kathy kallick Archives - The Bluegrass Situation

Don’t Call Me Darlin’: Lost Girl

Posted on October 19, 2026 by Cindy Howes

As a full-time musician living in Los Angeles, Carolyn Kendrick has a complicated relationship with bluegrass music. Despite years of experience and a deep connection to friendships formed in the community, Carolyn often thinks of herself as an outsider in the broader, male-dominated, and generally conservative genre. As life becomes more and more digitally saturated, the nostalgia-rich trappings and communal values of the bluegrass community speak to Carolyn as she finds herself yearning for a more grounded, unplugged time. She loves the music but is confused by how it fits into her sense of self.

She suddenly discovers that this internal friction is more common than expected when co-creator Tristan Scroggins shows her a collection of rare, feminist newsletters circulated in the ’90s by women who played bluegrass. These bright blue, hand stapled, self published newsletters contain nearly a decade of interviews, correspondence, and fellowship between women as they attempt to navigate and influence the genre.

As Carolyn explores these stories, it becomes clear that not only have women faced similar challenges since the music’s beginnings, but that previously gendered opportunities have gotten noticeably better in recent history. So why do the names and stories seem so unfamiliar? These questions lead down a rabbit hole as Carolyn and Tristan get in the car and drive to Virginia to interview Murphy Hicks Henry, the creator of the newsletter. Along the way they visit with friends, go to museums and festivals, interview friends, and re-interview the women from the newsletter to see what they think about the progress that has been made. All while recording to make this podcast.

Despite being a show about a newsletter about bluegrass, the show itself isn’t “about” bluegrass. It’s about community and what it means to be an insider. It’s about how tradition can bring us together but what happens to who gets left out. It’s about what we can learn from our elders and why we shouldn’t wait to ask them. It’s about women and their lives and what we can learn from them.

In this episode, you heard the voices of legends of bluegrass in the following order: Kathy Kallick, Missy Raines, Laurie Lewis, Maddie Witler, Murphy Henry, Dede Wyland , Lucy Singleton, Rhonda Vincent, Lisa Kay Howard, Sierra Hull, Kristin Scott Benson, Joselyn Skye, and Alison Brown.

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Don’t Call Me Darlin’ is based on the Women in Bluegrass newsletter that was published quarterly from 1994–2003 by Murphy Hicks Henry. More information about Murphy, including how to purchase her book Pretty Good for a Girl: Women in Bluegrass, can be found here.

Sources and citations for today’s episode.
Read the Women in Bluegrass digital archive, created by Tristan Scroggins
To help support the archive, consider making a tax-deductible donation

For more information on our hosts and their other ongoing projects, please visit:
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Photo Credit: Carolyn Kendrick

When Harmonies Run Deep: An Essential Roots Music Tradition

Posted on August 31, 2026August 31, 2026 by Justin Hiltner

Since Jamie Dailey and Darrin Vincent began singing together as Dailey & Vincent in 2007, they have awed fans in many ways: through their musicality, their sincerity, and their professionalism. But most of all, it’s about their duet singing.

It’s the way their voices blend and weave, so closely it can be hard to distinguish one from another. It’s the way their so-tight harmonies set up a vibration that makes the world tilt a little bit when they reach the high notes. It’s the way we sigh after they stop singing, because all’s right with the world.

Although they aren’t related, Dailey & Vincent do the bluegrass phenomenon of a “brother duet” like nobody’s business. They capture the familial force that Grammy-winning bluegrass artist Laurie Lewis describes as delightfully “making the hair on our arms and legs stand up.”

With Dailey & Vincent as our Artist of the Month, we thought we would peek into the history and tradition of brother duets and other harmony-driven duos that led to this great contemporary partnership.

Two Brothers and Two Instruments

For bluegrass journalist, songwriter, performer, and teacher Jon Weisberger, the term “brother duet” refers to something very specific: “A brother duet is basically a guitar and a mandolin and two guys, and they could be brothers, like the Monroe Brothers or the Blue Sky Boys [Bill and Earl Bolick] or even the Delmore Brothers.”

But many of the early duos later added more musicians. “They became something else, in this sort of organic process … because they wanted to have a fuller sound and they wanted to be competitive on the radio…”

“This brother duet thing existed before bluegrass,” Weisberger continues, “and then it became part of bluegrass. Such that modern folks like Michael Daves and Chris Thile … are doing a lot of the original-style singing, with just two instruments. It says something about the vitality and the attractiveness of that style.”

Weisberger notes that Dailey & Vincent recorded Gillian Welch’s “By the Mark” with just their voices, a guitar, and a mandolin. There are many other similar examples in country, old-time, and other folk formats, but the style is still beloved – and common, thankfully! – in bluegrass today.

Brothers in Tone and Timing

For many, a brother duet has to do with the spine-tingling effect of very tight harmonies, in which every note matches up in every way. Laurie Lewis, who has taught harmony singing extensively and is known for her many duet recordings and performances, talks about it this way.

“It’s easy for brother duets or sisters to blend, because they grew up pronouncing all their words the same way, because they’re from the same place and the same family,” Lewis explains. “So, they’ve got a big leg up that way.

