether it’s his proclivity for cross-genre conversation, songwriting prowess, or patinaed tenor delivery, Dierks has proved himself a mainstay favorite for country, Americana, and bluegrass fans – here at Good Country and BGS, and beyond. In honor of his recent album release and his huge Broken Branches tour with Zach Top and the Band Loula concluding this month, we present you with our Dierkscography, a non-comprehensive compilation of more than 15 songs meant to show off some of our favorite Dierks gems from across genres sampled from the many years of his remarkable career.

“Never You” featuring Miranda Lambert, Broken Branches (2025)

Dierks’s new album, Broken Branches, arrived fresh off the press with a slew of impressive collaborators, from Riley Green to Stephen Wilson Jr. Dierks fondly calls the record a “special” display of “making music in the studio with our buddies.” Country giant and longtime collaborator Miranda Lambert joins Bentley on this banjo-driven track, with the pair’s velvety duet vocals imbuing tenderness and warmth into one of the album’s only love songs.

“High Note” featuring Billy Strings, Gravel & Gold (2023)

This rip-roaring tune off of Bentley’s tenth studio album features a whole handful of bluegrass greats. Not only does Billy’s high tenor soar above Dierks gravelly tones during choruses, his famous flatpicking joins the likes of Sam Bush, Bryan Sutton, and Jerry Douglas for a superjam ending.

Of the collaboration, Dierks recalls, “Bryan Sutton first tipped me off to Billy Strings about seven years ago, mentioning that the future of bluegrass was in good hands. I was totally blown away the first time I saw him. I’ve cut songs like these since my first record, and I knew I wanted to have him on this one, I’m such a huge fan. It was a lot of fun to have him, Jerry, Sam, and Bryan all passing licks around – having them all on this record means a lot to me personally.”

“American Girl” (2024)

Who doesn’t love an Americana “American Girl”? Bentley delivers this country-fied Tom Petty classic alongside some BGS favorites, including Chris Eldridge on guitar and Noam Pikelny on banjo. Dierks reprised the hit single joined by Bronwyn Keith-Hynes, Sierra Hull, and Molly Tuttle on stage at the 2024 CMA Awards, bringing down the house.

“For As Long As I Can Remember,” Broken Branches (2025)

The country canon has seen its fair share of heartache, murder, trains, and drinking. Also on his latest release, “For As Long As I Can Remember” shirks these motifs in favor of something a little more wholesome – a warm and adoring ballad dedicated to the strength of enduring familial bond. An ode to his brother and father, Dierks reminds that respect and love can be country, too.

“Train Travelin’,” Dierks Bentley (2003)

With many of his nascent Nashville days edified by nights at the Station Inn and in the surrounding bluegrass scene, iconic bluegrass family the McCourys quickly became repeat collaborators for Dierks. Their features pepper many of his earlier albums, dating all the way back to his debut self-titled release in 2003. “Train Travelin’” would become the first of many, with other gems such as Good Man Like Me (Modern Day Drifter, 2005) and Last Call featuring Ronnie McCoury (Feel That Fire, 2009) dotting the road to Bentley’s eventual bluegrass-centric album, Up On The Ridge.

“Up On The Ridge,” Up On The Ridge (2010)

The titular track off of Bentley’s bluegrass-inspired album is thrumming with energy, both quickly-paced and haunting with its descending melodic hook. Up On The Ridge was Bentley’s fifth studio album, featuring a star-studded list of bluegrass collaborators including Alison Krauss, Punch Brothers, Chris Stapleton, Tim O’Brien, Sam Bush, and beyond. Del McCoury even joins forces with Bentley and Punch Brothers to deliver a deliciously grassified cover of U2’s “Pride (in the Name of Love)” further evidencing the album as a culmination of both tradition and innovation.

“Freeborn Man,” (Live, 2025)

Another of our favorite timeless covers, Dierks has been adorning his Broken Branches Tour this summer with his vigorous take on “Freeborn Man.” This rendition includes a fiery feature by Zach Top, nearly toppling the stage with talent.

“Hoedown for My Lowdown Rowdy Ways” featuring Dierks Bentley, Lowdown Hoedown (Jason Carter, 2022)

With Jason Carter fiddling his heart out on Dierks’ records since 2003, it’s of course a polite roots custom for Dierks to return the favor. Released as part of Carter’s second solo album, Lowdown Hoedown, “Hoedown for My Lowdown Rowdy Ways” has Dierks singing harmony and strumming away on the bluesy breakdown. Lowdown Hoedown also features a tender Jamie Hartford number, “Good Things Happen,” that Dierks Bentley covered on his 2005 album Modern Day Drifter, yet another frame of conversation between the two artists.

“Prodigal Son’s Prayer” featuring The Grascals, Long Trip Alone (2006)

This acoustic tune features the bluegrass sensibilities of the Grascals, a long-running group lauded for their instrumental prowess. The song loosely follows the parable of the prodigal son, ultimately centering themes of repair and reconciliation. The song also features the stomps and hums of incarcerated individuals from Charles Bass Correctional Complex, who had been in Bentley’s producer’s Bible studies course at the time.

“Free and Easy (Down The Road I Go),” Long Trip Alone (2006)

From the same release, this breezy banger remains a hallmark of Bentley’s career, even after nearly two decades since it dropped. The fifth of his singles to top Billboard’s Hot Country charts, “Free and Easy (Down The Road I Go)” lures in listeners with its fast-paced country twang and life-affirming sentiment.

“Beautiful World” featuring Patty Griffin, Feel That Fire (2009)

No stranger to incredible collaborators, Dierks Bentley asked iconic folk and country singer-songwriter Patty Griffin to accompany him on this track, gushing, “Her voice is one of a kind and she’s such an important figure in the American music scene… She’s just amazing. And so I asked her.”

The result is a tender homage to the beauties of the world, largely inspired by his wife, who was pregnant with their daughter at the time of the song’s conception. “You hear people sometimes say, ‘Man, I can’t imagine bringing a child into this world. It’s so bad.’ That’s just such a negative outlook,” Dierks says. “You cannot live your life with that viewpoint of the world. Yes, there are a lot of things that are wrong, but it is a beautiful world, and you need to find the positive in it.”

“Heart of a Lonely Girl,” Home (2012)

From Bentley’s sixth studio album, Home, comes this spirited, emotionally deep number. The narrative song was penned by the infinitely talented Charlie Worsham, who would go on to join Bentley’s touring band a decade later – and you can currently see him on stage each night during the Broken Branches tour.

“Trip Around the Sun,” featuring Dierks Bentley, I Built a World (Bronwyn Keith-Hynes, 2024)

Fiddler Bronwyn Keith-Hynes first connected with Bentley through Molly Tuttle & Golden Highway, the popular bluegrass group that opened for him several times on tour. She’s also married to Jason Carter, so Dierks wasn’t just a professional collaborator, but a member of her personal Nashville network, as well. It’s no surprise, then, that she’d end up on stage with him at the CMA Awards and, in the same year, he would guest on her acclaimed and GRAMMY Award-nominated album, I Built a World.

“Mardi Gras” featuring Trombone Shorty, Black (2016)

Soaked in Louisiana charm, this tune was inspired by Dierk’s 2015 galavant on a Mardi Gras parade float. Featuring the indelible hornsmanship of Trombone Shorty, the track grooves along with bluesy undertones. “Getting Trombone Shorty to do his thing on it, what a great guy. I love working with him. He is so laid-back and so good at what he does,” Bentley boasts of his collaborator.

“Travelin’ Light” featuring Brandi Carlile, The Mountain (2018)

Featuring the powerhouse vocals of Americana giant Brandi Carlile, this tune appears on Bentley’s 2018 album, The Mountain. The collaboration between the two icons came to fruition after Bentley saw Brandi perform at Telluride Bluegrass Festival, inspiring him to approach her about dueting on the track.

“Sun Sets in Colorado,” Gravel & Gold (2023)

Written reflecting his pandemic move to Colorado (though he has since returned to Nashville), Bentley released this tune on Gravel & Gold. The song shouts out New Grass Revival and Telluride in a verse: “Sing an old new grass song with me/ Telluride along with me,” while also featuring New Grass Revival founding member Sam Bush on mandolin. Bryan Sutton also joins in on the studio recording, yet another sparkling collab with bluegrass greats.

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Photo Credit: Robby Klein

Tyler Childers: The Backstory (In Songs)

Posted on by Justin Hiltner

Tyler Childers has taken an unlikely path to the top via live performance, not radio singles. He’s become an improbable arena-level star by ignoring typical Nashville bromides – equal parts Patterson Hood’s working-class Southern blues, Chris Stapleton’s bluegrass bonafides, and Woody Guthrie’s progressive populism. After all, you’re not gonna call your touring band The Food Stamps unless you lean left, at least a little.

Like Billy Strings, Childers has become enough of a sensation for his appeal to extend beyond the Americana-adjacent world, too. Last year, he even turned up onstage for a live cameo with pop star Olivia Rodrigo in his Kentucky stomping grounds to do his song “All Your’n.” It went over like a house on fire.

Since country radio is finally, belatedly catching on with “Nose On The Grindstone,” lead single to Childers’ fine new Rick Rubin-produced LP Snipe Hunter, let’s take a look back to where he came from.

How’d this happen, anyway? Like this.

“Hard Times,” Bottles and Bibles (2011)

Going back to the beginning, “Hard Times” was the song that opened Childers’ full-length debut Bottles and Bibles. It’s an actual hillbilly elegy that definitely sets a tone, with finely detailed lyrics that unfold like a short story. Simultaneously stoic and emotional, Childers’ quavering vocal about a holdup gone wrong makes him sound like a protagonist who somehow regrets both everything and nothing at all: “And if the Lord wants to take me, I’m here for the taking/ ‘Cause Hell’s probably better than tryin’ to get by.”

“Long Violent History,” Long Violent History (2020)

Bluegrass roots and of-the-moment progressive activism makes for an unusual combination, but here we are. “Long Violent History” is the title track to a bluegrass album and it’s the only original and non-instrumental track on the record. Evoking “Faded Love” at the outset and “My Old Kentucky Home” on the outro, it’s a rural Southern score for the Black Lives Matter protests that swept America in 2020.

“It’s the worst that it’s been since the last time it happened,” Childers sighs at the outset, resigned to the inevitability of violence happening again. For good measure, Childers made a supplemental spoken-word video (below) explaining the necessity of BLM: “If we didn’t need to be reminded, there would be justice for Breonna Taylor, a Kentuckian like me, and countless others.”

“Jersey Giant” – Elle King (2022)

If Childers ever records his own version of “Jersey Giant,” he’ll have to hustle to top Elle King’s cover. As with the similarly themed “Me and Bobby McGee” (written by Kris Kristofferson, but owned for the ages by Janis Joplin), King just completely inhabits the song’s bittersweet, longing anguish. “I left town when we were over… Just didn’t feel the same” – the way she pauses a beat between lines is just chef’s-kiss perfection. There are numerous cover versions of “Jersey Giant” out there, but this is the one that’s going to linger.

“Luke 2:8-10,” Rustin’ In The Rain (2023)

Remember the big pivot-point moment of truth in the classic holiday cartoon A Charlie Brown Christmas – the “Lights, please” speech that his friend Linus makes? Childers must have grown up with that, too. Linus spoke these Bible verses, Luke 2:8-10, which Childers transposes to the key of honky-tonk in this song with his drawl in full effect. You can almost imagine the “Peanuts” dancers doing a two-step to it.

“Purgatory,” Can I Take My Hounds to Heaven? (2022)

Childers’ ambitiously wide-ranging 2022 album Can I Take My Hounds to Heaven? featured eight gospel songs, each done in three different versions dubbed Hallelujah, Jubilee, and Joyful Noise. The latter category tricked each tune up with samples and remixes, which might be the closest Childers has ever come to hip-hop electronica (at least so far!). In this guise, the title track from his 2017 project Purgatory cuts the sort of groove you’d expect to hear in New Orleans.

“The Heart You’ve Been Tending,” Harlan Road – NewTown (2016)

What does it mean that so many of the best covers of Childers’ songs are by women? Who’s to say, but here’s another great one, from the Kentucky band NewTown’s Harlan Road album. “The Heart You’ve Been Tending” is in waltz time, with fiddler/singer Kati Penn’s vocal shining bright as a lighthouse cutting through a foggy mountain breakdown.

“In Your Love,” Rustin’ in the Rain (2023)

Another multimedia project of sorts, this song from Childers’ Rustin’ in the Rain started out as a relatively conventional devotional love song. Then he enlisted collaborators including his fellow Kentuckian, author Silas House, to make a video that casts “In Your Love” as a sort of country music version of Brokeback Mountain set in coal-mining country. As beautiful as it is heartbreaking.

“Matthew,” Country Squire (2019)

Childers has always been wildly eclectic and this song from his Country Squire LP is a prime example. “Matthew” is yet another working-class waltz, with enough bluegrass savvy to drop bluegrass legend Clarence White’s name in the lyrics – plus an actual sitar as oddball sound-effect mood-setter at the beginning of the song. Somehow it makes perfect sense.

“Bottles and Bibles (Live),” Live on Red Barn Radio I & II (2018)

With or without a band, Childers has always been a riveting performer. This live version of the title track to his 2011 studio debut closed out 2018’s Live on Red Barn Radio I & II and it’s just voice and guitar. All the better to focus on the tale of a preacher as wayfaring stranger pondering the difficulties of keeping to the straight and narrow: “But they ain’t had to walk with the weight that you’ve hauled/ They don’t know you at all, but they think that they do.”

“Coal,” Bottles and Bibles (2011)

What might Bruce Springsteen have been like if he’d grown up in a Kentucky coal-mining family? You can imagine him turning out like the narrator of this song, which sounds way too timeless to have originated in this century. It’s pure working-class desperation: “We coulda made something of ourselves out there, if we’d listened to the folks/ That coal is gonna bury you.”

“Oneida,” Snipe Hunter (2025)

To be a Childers fan is to accept that he does have some idiosyncratic boundaries. There are songs from his live shows he’s never recorded, like the previously mentioned “Jersey Giant”; or popular recorded songs he has sworn off playing live, including the now-widely-seen-as-problematic “Feathered Indians.” For the better part of a decade, one of his unrecorded orphans was “Oneida,” a longtime fan favorite that’s like a Harold and Maude for the country set. Lo and behold, a recorded version finally surfaced as one of the best songs on Snipe Hunter. Dreams do come true.

Find more of our Artist of the Month coverage of Tyler Childers – including our Essentials Playlist – here.

Photo Credit: Sam Waxman

See All the Nominees for the 36th Annual IBMA Awards

Posted on by Justin Hiltner

Today, July 16, 2025, the nominees, inductees, and recipients of the 36th Annual IBMA Bluegrass Music Awards were announced in Nashville, Tennessee at a special live event broadcast from SiriusXM’s studios co-hosted by Sierra Hull and Bluegrass Junction radio host and programmer Joey Black. The announcement broadcast also featured live on-air performances by Hull and the Travelin’ McCourys.