“The shape of a vowel is the most important thing to get right when you’re trying to blend with somebody. And consonants, you know, when you start or end the note. It’s placement, as well – where you place the tone: is it forward in your face? Is it back in your throat, or somewhere in between?”

Members of family bands and sibling duets often have the same vocal timbre – “high and lonesome,” in some cases, or deeper and more mellow in others. But, Lewis said, the brother effect can work even with singers whose voices have different qualities.

“Take Carter and Ralph Stanley, who sang so beautifully together and had really different voices. Carter’s was smooth,” she points out, while Ralph always had that rougher mountain quality.

Insights From Singing Brothers

Eric Gibson remembers when he and his brother Leigh first got the harmony buzz as teenagers. “We were working in the calf barn and I’d been listening to Jim & Jesse sing ‘Are You Missing Me?’ … I started singing it, and Leigh was maybe 10 or 15 feet away from me, when he hits the tenor. And I looked at him, and I just felt it, like, ‘What did we just do?’”

The Gibson Brothers have won national awards for vocal recordings, for songwriting, and for gospel albums. They both love using a horse racing analogy to achieve the brother duet sound. Leigh notes that in many duets and other harmony forms, the lead singer is out front, in volume and style. In contrast, Eric quotes Tim Austin as saying, “Your brother duet is like two racehorses. There’s not a lead horse out there with the harmony back here. They’re both fighting for position.”

Like horse racing, it takes discipline, and keeping the harmonies tight. “You have to stay on the straight and narrow.” The tenor singer has to follow the lead singer, and neither can add too much individual style.

Leigh adds, “You have to give some of yourself. If I wanted to throw our vocal thing into chaos, I’d start singing for myself rather than for the two of us.”

“It’s about really listening and even watching your duet partner,” he says, “how they’re shaping words, how they’re closing off a vocal sound, if it’s happening quickly or it’s a slow close off of that vowel sound.

“Listen and pay attention. I think that’s the best advice I could give anybody.”

Brothers by Birth

For a beautiful collection of brother duets drawn from some of the best and least-known brothers, visit the Gibsons Brothers’ 2015 album, Brotherhood. The liner notes are an engaging mini-history of brother harmonies.

Here are just a few of the other brothers who set the stage for the duets we hear today – and popularized or debuted many of the songs we still sing and love.

The Monroe Brothers

Let’s start with the Monroe Brothers. Bill, the father of bluegrass, began performing with his brothers Birch and Charlie (the uncles of bluegrass?) in the 1920s. Birch left the group when the other two accepted an offer to host their own radio show. The very popular partnership of Charlie on guitar and Bill on mandolin only lasted four years, because they both wanted to be the boss. Charlie continued assembling bands with musicians like Lester Flatt, Ira Louvin, and Curly Seckler. As for Bill, he launched a new genre of music that bears the name of his home state and his band, the Blue Grass Boys.

The Delmore Brothers

Alton and Rabon, the Delmore Brothers, grew up in a tenant farming family in Alabama. Grounded in church music, the Delmores distinguished themselves with their versatile songwriting, leading to membership in the Grand Ole Opry in 1933, extensive touring with Arthur Fiddlin’ Smith, and later with Grandpa Jones and Merle Travis. They are acknowledged as pioneers across country, bluegrass, and rockabilly circles. Songs like “Blues, Stay Away From Me” and “Gonna Lay Down My Old Guitar” remain standard bluegrass fare. Alton’s autobiography, Truth is Stranger Than Publicity, is a hoot and a half.

Blue Sky Boys

Bill and Earl Bolick first appeared on radio in 1935, when still in their early 20s. They later chose the name the Blue Sky Boys after Western North Carolina, Land of the Blue Skies. Steeped in gospel, their first recording, “Sunny Side of Life”/”Where the Soul Never Dies,” was such a big hit they earned the name “the New Hillbilly Kings.” They recorded 100 songs, both religious and secular, before joining the service. After the war they found they disliked newer music trends and they stopped playing entirely for a time when their label asked them to add electric guitar. The brothers played on and off, particularly at folk venues, until the late ’60s. Rounder Records pulled them out of retirement in 1975 for a bluegrass and folk tour.

The Lilly Brothers

Bea and Everett Lilly, the Lilly Brothers, performed on mandolin and guitar, influenced by the mountain music they heard in their home state of West Virginia. Their first local radio appearance was in 1938, and they later earned a spot on the venerated WWVA Jamboree. With Tex Logan and Don Stover – a configuration that would last 18 years – they moved to Boston, where they were welcomed in the folk scene. They are credited with bringing bluegrass to the Northeast, influencing musicians like Peter Rowan and Bill Keith. In Country Music: The Rough Guide, author Kurt Wolff quoted Bluegrass Hall of Fame inductee Joe Val as saying, “Those guys hit on like a bombshell. Nobody’d ever heard anything like that before.”

The Louvin Brothers

For many, the Louvin Brothers set the standard for brother duets. They began their duet career in the 1940s, continuing until 1963, when Charlie broke off from Ira for a solo career. Their harmonies were stunning, influenced by the shape note singing they grew up with, and their prolific writing and recordings left us with so many of the songs commonly heard in today’s bluegrass world. Their old-time religion permeated their work, as well as the life of the tormented Ira, who professed devotion while battling his demons. Emmylou Harris said, “There was something scary and washed in the blood about the sound of the Louvin Brothers.” The cover of their album Satan is Real is an apt visual representation of that thought. It is also the name of Charlie’s autobiography. Another great source is the Cocaine & Rhinestones episode on the Louvins.