Alison Krauss & Union Station lead the nominations following the release of their first album in over a decade, Arcadia. Between Krauss, and Union Station’s band members, the group have amassed nine nominations, including Entertainer of the Year – for which their last win was in 1995 – Album of the Year, and Vocal Group of the Year. Billy Strings, who last took home an Entertainer of the Year trophy in 2023, received five nominations – for Entertainer of the Year, Album of the Year, Instrumental Group of the Year, Male Vocalist of the Year, and Guitar Player of the Year.

Alison Brown & Steve Martin have racked up a handful of nominations between them this year, too, and Jason Carter & Michael Cleveland’s excellent new duo album – and the pair of fiddlers themselves – appear all across the nominees list, the duo collecting nine nominations together and separately.

And, for the first time in the nearly 40-year history of the IBMA, a Black person will be inducted into the Bluegrass Music Hall of Fame. Arnold Schultz, a seminal figure in bluegrass, blues, and old-time credited with greatly influencing the Father of Bluegrass, Bill Monroe, will be the first non-white member of the genre’s hall of honor.

“Our mission is to inspire innovation by recognizing the great work done by artists this past year and to honor tradition by inducting new members into the Bluegrass Music Hall of Fame,” said Ken White, executive director of IBMA, via press release. “The early influence of Arnold Shultz on Bill Monroe continues to shine through in the playing of even the youngest member of Kids on Bluegrass.”

Joining Schultz in this year’s class of Hall of Fame inductees are the Bluegrass Cardinals and Hot Rize. Additionally, IBMA announced 2025 recipients of their Distinguished Achievement Award, including Alan Arthur Knoth, Penny Parsons, Ron Thomason, Sidney Austin, LLP, and Missy Raines.

IBMA’s annual conference, World of Bluegrass, the IBMA Bluegrass Music Awards, and the organization’s annual festival, IBMA Bluegrass Live! will take place this year in a brand new host city, Chattanooga, Tennessee. The conference will run September 16-18 at the Chattanooga Convention Center; the IBMA Bluegrass Ramble, the event’s showcase series, will also run Sept. 16-18 in local venues. The 36th Annual IBMA Bluegrass Music Awards, where the winners, recipients, and inductees will be honored by their peers and fans, is scheduled for Thursday evening, Sept. 18; IBMA Bluegrass Live! will be held Sept. 19-20.

Find more information on IBMA and all of this year’s World of Bluegrass events in Chattanooga here and find the full list of nominees, recipients, and inductees below.

ENTERTAINER OF THE YEAR 

Alison Krauss & Union Station
Appalachian Road Show
Billy Strings
East Nash Grass
The Del McCoury Band

SONG OF THE YEAR 

“5 Days Out, 2 Days Back” – Alison Brown, Steve Martin, Featuring Tim O’Brien
Songwriters: Steve Martin, Alison Brown
Producers: Alison Brown, Garry West
Label: Compass Records

“Big Wheels” – Authentic Unlimited
Songwriter: Jerry Cole
Producer: Authentic Unlimited
Label: Billy Blue Records

“Coal Dust Kisses” – The Grascals
Songwriters: Susanne Mumpower, Jerry Salley
Producer: The Grascals
Label: Mountain Home Music Company

“My Favorite Picture of You” – Darin & Brooke Aldridge
Songwriters: Darin Aldridge, Brooke Aldridge, Dennis Duff
Producers: Darin Aldridge, Mark Fain
Label: Billy Blue Records

“Outrun the Rain” – Jason Carter & Michael Cleveland
Songwriters: Terry Herd, Jimmy Yeary
Producers: Jason Carter, Michael Cleveland
Label: Fiddle Man Records

ALBUM OF THE YEAR 

Arcadia – Alison Krauss & Union Station
Producer: Alison Krauss & Union Station
Label: Down the Road Records

Carter & Cleveland – Jason Carter & Michael Cleveland
Producers: Jason Carter, Michael Cleveland
Label: Fiddle Man Records

Earl Jam – Tony Trischka
Producers: Tony Trischka, Lawson White
Label: Down the Road Records

Highway Prayers – Billy Strings
Producers: Billy Strings, Jon Brion
Label: Reprise Records

I Built a World – Bronwyn Keith-Hynes
Producers: Brent Truitt, Bronwyn Keith-Hynes
Label: Sugar Petunia Records

VOCAL GROUP OF THE YEAR 

Alison Krauss & Union Station
Authentic Unlimited
Blue Highway
Sister Sadie
The Del McCoury Band

INSTRUMENTAL GROUP OF THE YEAR 

Billy Strings
East Nash Grass
Michael Cleveland & Flamekeeper
Molly Tuttle & Golden Highway
The Travelin’ McCourys

GOSPEL RECORDING OF THE YEAR 

“Blue Collar Gospel” – Jerry Salley Featuring The Oak Ridge Boys
Songwriters: Rick Lang, Bill Whyte, Jerry Salley
Producer: Jerry Salley
Label: Billy Blue Records

“Dear Lord” – Darin & Brooke Aldridge
Songwriter: Daniel Davis
Producers: Darin Aldridge, Mark Fain
Label: Billy Blue Records

“Even Better When You Listen” – Joe Mullins & The Radio Ramblers
Songwriters: Rick Lang, Mark BonDurant
Producer: Joe Mullins & The Radio Ramblers
Label: Billy Blue Records

“He’s Gone” – Jaelee Roberts
Songwriter: Kelsi Harrigill
Producer: Byron House
Label: Mountain Home Music Company

“Wings of Love” – Authentic Unlimited
Songwriters: Jesse Brock, Stephen Burwell, Jerry Cole, Eli Johnston, John Meador
Producer: Authentic Unlimited
Label: Billy Blue Records

INSTRUMENTAL RECORDING OF THE YEAR 

“Bluegrass in the Backwoods” – Jason Carter & Michael Cleveland
Songwriter: Kenny Baker
Producers: Jason Carter, Michael Cleveland
Label: Fiddle Man Records

“The Drifter” – Danny Roberts
Songwriter: Danny Roberts
Producers: Danny Roberts, Andrea Roberts
Label: Mountain Home Music Company

“A Drive at Dusk” – Authentic Unlimited
Songwriter: Jesse Brock
Producer: Authentic Unlimited
Label: Billy Blue Records

“Kern County Breakdown” – Jason Carter & Michael Cleveland
Songwriter: Buck Owens, Don Rich
Producers: Jason Carter, Michael Cleveland
Label: Fiddle Man Records

“Ralph’s Banjo Special” – Kristin Scott Benson, Gena Britt, Alison Brown
Songwriter: Ralph Stanley
Producer: Alison Brown
Label: Compass Records

NEW ARTIST OF THE YEAR 

AJ Lee & Blue Summit
Bronwyn Keith-Hynes
Jason Carter
Red Camel Collective
Wyatt Ellis

COLLABORATIVE RECORDING OF THE YEAR 

“5 Days Out, 2 Days Back” – Alison Brown & Steve Martin Featuring Tim O’Brien
Songwriters: Steve Martin, Alison Brown
Producer: Alison Brown, Garry West
Label: Compass Records

“A Million Memories (A Song for Byron)” – Darin & Brooke Aldridge Featuring Vince Gill
Songwriter: Vince Gill
Producers: Darin Aldridge, Mark Fain
Label: Billy Blue Records

“Cora Is Gone” – Bobby Osborne & C.J. Lewandowski Featuring Rob McCoury, Billy Strings
Songwriter: Mac Odell
Producer: C.J. Lewandowski
Label: Turnberry Records

“Outrun the Rain” – Jason Carter & Michael Cleveland, Jaelee Roberts, Vince Gill
Songwriters: Terry Herd, Jimmy Yeary
Producers: Jason Carter, Michael Cleveland
Label: Fiddle Man Records