Jim & Jesse

Jim & Jesse McReynolds from Colfax, Virginia are lauded as much for Jesse’s mandolin style as for their duet singing. Many of bluegrass’s most accomplished musicians passed through their band, the Virginia Boys, including Vassar Clements, Allen Shelton, Vic Jordon, Carl Jackson, and Glen Duncan. Their versions of songs like “Are You Missing Me” are mainstays of bluegrass jams, while they ventured into the folk rock world with “Paradise.” Jesse would later host a tribute to Jerry Garcia and Robert Hunter, too. Jim died in 2002 at age 75, ending what Wikipedia calls their 55 years performing together “the longest active professional brother duet in country music history.”

The Everly Brothers

Contemporary musicians from Graham Nash to Paul Simon have cited Don and Phil Everly’s duets as inspirational. Their harmonies were intricate, tight, and gorgeous. Coming from a country music background, they became hit pop stars, with “Bye Bye Love” in 1957. While many of their most popular songs were written by Felice and Boudleaux Bryant, the brothers were also prolific songwriters. They have been widely recognized by the music industry, from membership in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame to a #33 ranking in Rolling Stone’s list of 100 greatest artists of all time. For an excellent review of their often tumultuous careers and relationships, pick up Blood Harmony: The Everly Brothers Story by Barry Mazor.

Sisters, Mothers and Daughters

Family bands featuring female singers have been popular for decades, even before the Carter Family blasted from radio stations in the 1930s. But sister duets have been less prominent than their brotherly counterparts. We can speculate that’s because, historically, women were less likely to venture out on their own, and because they were less welcome at the front and center of bluegrass and country.

But when these women stepped up, they truly shined.

The Whites

Sisters Sharon and Cheryl performed for decades with their father, Buck White, as the Whites. But it is their duet singing that ranks with the tightest and tingliest of any brother duo. Buck, a mandolinist and piano player, encouraged his daughters to take up music. The three recorded extensively beginning in 1972 and recorded “Keep on the Sunny Side” for the Grammy Award-winning O Brother, Where Art Thou? soundtrack. After Buck’s death in 2025, Sharon and Cheryl continue to perform, sometimes with Rosie, another sister, adding a high harmony. They have received highest honors in both the country and bluegrass fields, with more than 40 years as members of the Grand Ole Opry.

Kate & Anna McGarrigle

Kate and Anna McGarrigle were acclaimed Canadian folk singers and songwriters. Often passing the melody back and forth, it could be difficult to tell when one voice ended and the other began. Their harmonies were delicious. Linda Ronstadt had a big hit with the McGarrigles’ song “Heart Like a Wheel,” and Maria Muldaur, Emmylou Harris, and Judy Collins also covered their songs. Kate died in 2010.

The Judds

This mother/daughter duo certainly had the blood-harmony duet thing going big time with perfectly executed, soaring vocals. In a Cinderella-like story line, Naomi and her daughter Wynonna went from living on welfare to auditioning (in terror, as they described it) before a room full of recording executives – who signed them immediately. Within two years of the 1983 audition, they recorded the first of eight consecutive number one singles and received their first of five Grammys. Their family story is both fractious and inspiring.

More Essential Duets

Nowadays, it often seems the most common examples of high quality duet singing come from non-siblings, from chosen family, from lifelong musical partners. Turns out “blood harmony” is possible without the biological ties. (But of course it is.) Some of the best examples of the form are singers unrelated to each other.

Hazel Dickens & Alice Gerrard

Hazel Dickens and Alice Gerrard presented a side of duet singing that was at once sweet and gutsy. Although from very different geographic and social backgrounds, the pair came together through the Baltimore folk community in the 1970s. They sang with intense sincerity, performing older and traditional tunes and presenting Dickens’ heart-rending (and sometimes snarky) originals to the world. They were some of the first women to front a bluegrass act and are widely acknowledged as inspiring groundbreakers.

Ricky Skaggs & Tony Rice

In 1980, Ricky Skaggs and Tony Rice released what has become an iconic duet recording, Skaggs & Rice. Its content draws on traditional and pre-bluegrass tunes recorded by earlier brother duets. In fact, Weisberger points out, the album cover illustration, featuring the two men in uncomfortable-looking suits, is modeled after a Lilly Brothers photo. Skaggs and Rice taught us how two voices with starkly different qualities could blend, with sibling-like effect.

Ricky Skaggs & Keith Whitley

Skaggs and his wife, Sharon White, both sing in a high range, blending beautifully and adding intensity to everything they sing. And with his piercing tenor, Skaggs has the ability to create a brother sound with just about anyone. His partnership with Keith Whitley was equally natural, as they started singing together as teenagers in Kentucky. They began touring with the Stanley Brothers when they were both 16. In essence, they grew up together, as did their vocal blend.