“Ralph’s Banjo Special” – Kristin Scott Benson, Gena Britt, Alison Brown
Songwriter: Ralph Stanley
Producer: Alison Brown
Label: Compass Records

MALE VOCALIST OF THE YEAR 

Billy Strings
Dan Tyminski
Del McCoury
Greg Blake
Russell Moore

FEMALE VOCALIST OF THE YEAR 

AJ Lee
Alison Krauss
Brooke Aldridge
Jaelee Roberts
Sierra Hull

BANJO PLAYER OF THE YEAR 

Alison Brown
Gena Britt
Kristin Scott Benson
Ron Block
Tony Trischka

BASS PLAYER OF THE YEAR 

Barry Bales
Mike Bub
Missy Raines
Todd Phillips
Vickie Vaughn

FIDDLE PLAYER OF THE YEAR 

Bronwyn Keith-Hynes
Jason Carter
Maddie Denton
Michael Cleveland
Stuart Duncan

RESOPHONIC GUITAR PLAYER OF THE YEAR 

Andy Hall
Jerry Douglas
Justin Moses
Matt Leadbetter
Rob Ickes

GUITAR PLAYER OF THE YEAR 

Billy Strings
Bryan Sutton
Cody Kilby
Molly Tuttle
Trey Hensley

MANDOLIN PLAYER OF THE YEAR 

Alan Bibey
Jesse Brock
Ronnie McCoury
Sam Bush
Sierra Hull

MUSIC VIDEO OF THE YEAR 

“5 Days Out, 2 Days Back” – Alison Brown & Steve Martin Featuring Tim O’Brien
Songwriters: Steve Martin, Alison Brown
Producer: Alison Brown, Garry West
Videographer: Joseph Spence
Label: Compass Records

“A Million Memories (A Song for Byron)” – Darin & Brooke Aldridge Featuring Vince Gill
Songwriter: Vince Gill
Producer: Jenny Gill
Videographer: Travis Flynn
Label: Billy Blue Records

“Big Wheels” – Authentic Unlimited
Songwriter: Jerry Cole
Producers: Bryce Free, Kyle Johnson
Videographer: Bryce Free
Label: Billy Blue Records

“Gallows Pole” – Appalachian Road Show
Songwriter: Traditional, arr. Barry Abernathy, Jim VanCleve, Darrell Webb
Producer: Steve Kinney
Videographer: Steve Kinney
Label: Billy Blue Records

“Tennessee Hound Dog” – The Grascals
Songwriter: Felice Bryant, Boudleaux Bryant
Producer: Ty Gilpin
Videographer: Nate Shuppert
Label: Mountain Home Music Company

“The Auctioneer” – The Kody Norris Show
Songwriters: Leroy Van Dyke, Buddy Black
Producer: James Gilley
Videographer: Nate Wiles
Label: Rebel Records

HALL OF FAME INDUCTEES

Hot Rize
The Bluegrass Cardinals
Arnold Schultz

DISTINGUISHED ACHIEVEMENT AWARD RECIPIENTS

Alan Arthur Knoth
Penny Parsons
Ron Thomason
Sidney Austin, LLP
Missy Raines

The 36th Annual IBMA Bluegrass Music Awards will be held September 18, 2025 in Chattanooga, Tennessee. Tickets and more information here.

Photo Credit: Alison Krauss by Randee St. Nicholas; Billy Strings by Dana Trippe.

50 Years of 0044: JD Crowe & The New South’s Landmark Album

Posted on by Justin Hiltner

Writer Marty Godby called it “The convergence of 1975.”

The elements: a band that would only be together for 10 months, a benevolent venture capitalist who loved bluegrass, and an upstart record label from Boston. The resulting product was unprecedented and unforgettable: The New South, Rounder Records 0044. Bluegrass fans know it simply as “0044.”

The New South of this recording was J.D. Crowe on banjo; Tony Rice on guitar; Ricky Skaggs on mandolin; Bobby Slone on bass; and Jerry Douglas on Dobro. The impact of that configuration and the album were stunning. Yet, within a year of the recording, Rice would leave to become a founding member of the David Grisman Quintet. Skaggs and Douglas formed Boone Creek. Crowe and Slone continued performing together for years.

Rounder 0044 was influential enough to be preserved in the Library of Congress’ National Recording Registry in 2024 and was awarded induction into the GRAMMY Hall of Fame this year. This month, Real Gone Music will re-release the album on vinyl, as will Craft Recordings later this year on compact disc.

Both the origin story and legacy of 0044 have inspired great narratives, probably more than any other bluegrass album. Bill Nowlin, one of the three founders of Rounder Records, wrote three articles for BGS on the album’s 40th anniversary. They offer a step-by-step look at what happened in 1974 and 75, plus hilarious and poignant anecdotes and quotes.

David Menconi dedicated a chapter of his excellent book, Oh, Didn’t They Ramble: Rounder Records and the Transformation of American Roots Music, to 0044. In 2016, radio host Daniel Mullins focused his college history capstone project on the album. Of course, it was 44 pages.

THE SHORT VERSION

 

J.D. Crowe, already revered for his banjo playing and baritone singing, led a band called The Kentucky Mountain Boys. From 1968, they had a six-nights-a-week gig at the Red Slipper Lounge in a Lexington, Kentucky Holiday Inn. Crowe added non-traditional bluegrass instruments and songs to the Holiday Inn repertoire. This was as much to please a diverse audience as it was to keep the musicians from getting bored. In 1971, Crowe changed the band’s name to The New South.

Of the name change, Rounder’s Marian Leighton Levy said, “It was obvious that this was a new kind of bluegrass.” From a broader view, “It was an era when the South was, in a way, trying to self-consciously reinvent itself as a new, modern place. And they [The New South] were kind of the musical representation of that wider political context.”

It was the ’70s, and change was brewing – even in the tightly controlled world of country music, Levy noted. Around the same time, Willie Nelson and his Outlaw Country compatriots were reaching out to new songwriters and moving away, physically and musically, from “the factory system of Nashville publishing companies.”

In 1974, lead singer Larry Rice left the New South and brother Tony took over singing lead. Ricky Skaggs’ pure tenor mixed with Rice’s unmistakable mid-range voice, creating a new, dynamic tension for their duets and trios. In the summer of that year, Crowe and the band toured without any product to sell. At the annual Gettysburg Blue Grass Festival, Crowe, his friend and manager, venture capitalist Hugh Sturgill, and the young founders of Rounder Records initiated “The Great Convergence” – an agreement for a studio recording. An innovative contract led to the first New South album.

THE BLUEGRASS WORLD EXPLODED

 

As soon as they heard the test pressing, the Rounder founders knew they had something remarkable on their hands. “Jack Tottle [who, along with John Hartford, wrote liner notes for the album] was stunned, and he kept saying, ‘This is one of the most amazing records ever made.’ And he was not given to exaggerating,” Levy said.

“It was clear. It was crisp … and the more you played it, the more you wanted to hear it.”

0044 came out in the spring of 1975. Levy said by festival season, other bands were playing the tunes from the record “pretty much note for note.” One observer said that at one festival, almost every band on stage played “Old Home Place.”

So, what is it about that record? Let’s start with the musicians. Skip Heller, who initiated the 0044 Real Gone Music reissue, said everyone in that group of players “would talk about it like it was high school prom and their first love … they had all been in good bands before, but this was the first time they had been in a band that was as great as anything in bluegrass music had ever been.”

Levy said, “They absolutely knocked each other out. … And I think that long before anybody heard the record, they knew the band would stand the test of time – because of all of them, not just one person.”