Laurie Lewis & Tom Rozum

Laurie Lewis is another who can turn any duet into sibling-style harmonies. She and Tom Rozum have sung together for decades. Lewis said that in addition to working hard on their timing and pronunciation (the word “yours” was once problematic), they have the advantage of remarkably similar vocal ranges for a male and female. When they are both “in the head voice, you can really hear the tension in our voices,” an exciting aspect of their duets, she said.

Laurie Lewis & Kathie Kallick

Since the earliest configuration of Good Ol’ Persons, Lewis and Kathy Kallick have sung together, including producing two duet albums. Lewis said, “We have really different timbres to our voices. But we sometimes get confused as to who was singing which part on our old recordings. ‘Wait, is that me or is that Kathy?’” Lewis’ duet album, And Laurie Lewis, showcases her skill in joining voices with so many of her old friends.

The Johnson Mountain Boys’ Dudley Connell and David McLaughlin

Eric Gibson remembered terrific harmony singing by Dudley Connell and David McLaughlin in the Johnson Mountain Boys days. That revered group won the very first IBMA Award for Album of the Year (for At the Old Schoolhouse) and were inducted into the Bluegrass Music Hall of Fame in 2020. And since his days in the Johnson Mountain Boys, Connell has shown he, too, raises any duo to the level of glorious sibling sounds. Some examples are with bandmate Lou Reid in the Seldom Scene and his two duet albums with Don Rigsby.

Emmylou Harris & … Almost Everyone

The Gibsons both mentioned Emmylou Harris’ stunning ability to create tension and beauty in sibling duet style with so many. Examples range from her earliest recordings with Gram Parsons through all her singing partners in her band, including Ricky Skaggs and Rodney Crowell, and when she introduced a young country audience to the material of the Louvin Brothers on recordings such as “If I Could Only Win Your Love,” “When I Stop Dreaming,” and “Every Time You Leave.” Her 1990 duet album pairs her with male singers. In 1999, after the success of the Trio albums with Dolly Parton and Linda Ronstadt, she and Ronstadt recorded Western Wall: The Tucson Sessions, showing off the perfection of two beautiful singers who love to sing together.

Dailey & Vincent

Jamie Dailey and Darrin Vincent both grew up performing in family bands. Jamie started singing with his family at age 3, and by age 12 had mastered bass and banjo. For nine years, he sang lead vocals with Doyle Lawson & Quicksilver, a band noted for their excellent voices and superb harmonies.

An article in Entertainment News said the Vincent children “were practically raised on harmony” from their youngest days in the Sally Mountain Show. For nine years, Vincent sang the baritone parts with Ricky Skaggs’ Kentucky Thunder. The two men’s early training, the discipline gained from playing with exceptional band leaders, plus their perfect-for-bluegrass voices created a glorious blend of heartfelt harmony and musical excellence.

Their first album, released in 2008, was met with a flurry of enthusiasm. It earned the duo six IBMA Awards – including Album of the Year – plus two other nominations that year. They have continued to receive dozens of awards from bluegrass, country, and gospel organizations, as well as three Grammy nominations as a duo and two wins between them during their time with other acts. Their 10th album, A Beautiful Life, was released earlier this year.

Explore more of our Artist of the Month content on Dailey & Vincent here. Enjoy even more bluegrass duos here and country duos here.

Lead Image: The Louvin Brothers from Pictorial Press.

John Reischman: Between the Salish Sea and Salt Spring

Posted on March 25, 2026March 25, 2026 by Justin Hiltner

There are no U.S./Canada border wars when it comes to John Reischman. The revered mandolin master was born in Northern California but has lived in British Columbia since the early 1990s. His longtime band, the Jaybirds, are a quartet that includes two members who are also based in British Columbia (bassist/vocalist Trisha Gagnon and banjoist Nick Hornbuckle) and two who reside in America (fiddler Greg Spatz lives in Eastern Washington and guitarist/vocalist Patrick Sauber is from Southern California).

Their latest album, The Salish Sea, refers to the body of water between Vancouver Island and the British Columbia mainland. The record is their first since 2017’s On That Other Green Shore along with being the first to feature “new” guitarist Sauber on the entire album. The song “The Salish Sea” not only serves as the album’s title, but also is part of an original “Bluegrass Concerto” that Reischman was commissioned to create for FreshGrass in 2024. The honor is just one example in a long line of accolades for Reischman, who began his career in the Bay Area bluegrass/folk scene of the 1970s (including a stretch with the Tony Rice Unit) before moving to Canada, where he started the Jaybirds as well as performing solo and in other groupings.

In recent years, Reischman has seen his song “Salt Spring” become something of a modern bluegrass classic. He spoke with the BGS from his home in Vancouver about “Salt Spring” as well as The Salish Sea, his famous Lloyd Loar mandolin, and how he got into bluegrass music.

What was the process of putting the new album together?

John Reischman: There was one venue in Washington State where we had a residency. It was in the fall, in a beautiful spot. It was just ideal. So we took the extra day, worked up like six new tunes, and then started performing them right away. I guess this was October of ‘23.

And then you recorded the album in Vancouver?

In December of ‘23, I wanted the band to check out the studio here in Vancouver, where we ended up ultimately recording. I just want to make sure everybody was cool with it. I knew I liked it, because I had used it for my solo record, New Time & Old Acoustic. They all liked it. At the end of any tour we had that was close to Vancouver in 2024, I’d book a day or two in the studio, and we’d go record two or three or four songs. We were able to perform all this material mostly before we recorded it. … And it was great, because we’d be warmed up from the tour and we’d go in and track some tunes.

This album was the first in a while, and also the first that Patrick Sauber was fully on it.

Right, On That Other Green Shore came out in 2017. That was kind of the tail end of our time with [guitarist] Jim Nunally being a band member. He was exploring other things and decided he’d leave the band. We had a few more tracks to do… and we had some dates on the calendar.

I thought of Patrick immediately, because I’d known him for many years and I thought he’d be good. So he signed on for a tour and then another tour and it was just like, “This works great.” We asked him to join and he immediately said yes. He was a great fit.

How did the Jaybirds come together in the first place?

I didn’t really set out to have a band, except for the fact that I had a solo record called Up in the Woods. There was a local festival, so I put the band together to help promote the record. Seemed like a good idea. And I liked playing with all those people and it just continued on.

It’s called John Reischman and the Jaybirds, because I conceived of it. My name was probably the most well known at the time, but I wanted to be integrated into a bluegrass band. People present stuff, and I almost always accept it. Mostly it’s a pretty democratic presentation, I think. That’s what I like. It’s not Gladys Knight & the Pips.

Can you talk about the title track and how it’s also part of a larger project?

I had been asked to write what they call a “Bluegrass Concerto” by the East Coast festival FreshGrass, and I came up with these three tunes that work together. The first tune was the first movement, which ultimately was called “The Salish Sea.” I thought this will be my contribution to the new Jaybirds record, because they were involved with the performance of the Concerto.

We performed it [at FreshGrass in 2024] and I really liked the idea of having two mandolins and I’ve always loved two fiddles. I knew Darol Anger was going to there, so I asked him if he’d play twin fiddles on it. And then Sharon Gilchrist is a good friend and great mandolinist; we’ve played a lot together, and I asked her to play a mandolin on two of the three pieces.

I’ve got to acknowledge David Grisman, because the music is influenced by his “Dawg Music.” It’s also the sound that I initially heard on his first solo record, The David Grisman Rounder Record. He incorporated harmony mandolin on a lot of it.

It must have been very inspiring and gratifying to receive this commission.

You know, I’ve written a lot of tunes and a lot of folks have learned my tunes, which is really gratifying. But to have been commissioned to write this and have the confidence of this great festival and organization, yeah it was.

I had plenty of time to work on it and the time that it mostly came together was when I think my wife was visiting family. I had the house to myself. That first piece, in particular, really developed over a period of time. The second one [“The Family’s Farewell”], I came up with the A part pretty quickly and it took a while to get a bridge for it.

The third part [“The Little River Ramble”] was similar. … The thing about the concerto format is the third movement typically has an extended solo section and it’s often a bender where it’s just the featured soloist playing solo without any accompaniment. But I wasn’t really comfortable so much with that. I thought, I’ll just have it break down and I’ll solo all through there but have it build back up.

I’m really happy with the response it has gotten. Even playing it just as the five-piece band, I think the band sounds great on it. It’s only like icing on the cake when the twin fiddles and the twin mandolins are there.

And this spring, you’re going to record the entire concerto?

At the end of March, we’re going to be on tour on the East Coast and the FreshGrass Festival has a recording studio. They offered to make the studio available, so we’re going to record that just as we performed it, with Darol and Sharon joining in. That will be part of a solo record, even though I’m using those musicians. And I have other sessions planned. I’ve done one session that will add to the whole thing. Those three tunes of the concerto will just be one component of the new recording.

“Salt Spring,” one of your older songs, has become a highly popular instrumental now in the bluegrass world. How much of a pleasant surprise has that been?

It’s kind of remarkable to me that it’s as popular as it is. I mean, I’m not complaining. It’s great. … But it’s interesting how it’s just traveled all over and people think it’s just a traditional tune in some circles. They have no idea that it was composed by me. That’s cool, too.

The Jaybirds recorded it and it came out on a CD in 2001. We were at a music camp with some folks from Colorado and they learned it. I think that’s largely the beginning of it getting circulated among other people – where they took it back to Colorado. They’re the “patient zero,” I guess.

I know that a certain generation of Berklee students were playing it a lot, and maybe a bit later – maybe 10 years later. It’s pretty cool having people play your tune when you’re not there. That CD was never available digitally until recently, but we made a video of it around 2011… and that was the source, I think, for a lot of people learning it.

And then you recorded it again with Molly Tuttle, Alex Hargreaves, Max Schwartz, and Allison de Groot on your 2021 solo album New Time & Old Acoustic.

I didn’t have all the material when I started that whole project, but I knew I wanted to re-record “Salt Spring” with some of these younger musicians who had grown up playing it.

What do you remember about writing it? And why do you think so many musicians have gravitated to playing it?

I was on Salt Spring Island [in British Columbia] staying with some friends and they had a little old turn-of-the-century Martin small-body guitar. I was just playing the guitar and I was playing out of a D chord shape, and the A part of the tune just kind of took shape under my fingers. It was memorable enough that I don’t think I had to record it to remember it. The B part was just this little phrase I would play on the mandolin, just noodling around … so I just kind of stuck it on there and it worked pretty well.