The record’s title was The New South. Only after the first printing sold out, three band members had moved on, and it was time to redo the cover (read about the cover photo – a great story in itself), was it retitled J.D. Crowe & the New South. Crowe, born in 1937, was the venerated elder and a banjo icon. After entering Jimmy Martin’s boot-camp-of-a-band at age 18, he developed impeccable timing, his own take on Scruggs-style banjo, and excellence as a baritone singer. And he knew how to pick his band members.

The influences of Tony Rice (age 24 at the time) on bluegrass and related music are limitless – from cementing the role of guitar as a lead bluegrass instrument, to modeling impeccable rhythm playing and singing, to excelling in so many genres outside the bluegrass boundaries. At 21, Skaggs had the instrumental chops, a stunning voice and the instincts to become successful in both country and bluegrass. Rounder’s Ken Irwin attributes much of 0044’s innovation to Skaggs, including bringing a teenaged Douglas into the mix.

Douglas is to Dobro what Rice is to lead guitar. Fifty years later, after 14 GRAMMY awards and countless other honors, he continues to inspire and encourage musicality and creativity in Dobro playing. Touring with Alison Krauss since 1998, it’s likely that he has been heard live by more people than any other resophonic guitar player. Of the veteran, Bobby Slone, Mullins said, “Everyone in the band wanted to make sure that Bobby got a lot of credit. … He was such a rock solid force on that band, not just on bass, but as far as camaraderie was concerned.”

By the time The New South entered the studio, Crowe, Slone, and Rice, later joined by Skaggs, had spent hundreds of hours performing together at the Holiday Inn. Individually, they were superb musicians. Together, they were as tight as a band could be.

THE SONGS

 

Long before 0044, Crowe had blasted out from under bluegrass constraints, incorporating songs like Fats Domino’s “I’m Walkin,” and at Larry Rice’s suggestion, The Flying Burrito Brothers’ “Sin City.” The songs on 0044 were just a small set of a huge repertoire. While the unconventional musical choices sparked controversy among traditionalists, they also sparked a flame of excitement that spread quickly and widely.

In 1975, Mullins said, Ralph Stanley & the Clinch Mountain Boys, Jimmy Martin, and Bill Monroe were still “killing it” at festivals with their first generation bluegrass sound. “On the other end of the spectrum, Seldom Scene recorded Live at the Cellar Door,” an immensely popular recording, that year. Like the Country Gentlemen, the Scene had been recording songs totally out of the bluegrass box, using bluegrass instrumentation, but with an emphasis on rich melodies and harmonies, rather than just the drive of traditional bluegrass.

Mullins said, “You go to Crowe, who’s got the street cred from all his records with Martin, but he’s also looking ahead, and so he’s able to get it all in there. A lot of bands were playing to one side or the other … but to have one that hit right in the middle, right at that time, was unreal.”

“When they saw J.D. Crowe’s name up front, and they knew that he had played banjo with Jimmy Martin on all those records they had loved for 20 years, it probably made some of those hard-edged fans pay more attention,” he said.

Whatever the dynamics of the time, The New South became synonymous with great bluegrass. And 0044 made Ian Tyson’s songs forever acceptable in bluegrass jams.

ON AND ON

 

Kristin Scott Benson, six-time IBMA Banjo Player of the Year, was born the year after 0044 came out. Benson said she was about nine the first time she saw J.D. Crowe. He was playing with the Bluegrass Album Band, “and that was a formative experience. That band was so explosive, and the crowd had an air of chaos, because everybody was so excited to hear the band. Every time Tony Rice ended a solo, you couldn’t hear any music.” (Because of the crowd noise.)

It would be four years until she picked up the banjo, and two more years until she learned about The New South album – and what it meant to a banjo player.

On 0044, she says, “If you just talk quintessential banjo solos, you’ve got ‘I’m Walkin’ and ‘You Are What I Am.’ His tone is aggressive. It’s just such confident, groovy, greasy, pristine banjo. It’s impossible to overstate how good it is and how influential it is.”

“But I think you should listen to his contributions on the less banjo-friendly songs [‘Home Sweet Home Revisited,’ ’10 Degrees’], because Crowe was great at that. He was a magical backup player.”

Billy Failing, who currently plays banjo with Billy Strings, agrees. Failing started out his banjo life drawn to more progressive players like Béla Fleck. But, he said, “As time goes on, the more I circle back to J.D. Crowe. I think of how much of a gold standard he is for bluegrass banjo, and how interesting his playing is.”

“He’s considered a traditional player,” Failing continued, “but then I’m always hearing some lick that surprises me. It’s been a gradual thing, but it becomes more meaningful as time goes on. I was just listening to The New South album, and on ‘Cryin’ Holy’ – it’s just so slamming! He’s turned it up to 11 constantly on that one.” And, like Benson, he points out what he calls Crowe’s “intricate touch” on banjo.

“It’s such a cool kind of push and pull between whether he’s out front or whether he’s playing backup … it catches your attention in such a cool way.”

Benson said, “It’s easy just to be drawn to those obvious picks [like ‘Old Home Place’] but the album is so much deeper than that. This particular band presented a tightness and a level of execution that was new – I don’t think there had been a bluegrass record up until that point that was so well done.”

“The vocals, the arrangements are so well thought out. Everybody’s playing so well together. It was just a special moment and a special group of people, and I think it raised the bar for bluegrass albums,” she said, and made an imprint on so many contemporary musicians.

Benson poses the question, “Who’s the most influential modern bluegrass guy? It would have to be Tony Rice, because he affected the genre with his rhythm guitar playing, which is phenomenal. And that type of rhythm playing affects the entire groove of the band. It became the new standard, what most people go for.”

“Never discount the importance of his rhythm,” she continued, “and then obviously his lead playing, but also his singing and his material choice … so if someone pinned me down and I could only name one, he might be the guy.”

Failing, speaking of his bandmates, said, “Everybody’s inspired by The New South. I hear Billy [Strings] constantly talking about his inspiration by Tony Rice, and Jarrod [Walker] by Ricky Skaggs.” (Walker wrote liner notes for the Real Gone Music re-release.)

Mullins noted that the Rice/Skaggs blend – a lead singer with a baritone-range voice coupled with a high tenor – established a hair-tingling blend that continues to be emulated, from Ronnie Bowman and Don Rigsby in Lonesome River Band through Alison Krauss’ duets with Dan Tyminski and Russell Moore.

Benson said, “It’s an important record for the genre as a whole, and it’s also an important record to me, personally, and really, to any banjo player who is serious about learning. It’s one of those essential albums.”

UNANSWERED QUESTIONS

 

First, how did it come to be widely known as 0044? Well, nobody’s sure. Irwin and Levy remember being in the very early stages of their operations at the time – with both a new label and a new distribution company. All three Rounders had been totally immersed in music, but they were learning the business as they went, developing it on their own terms.

Levy speculated, “It is possible that it went back to when we were just calling records by their numbers,” when there just weren’t that many products. “So, it may have been something we started when we were talking, and other people picked up on it, not intentionally. And we thought it was sort of humorous.”

And how did members of Emmylou Harris’ Angel Band get left off the credits, as well as the fact that J.D. played guitar on it? John Lawless goes into depth in his fascinating Bluegrass Today article.

HAPPY 50TH BIRTHDAY

 

As the liner notes to the Real Gone Music re-release say, “Virtually no other album anywhere in history is known to its audience by its label number. Not Kind of Blue, nor Pet Sounds, Glenn Gould’s Goldberg Variations, none.”

That says quite a bit about the recording’s importance. So does the fact that two labels are issuing re-releases this year.

The Real Gone Music edition is pressed on gold-colored vinyl for its golden anniversary. Both re-releases contain two cuts not included on the original product: “Why Don’t You Tell Me So?” and a version of “Cryin Holy” with Emmylou’s voice in the mix.