I think the thing about the tune is the basic melody is very simple, but the way I played on the mandolin, the technique I use, is not quite cross-picking. But it falls into a right-hand pattern that sort of mimics the way the frailing banjo is played with that “bum-ditty, bum-ditty, down-down up, down-down up” pick stroke. So, these extra “down ups” are drone notes and that just kind of enhance the whole overall effect. Because of that, it lays out really nicely on the banjo. Then on the fiddle, you can add drones and add to it that way. And on the guitar also, you can fall into that kind of “bum-ditty” pattern as well.

I think you can learn the tune pretty easily. It’s not super challenging like some fiddle tunes where they’re very detailed in the melody. It’s pretty straight and so I think that’s partly why people gravitate towards it.

You grew up in Northern California. How did you get interested and involved in music, specifically bluegrass music?

Have you heard of a guitar player named Robben Ford? He grew up in the same town where I did in Northern California. He was in a high school band with my neighbors. I must have been 12 or 13. They were rehearsing on a patio and I went over to listen. I was interested in music and I heard them play the Freddie King tune “Hideaway,” which Eric Clapton recorded on the John Mayall & the Blues Breakers record. My brother Steve had that record. I recognized the tune and I thought, “What? This is impossible. This sounds as good as the record!”

From then on, I was just focused on trying to play the guitar. I had taken guitar lessons prior to that, but it didn’t really work. But there were guitars around the house. So that was the thing that really sparked my interest in learning to play. But I was open to all kinds of music. I’d have access to the PBS station KQED and they’d often air Pete Seeger’s Rainbow Quest, where he’d have different folk musicians, bluegrass musicians, old-time musicians. I thought, “Oh, this is cool!” And then the mainstream presentation of bluegrass with The Beverly Hillbillies, having Flatt & Scruggs on it, and the Dillards and the Country Boys playing on The Andy Griffith Show.

At some point, I had access to a mandolin, which I associated [with] bluegrass music, and taught myself to play it. I tuned it to an open chord for a long time, like a banjo, which was incorrect. And I didn’t use a pick. But eventually I got things squared away.

I discovered the John Hartford Aereo-Plain record. I saw them on TV as well. That was very inspiring. Then I discovered Norman Blake and Vassar Clements. I come to find out they had their own records. … That first Norman Blake record, I couldn’t believe it. I just flipped over that, and I thought, “This is so great!” And I’d heard Doc Watson at that point, so I just got really interested in it, and focused on that music, primarily.

So, was the Good Ol’ Persons your first significant band?

Yeah, it was the first real pro band I was ever in, and I was a fan of theirs before that. I [had] lived in San Francisco for a short while and saw their original lineup, which included all women. And it was exciting to get the opportunity to play with these folks. Because I was living near Eugene, Oregon, and I was just playing the mandolin all the time – a lot with my brother, Steve – but I wasn’t in a band, and I was working on a farm, just part-time. And a friend from the Oregon bluegrass scene had joined them and they needed a mandolin player. He said, “I know a guy.”

That placed me in the Bay Area, which was a great scene. There were lots of good bluegrass bands. And the Grisman Quintet was there. … But the thing that set Good Ol’ Persons apart was their original material, because Kathy [Kallick] is a fantastic songwriter. And Paul Shelasky, who was in the band, also wrote great songs. That opened the door for me to try and write tunes – because, “Oh, these guys write tunes. I’ll try it.” I wrote a few and people liked them. That just gave me encouragement to keep at it, which I have done.

So consequently, when Grisman and Tony Rice parted ways, Tony was aware of me. He’d heard me play at the local bar. He wanted to put a band together and needed a mandolin player. So, I went to the audition and he hired me.

You are well known for having an antique Gibson Lloyd Loar mandolin. What do you think makes those mandolins so special?

I guess that [mandolin] was kind of the ultimate expression of Gibson mandolins. But there’s plenty of new makers and a lot of them are using that basic design. So, aesthetically and as far as the craft of the instruments, some of these builders are way better than the Gibson mandolins were to look at, but the Gibsons have 100 years of aging and playing.

I think the playing of the instrument contributes hugely to its sound. Because, if there’s a Lloyd Loar that left the factory and went into someone’s closet and never came out for 50 years, I don’t think it’s going to sound like one like mine that has been played consistently over time.

I feel fortunate to be the caretaker for this great instrument. I think for most bluegrass musicians, it’s not only the music, but it’s the tools. These vintage instruments, like the Martins from the ‘30s and ‘40s, and Gibson mandolins from the ‘20s, and old banjos, it’s just a vibe that goes along with the music and aesthetic.

Photo courtesy of John Reischman.

Nora Brown and Stephanie Coleman Bring Old-Time to NPR’s Tiny Desk

Posted on October 30, 2023June 20, 2025 by Justin Hiltner

Perhaps the most remarkable skill of New York-based old-time duo Nora Brown and Stephanie Coleman is their ability to place canonical old-time material – fiddle tunes, ballads, breakdowns, hornpipes, transatlantic lyrics, and more – firmly in the present. Aided and abetted by their youth and their now longstanding musical collaboration, the two deftly entwine together timelessness and the fleeting, effervescent moment, leaving listeners on the edges of their seats as we cling to the temporal and seemingly miraculous space that opens up between them.

Brown and Coleman thrive behind NPR’s fabled Tiny Desk, all at once broad and bold while tender and understated, simple. Unadorned, but flush and full. Their new EP together, Lady of the Lake, features two of the numbers they performed at NPR’s headquarters in D.C., the title track and “Copper Kettle.” But they open their mini concert with a set, “Across the Rocky Mountains” and “The Old Blue Bonnet,” with Brown on guitar, before switching to her signature clawhammer banjo. For being so young – she only recently dropped the “Little” from her former stage moniker, Little Nora Brown – her voice carries an ancient ache. As their vocals resonate together in close harmony, Brown and Coleman remind of so many old-time, string band, and bluegrass duos that came before them, like Hazel & Alice, Laurie Lewis & Kathy Kallick, Cathy Fink & Marcy Marxer, and many more.

We hope then, like those impactful and influential duos that came before them, that Nora Brown and Stephanie Coleman continue to gift us with gorgeous music such as this for many decades to come.

Photo courtesy of Nick Loss-Easton Media

LISTEN: Kathy Kallick Band, “Just Lonesome Ol’ Me & the Radio”

Posted on September 18, 2023June 20, 2025 by Justin Hiltner

Artist: Kathy Kallick Band
Hometown: San Francisco Bay Area, California
Song: “Just Lonesome Ol’ Me & the Radio”
Album: The Lonesome Chronicles
Release Date: September 19, 2023 (single); October 17, 2023 (album)
Label: Live Oak Records

In Their Words: “People of different ages will feel their engagement with radio in different ways. As part of a family gathered around the radio for a specific show, as a teenager listening to a transistor radio under their pillow, as a traveler on a long car trip with the radio tuned in to whatever signal it can find, or as a listener with that favorite show tuned in on a laptop from anywhere in the world, the radio means connection. In that bizarre time of lockdown, we all looked for ways to ‘be’ with other people, and a dear friend and I started having a listening date, tuning in to the same radio show from our separate places, and commenting to each other via email, text, or calling on the phone. It made us feel like we were having a little party!” – Kathy Kallick

Track Credits:

Kathy Kallick: composer, lead vocal, guitar

Annie Staninec: tenor vocal, fiddle

Greg Booth: baritone vocal, dobro

Tom Bekeny: mandolin

Cary Black: bass

Photo Credit: Anne Hamersky

The Inspirations and Issues Behind Molly Tuttle’s ‘City of Gold’

Posted on July 18, 2023June 20, 2025 by Justin Hiltner

Over the course of her lifelong career in bluegrass, Americana and roots music, we’ve had the pleasure of interviewing and connecting with Grammy Award winner Molly Tuttle on quite a few occasions. When we selected Tuttle and her band, Golden Highway, as our Artist of the Month, we wanted to open a space to discuss her career and music in a fresh light – and we could think of no better context for such a conversation than Basic Folk.

We asked Basic Folk podcast hosts Cindy Howes and Lizzie No – who featured Tuttle on the show once prior, in 2022 – to sit back down with the International Folk Award and Americana Award winner to discuss her brand new album, City of Gold, and to dig deeper into the creative output of this buzzworthy guitar player, songwriter, and business woman.

Watch for the full podcast episode to drop later this month, but for now enjoy these excerpts from Cindy and Lizzie’s conversation with Molly Tuttle.

Cindy Howes: Molly Tuttle, welcome to Basic Folk again. It’s so great to have you back on the podcast.

Molly Tuttle: Thank you so much for having me back. It’s great to be here with you guys.

CH: Before we start our interview, I want to set the tone for our conversation. Molly Tuttle is being highlighted as Bluegrass Situations’ Artist of the Month, which is so awesome. The tone of our interview today is LYLAS. Do you know what LYLAS is?

Lizzie No: It’s spelled L-Y-L-A-S.

MT: LYLAS. Okay. I don’t know that.

LN: What it means is: “Love you like a sister.”

CH: Oh yeah. So we are total LYLAS. This is like a fun trip to the mall. This is like a really fun cruise around the harbor with your gal pals.

MT: Oh my gosh, that’s so fun. Well, it’s perfect because I’m actually in a hotel outside of Missoula. And there’s a strip mall nearby. So shopping has been on my mind today. Great.

CH: We’ll all get mani pedis together.

LN: Yes. French tip.

CH: So, when approaching the writing on City of Gold, you asked yourself, “How do I tell my story through bluegrass?” Which I can relate to, as somebody who’s sort of tried to distance themselves from folk music for a really long time. And now I am fully leaning into it. So, I take [it as] you asking that question of yourself, like “How can I fit my Molly Tuttle-ness into a world that can be rigid, patriarchal, and maybe different from what you stand for.” So how true is that? And how have these songs helped you take control of the bluegrass narrative and tradition?

MT: I think that’s something I’ve always kind of struggled with. I remember when I first started writing songs, I just thought, “I don’t know how to write a bluegrass song.” I can write a song, but they never ended up sounding like bluegrass to me and I just didn’t feel like my story fit into the bluegrass narrative of the songs that I grew up singing.