Failing sums up what 0044, J.D. Crowe, and the musicians he surrounded himself with mean to him and to many of the pickers making the best music today.

“Every time I circle back to the Bluegrass Album Band, The New South, and J.D. Crowe, I’m reminded, ‘that’s how it’s done!’”

Photo Credit: Phil Zimmerman

Wear your love for 0044! Shop our exclusive RR 0044 tee on the BGS Mercantile here. 

Charley Crockett, Gillian Welch & David Rawlings, Waxahatchee Among Americana Nominees

Posted on by Editor

The Americana Music Association has announced the nominees for its 24th annual Americana Honors & Awards. This year’s nominations were revealed by Brandi Carlile, Kashus Culpepper, S.G. Goodman, Jim Lauderdale, Kacey Musgraves and Molly Tuttle in a social media announcement.

The winners will be announced during the Americana Honors & Awards on Wednesday, Sept. 10, 2025, at the historic Ryman Auditorium in Nashville. The celebrated program is the hallmark event of AMERICANAFEST, which returns for its 25th year on Sept. 9-13, 2025.

A full list of categories and nominees for the Americana Music Association’s 24th annual Americana Honors & Awards is below the video player.

ALBUM OF THE YEAR:

Lonesome Drifter, Charley Crockett; Produced by Charley Crockett & Shooter Jennings

Foxes in the Snow, Jason Isbell; Produced by Jason Isbell & Gena Johnson

Manning Fireworks, MJ Lenderman; Produced by Alex Farrar & MJ Lenderman

South of Here, Nathaniel Rateliff & The Night Sweats; Produced by Brad Cook

Woodland, Gillian Welch & David Rawlings; Produced by David Rawlings

ARTIST OF THE YEAR:

Charley Crockett

Sierra Ferrell

Joy Oladokun

Billy Strings

Waxahatchee

DUO/GROUP OF THE YEAR:

Julien Baker & TORRES

Dawes

Larkin Poe

The Mavericks

Gillian Welch & David Rawlings

EMERGING ACT OF THE YEAR:

Noeline Hofmann

MJ Lenderman

Medium Build

Maggie Rose

Jesse Welles

INSTRUMENTALIST OF THE YEAR:

Fred Eltringham

Alex Hargreaves

Megan Jane

Kaitlyn Raitz

Seth Taylor

SONG OF THE YEAR:

“Johnny Moonshine,” Maggie Antone; Written by Maggie Antone, Natalie Hemby & Aaron Raitiere

“Ancient Light,” I’m With Her; Written by Sarah Jarosz, Aoife O’Donovan & Sara Watkins

“Wristwatch,” MJ Lenderman; Written by MJ Lenderman

“Sunshine Getaway,” JD McPherson; Written by Page Burkum, JD McPherson & Jack Torrey

“Heartless,” Nathaniel Rateliff & The Night Sweats; Written by Nathaniel Rateliff

Photo Credits: Charley Crockett courtesy of the artist; Gillian Welch & David Rawlings by Alysse Gafkjen; Waxahatchee by Molly Matalon

Let’s Party About It

Posted on by Editor

When it comes to the rich, vibrant musical landscape that is American music, few bands have the sonic range, technical capabilities and curious prowess as that of Leftover Salmon — bluegrass to blues, country to Cajun, rock to roots, jazz to jam.

And it’s that jam element at the melodic core of Salmon. They jam under the cascading snowflakes atop a Colorado ski slope or with beads of sweat rolling down their faces in the backwoods of Florida. They jam early in the morning or way late into the night. They jam for massive crowds or simply for themselves. What matters most is the music and where it can take you, onstage and on the road.

Though Salmon is in the midst of its 35th anniversary celebration, the actual timeline goes back four decades, where, in 1985, a young guitarist named Vince Herman took off from West Virginia in search of the “mythical bluegrass scene” in Colorado.

His quest eventually led him to a bar in Boulder one night, the same evening a talented multi-instrumentalist, Drew Emmitt, was performing onstage in the Left Hand String Band. The sign on the door said “Live Bluegrass Music Tonight,” so Herman strolled in.

From there, the duo became inseparable, ultimately joining forces in 1989 to play a New Year’s Eve gig in Crested Butte under the name Leftover Salmon (a combination of Emmitt’s band moniker and Herman’s short-lived Colorado group The Salmon Heads).

With Salmon’s latest album, Let’s Party About It, the outfit once again rises to the occasion, providing soothing, feel-good tunes that radiate gratitude, graciousness, connectivity and compassion in a modern era of uncertainty, confusion and fear.

Backstage before a show in Asheville, North Carolina, Herman and Emmitt talked at length about the road to the here and now. In simplest terms, Leftover Salmon is currently riding a big wave of popularity and cultural importance — a high-water mark of its legend, lore and legacy.

What spurred you to go to Colorado in 1985?

Vince Herman: It was fall [in Morganton, West Virginia]. It was getting cold in this place I was living, which was in an attic of a house that we were remodeling. It didn’t have any heat. I went to college there [at the West Virginia University] and had six credits to go. I kind of ran out of motivation and it was getting cold. We just figured it was time to do something else.

Why Colorado?

Well, it was the bluegrass scene there. I was playing a lot of old-time and some bluegrass in West Virginia. And I knew there was a progressive bluegrass scene based around the Telluride Bluegrass Festival. The band Hot Rize was in Boulder, which was a major influence on me. So, I figured Boulder would have a good progressive bluegrass scene. And it sure did, proven by pulling up and seeing a “Live Bluegrass Music Tonight” sign [at a bar].

Did you drive across the country by yourself?

No, I came across with a guy named Lou Pritchard. There’s all kinds of Pritchards in the music business. He’s a teacher [now] in southern West Virginia. So, I threw the dice and sold a guitar to make the trip. We lived the first week in a storage shed. We rented it. It was a storage shed, but hell, it had power, you know? [Laughs] The plan was, “Let’s go to Colorado and see what happens.” Lou was thinking about starting a brewery because small breweries were just made legal. I ended up getting a job cooking in a restaurant and just playing tunes on the Boulder Mall. [Back in West Virginia], I was playing for free beer and somebody’s wallet, played a little bit in a Grateful Dead band called Nexus. But nothing professional in any way.

Were there aspirations to start a band and really give it a go?

Yeah, definitely. It was, “Go to Colorado and find like-minded players.” I didn’t know for sure whether I’d have a music career, but other things were totally unsatisfying. I’ve had a lot of jobs, man. I’ve been a cook, bartender, fisherman, roofer, painter, landscaper. I’ve done all the jobs you can imagine. But this is by far the best.

So, your first night in Boulder, the stars align. You walk in on a bluegrass jam and run into Drew, who’s been with you since that moment.

VH: Yeah, it’s been 40 years. I said hello [to Drew] that night and, I guess, it was probably six or nine months later I was in the Left Hand String Band. I did about a year there, and then they got a better guitar player. So, I started The Salmon Heads after I got kicked out of Left Hand. [Laughs]

You told me one time that if you tried out for Salmon now, you wouldn’t get in.

Oh, for sure. Definitely. My philosophy has always been to be the worst player in any band I’m in. So, it has served me well over the years. [Laughs]

So, New Year’s Eve 1989, you form Leftover Salmon.

We went through every combination of those two band names — Left Hand String Band and The Salmon Heads — and stuck with Leftover Salmon for the first night, never knowing it would be any more than one night of a gig [in Crested Butte]. The older the tune, the more the bluegrass stomp kind of thing would go on, people would slam dance. We were like, “Something’s good about this.” And we had a bunch of gigs the next morning. All the bar owners talked to each other. There was no plan [to form a group], but we got all those calls the next morning to book the band.

[Drew Emmitt enters the backstage area and sits down.]

What about for you, Drew? You and Vince have been together for 40 years. What was it about Vince that you felt this was a guy you wanted to play with?

Drew Emmitt: Well, I came from more of a bluegrass-serious kind of world. And I always loved the lightness that Vince always brought to the music, all the fun. Playing music with him was always fun, and singing with him. He’s got a very powerful voice. We both sing kind of loud, so we sing well together. The lightness and the fun factor — that’s what, in so many ways, has driven this band. It’s just always been fun. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve been onstage just laughing hysterically because there’s so much madness going on.

I’ve been following you guys for almost 20 years and, no matter what kind of day your day is, you’ll always have fun at a Salmon show. And it seems, lately, that there’s a reinvigoration in the band, a few more logs being thrown on the fire.

VH: Absolutely. Jay Starling on keys, dobro and lap steel adds a great element to it, you know? And [drummer] Alwyn [Robinson] and [bassist] Greg [Garrison] together in the rhythm section. It just brings such energy to it. And Drew, [banjoist] Andy [Thorn] and I just get to ride on that stuff.

What is it about Drew that works for you?

VH: He’s relentless, man. (Turns to Emmitt). You hit that mandolin and just get that tremolo going — nobody like it. It sure gets a crowd riled up.

You have a new album out. What does it mean that people still believe in what the band is and what the band does?

VH: Hot Rize was a real major influence. I saw Tim [O’Brien] and was like, “Okay, so we’ll be in this little musical niche.” It’s never going to be the Rolling Stones or Pink Floyd level kind of stuff. But, it could be this niche that I could age in and stay in, and be able to do it for a long time. That’s kind of what the folk/bluegrass world looked like to me. I just feel very lucky to have kind of imagined that so many years ago, and to have actually lived it. It’s pretty unusual and I’m incredibly grateful.

What’s been the biggest takeaway from this journey thus far?

DE: The fact that people are still coming to see us. And it’s still working, and actually working better than it ever had. The fact that we can keep playing this and that it’s still relevant. And there’s this scene that has built up around this music. There’s a lot of different bands out there that are building the momentum, [with] probably the main driver of that would be our buddy, Billy Strings.

And you guys blazed a lot of that path Billy’s walking on.

DE: And we followed in a blazed path. We came up behind the people that blazed it for us. And then we contributed our part of it, which was maybe adding a little more rowdiness, a little more rock and roll. But, keeping with that progressive thing that we learned from Hot Rize, New Grass Revival, Nitty Gritty Dirt Band, Old & In the Way — bands that were pushing the limits of bluegrass. I love traditional bluegrass, but it’s so fun to take traditional bluegrass and do crazy stuff with it.

Traditional bluegrass gives you the tools to do whatever you want.

DE: Exactly. Because it’s an art form, and you’ve got to learn it if you want to play bluegrass, which I’m still working very hard at, trying to learn to how to do it. What this band has brought to the scene is a levity, a fun factor. Over the years, so many of these amazing musicians have sat in with us, and they always have such a good time because it’s just wide open. Like, for instance, when Sam Bush sits in with us, he has such a good time ‘cause we just let him go.

Is that by evolution or by design, that ethos?

VH: I guess it has a lot to do with the Grateful Dead. You know, really saying, “It’s okay to have fun with music.” Go out looking for stuff in the middle of a jam. It gave us permission to do that, and [the Dead] brought so many people to bluegrass.

DE: And I hope we can keep doing it for a while. I hope that I can keep looking across the stage and seeing Vince for a long time. I’m glad to still be onstage with this guy. [Turns to Herman]

VH: I just keep being reminded of the importance of community, and helping us all get by with this [music]. Thank God we have music in the midst of all this chaos [of modern society], something that brings people together under a positive banner, and reinforces the humanity in all of us — there ain’t nothing better than music to do that.

Editor’s Note: Don’t miss Leftover Salmon and so many other great artists on the BGS stage at Bourbon & Beyond 2025. More info at bourbonandbeyond.com.

Lead Image: Tobin Voggesser

Sierra Hull & Billy Strings Do Traditional Bluegrass Justice with a Duet on Austin City Limits

Posted on by Justin Hiltner

Last week, Austin City Limits released an excellent bluegrass performance from their Austin City Limits Celebrates 50 Years broadcast, which debuted on April 4 on PBS. Mandolinist Sierra Hull and guitar phenom Billy Strings appeared on the special ACL show, performing a classic bluegrass number, “Midnight on the Stormy Deep,” a traditional song that entered the bluegrass canon via Bill Monroe himself. (Watch above.) It’s a popular duet, whether at jam sessions or on stage, and in this iteration finds the forward-thinking pair of Hull and Strings employing more retro sounds. Both are adept at these tones and textures, but tend to opt for more envelope-pushing picking on their own songs and creations. It’s lovely to hear both players in a bit more reserved a setting, with moments of star power shining through their tasteful playing and careful listening.

It’s striking how crisp, clean, and precise Hull and Strings render the song, but the grit and gristle that we tend to associate with bluegrass – and that “high lonesome sound” – are evident, certainly not in short supply. Hull’s solos are playful with zany touches and bluesy licks. Strings holds down the resonant lead vocal part while Hull adds the high harmony, both singing the lyric entirely in duet, because that’s how it goes! Strings pulls hard through his own solo with his signature confidence and boldness, while reminding his listeners how pivotal an influence Doc Watson has been across his career.

Hull and Strings are no strangers to collaborating, and in many contexts. Remember that time they covered Post Malone together? And well before Postie’s country foray and Strings’ track features on it. Hull has been known to guest on Strings’ shows, and vice versa. Their backstage cover of “What Does the Deep Sea Say” taped at the Ryman Auditorium has hundreds of thousands of views; “Midnight on the Stormy Deep,” meanwhile, has amassed nearly 200,000 views since it landed on YouTube late last week. Plus, Strings fans will recognize the track, not only from the bluegrass songbook, as it were, but from Strings’ own discography as well. He dueted with bluegrass legend and Hall of Famer Del McCoury on a version of the number a few years back. We never tire of it.

Whatever the many factors that led to Hull and Strings picking “Midnight on the Stormy Deep” together on ACL, they all add up to a live performance that’s easy, confident, and fun, and ultimately speaks to the deep and wide roster of young and younger bluegrass professionals who are keeping this music alive and in the limelight. For the coming generations and as-yet uninitiated new bluegrass fans, too.

Read our recent Cover Story interview with Sierra Hull on her brand new album here.

Read our recent exclusive interview with Billy Strings here.

SURPRISE! Billy Strings & Bryan Sutton Release ‘Live at the Legion’

Posted on by Justin Hiltner

A year ago today, on April 7, 2024, the American Legion Post 82 in East Nashville was packed to the gills with rabid flatpicking fans, geared up for a special appearance by two of the greats: Billy Strings and Bryan Sutton. Far from their first show together or their first collaboration, it was still one of the hottest tickets in Nashville and fans lined up down the sidewalk and up the drive of the humble Legion for their chance to witness bluegrass guitar history in the making.

To the delight of the many hundreds of thousands who would have but couldn’t also squeeze into the cinder block building known for two-stepping, honky-tonkin’, and bluegrass jams, today Strings and Sutton surprise released a live-recorded album of that evening’s show, Live at the Legion. Available digitally – with CDs and vinyl on the way August 1, and physical pre-order open now – it’s a two-disc, 20-song collection of traditional tunes, medleys, covers, and two of the most personality-rich and unique improvisational voices on the instrument.

Strings makes it no secret that, like many younger guitar pickers in bluegrass and adjacent styles, Bryan Sutton is a hero. The two have collaborated often in the past, formally and informally, getting together for jams and lessons, Strings appearing at and attending Sutton’s Blue Ridge Guitar Camp, performing as a duo at the Station Inn, Sutton guesting on stage with Strings and band, and more.

These are two generational talents, understood within and outside of bluegrass to be standard-setters for the instrument and for flatpicking at large. Together, their musical dialogues are entrancing, exciting, and as charming as they are downright unpredictable. Billy’s power and aggression on the six-string ease, while each player listens ardently and responds to the other with comfortability, or a wink, or a tasteful counterpoint, or an outburst-inducing surprise. Sutton is endlessly lyrical, drawing out such responses from Strings. For their level of chops, the collection rarely strays into self-involved jamming or ego-driven ideas.

Later this year, in September, Strings and Sutton will perform a short series of intimate duo shows to celebrate Live at the Legion – and give any who couldn’t be there in East Nashville in 2024 for the taping of the album another chance to catch the magic. The pair will appear at the Bluegrass Music Hall of Fame & Museum in Owensboro, Kentucky; at Nashville’s Ryman Auditorium; in Chattanooga, Tennessee; and in Boone, North Carolina with accompaniment by Strings’ bassist, Royal Masat. Due to anticipated demand, tickets for any/all of the shows must be requested by April 21, 2025, after which lottery winners will be notified. Sign up to request tickets here.

Bluegrass boasts many an iconic duo album, especially focused on the guitar. In the future, will we group Live at the Legion alongside other such definitive recordings as Blake & Rice? It seems almost inevitable. From Blake & Rice to Skaggs & Whitley, Watson & Monroe, and Grisman & Garcia – or even the just-released Carter & Cleveland – it seems immediately clear Billy Strings & Bryan Sutton’s Live at the Legion will be going down in bluegrass history. Tuck into this double album delight to see and hear why for yourself.

Photo Credit: Joshua Black Wilkins

Artist of the Month: Alison Krauss & Union Station

Posted on by Justin Hiltner

After 14 years, one of the biggest and most well-known bluegrass bands in the history of the music, Alison Krauss & Union Station, have returned with a brand new studio album, Arcadia. Released on March 28 to the delight of bluegrass and AKUS fans the world over, the collection doesn’t merely pick up where the group left off with 2011’s Paper Airplane. Instead, Arcadia soars back through the band’s deep and mighty discography landing somewhere, sonically, between So Long, So Wrong (1997) and Lonely Runs Both Ways (2004) – in other words, this iconic bluegrass band made a bluegrass album.

Alison Krauss & Union Station, by many measures, are one of the most prominent bluegrass bands to ever emerge from the genre. With the smashing success of her late ’90s to 2010s projects with Union Station and the incredible momentum behind their particular blend of bluegrass, “mash,” easy listening, country, and adult contemporary, Krauss catapulted to roots music notoriety, becoming a household name. She’d lend her voice to the blockbuster Coen Brothers film O Brother, Where Art Thou?, tour with Willie Nelson and Family, make two smash hit records with rock and roll legend Robert Plant, back up Shania Twain, duet with artists like Dolly Parton, Andrea Bocelli, Kris Kristofferson, Cyndi Lauper, Ringo Starr, and countless others. Was bluegrass, which Krauss had called her musical home since she was a pre-teen fiddle contest phenom, merely a springboard into fame and notoriety?

Of course not. This is the idiom in which Krauss has made most of her art; this is a second language – or perhaps, a first – and the fluency and virtuosity Krauss and her band have displayed are two of the most important bluegrass exports that registered and resonated with the masses who would become her fans. Krauss’s crystalline and powerful voice, sensitive and deliberate deliveries, endless grit, and one-of-a-kind skill for song curation only bolstered the electric, engaging charm of the bluegrass bones endemic in her artistry. It’s no wonder that this iteration of bluegrass ended up becoming arguably the most mainstream and most recognizable in the U.S., if not the world.

So, Krauss spread her wings and flew, carrying those bluegrass sensibilities – however overt or subtle – into everything she made. Whether the clean and country Windy City or the soulful and rockin’ pair of Raising Sand and Raise The Roof with Robert Plant, or the easy and romantic Forget About It, she had new horizons to run towards. But she always brought bluegrass with her. To arena tours, giant amphitheaters, sheds, pavilions, the biggest festivals, and beyond. By the time Paper Airplane took off, many in bluegrass regarded AKUS as bluegrass’s zenith, its peak, its maximum. Would anyone ever go further, achieve more, or play to larger audiences? This, after all, is the woman and band who up until they were bested by Beyoncé herself boasted more GRAMMY wins than any other artist in the organization’s history. Who could ever top them?

Well, it turns out Alison Krauss & Union Station weren’t just blazing a trail only they could trod down. Arcadia, fourteen years on from their most recent studio release, enters a universe – a resplendent ecosystem, a vibrant economy – that wouldn’t have existed if not for this band creating the factors that would allow it to exist. Folks like Billy Strings, Molly Tuttle, Sierra Ferrell, Tyler Childers, Zach Top, and many more have raised the roof on what’s possible for bluegrass and bluegrass-adjacent artists, what heights they can achieve, and what genre and style infusions are acceptable and marketable.

But AKUS and Arcadia, especially by returning to many of the musical markers from their ’90s and ’00s offerings, reenter the world that they created not as legacy artists or sceptered elders. They seem to be quite happy to consider themselves among these fresh giants in or around or from bluegrass as peers, contemporaries. Legends in their own rights, yes, and with a mythical gravitational pull to all of these acts and musicians they have inspired across generations, but Arcadia doesn’t feel stoic or mothballed, or almighty and shrouded by clouds high atop a sacred mountain. There’s mash that sounds direct from the halls of SPBGMA at the Music City Sheraton, there’s tender, longing romance, there’s rip roarin’ fiddle, there are transatlantic touches, there’s a dash of dystopia, and plenty of that iconoclastic melancholy for which Krauss has become known. There’s also a new voice in the mix, IIIrd Tyme Out’s frontman Russell Moore, who sings lead on four of the album’s ten tracks, filling the “big shoes” of former member Dan Tyminski.

In short, Alison Krauss & Union Station may be roots music royalty, but their status has in no way dulled their dynamism. They could rest on their laurels, but Krauss and her cohort are clearly still staring down fresh, new horizons. Could there be a new wind in their sails, as they embark alongside this new class of arena-ready, large scale bluegrassers? Has a tacit permission been given to return to their essential roots? Or maybe it’s just a matter of time. When bluegrass is in you, in the soil from which you grew, it has a tendency to ooze out all along or all at once. That trail of ‘grassy touches is what got Alison Krauss & Union Station here in the first place, and it’s what will bring them through the next fourteen years, too. Whatever sounds, songs, and stories occur between.

Alison Krauss & Union Station are our April 2025 Artist of the Month. Our 3+ hour Essentials Playlist below covers their entire discography, as well as Krauss’ own releases and other collaborations. Stay tuned for exclusive content coming later this month – like our interview with Alison about the album, powering through dysphonia, how she collects songs, and more. Plus, we have a collection of Six of the Best Alison Krauss Covers and our discography deep dive for beginners and longtime fans alike. Don’t forget about our exclusive Toy Heart podcast interview with Alison hosted by Tom Power or our recent interview with Russell Moore himself about how excited he is for this brand new gig. We’ll be diving back into the BGS Archives for all things AKUS, so follow along on social media as, for a month at least, we’ll be a proud Alison Krauss & Union Situation.

Photo Credit: Randee St. Nicholas