I always loved songwriters like Hazel Dickens, who wrote bluegrass songs from a woman’s perspective, wrote songs about the struggles that she had as a woman in the music industry and as a working woman, and songs about workers’ rights and things she believed in. I grew up with two really strong role models, Laurie Lewis and Kathy Kallick, out in the Bay Area. I remember early on I would go out to [Kathy Kallick’s] house and she would make me tea and listen to my songs. She always told me that when she was first getting started writing bluegrass songs, she kind of felt the same way as me. Like, maybe her story didn’t belong in the genre. But she met Bill Monroe, and he encouraged her, “Don’t try to write a song that sounds like a song I would have written, write a song from your own perspective.”

So she wrote a song called “Broken Tie” about her parents getting a divorce. She said every time she was at a festival with Bill Monroe, he specifically requested that song. That was an inspiring story to me. But when I started writing songs for Crooked Tree, it was suddenly like a floodgate opened. I think I just found my people to write with, found my groove, and ended up with a collection of songs that kind of told my story, [told] about things I believed in, and [told] my family history and personal experiences. And then other songs that were just, you know, from a woman’s perspective, or from a perspective that I resonate with.

For [City of Gold], it was fun to kind of continue that and also expand it to be songs that I felt like were inspired by my band members, or inspired by experiences we’d had on the road. This felt more like a collective vision in a way.

LN: Okay, let’s talk about Crooked Tree. The title track from your last record was partly inspired by your experience living with alopecia. You’ve said that as a kid you would wear hats and then wigs, and then you learned to talk about your wig. Eventually, you started to get more comfortable going without. Now that you’re touring with Golden Highway a ton, you sometimes take your wig off when you play that song, which is such a powerful moment of joy, courage, and vulnerability. As a performer, I can relate to those moments where you bring a little bit extra of yourself and you share a part of yourself that you might normally keep private. How do you get to that right mood? How do you gauge if the crowd is like the right crowd to share about your alopecia experience?

MT: It’s also based on how I’m feeling. I took off my wig a few times last year. But I didn’t do it as much as maybe I wanted to, or maybe I should have, just because I wasn’t always sure what to say. I’ve had so many experiences of trying to explain alopecia to people and they still think I’m sick or still feel bad for me. And it’s so hard sometimes to put it in words that aren’t going to bring the mood down at the show, you know, I want people to be having a good time. I want it to be this fun, inspiring moment, not a moment where people can go, “I feel so bad for you.”

Recently, I performed and told my whole story [for] a keynote speech at this alopecia conference out in Denver, Colorado. I think that was such an important step for me. Just getting to share my story and reflect on the pain of growing up having this really visible difference, but also like, the joy and why it’s so important to me to share that with others and share the message that it’s okay to be different. It’s okay to be a “Crooked Tree.” This last weekend, we played in Michigan, and I did take off my wig and I felt like I finally nailed what I said and the perfect mood. Everyone was cheering and it was just a moment of celebration. I think I’m gonna just continue doing that more and more, but I find that it’s so helpful for me to check in with the alopecia community and feel that support from other people who know exactly how I feel. That makes me feel confident to share my message with the world and maybe sometimes be like, “I don’t care how it’s received, maybe I’m not sure how it’s gonna be received, but I’m going to do it anyway.” That just comes with time. And I guess I’ve had to grow kind of a thick skin. It used to be a lot harder for me.

CH: The new album, City of Gold, the songs were mostly written by you and your partner Ketch Secor of Old Crow Medicine Show. What is the writing process like with you and Ketch? Like, how do you bring out the best in each other’s writing?

MT: We’re both quite different writers. He’s very fast paced. He throws out ideas and lines. [While I’ll] think it over. I’m kind of more internal. I think about the lines. We balance each other out in a way where I might think a lot about what exactly we are saying, and then he’s good. If I get stuck on something, [he can] kind of keep it moving. But our writing process is always different. It’s nice, because we’re together a lot. So we can write in a lot of different circumstances. Some of the songs we wrote in the car, like on a road trip, just throwing lines back and forth. Maybe he’d be driving, I’d be writing the lines on my phone. Maybe we’re talking about something at home or listening to music and sitting down with instruments, kind of more the conventional way of writing. I find it so hard to fit writing into my life, especially when I’m on tour and I’m on the go so much. [It’s so nice that] we got into a groove with it, where we were just doing it all the time, and it felt more naturally intertwined into my day-to-day life.

LN: The bluegrass community was a huge source of inspiration for you. Of this record, you said, “One of the things I love most about this music is how so much of the audience plays music as well.” And that you hope that people will sing along and maybe play those songs with their friends, almost like we’re all a part of one great big family. Now, how do you walk the line of making a sophisticated, bitchin’ bluegrass record, while keeping it simple enough for others who might not be musical geniuses to play along?

MT: The beauty of bluegrass music is that most of the songs have like three or four chords. You can play them really simple, you can just strum along and play as slow as you want. Beginner bluegrass musicians might go to a jam of people at the same level as them and play these songs in a lot simpler of a way. Then, as you get better and better you can play it faster, you can play more complicated solos, you can really play with the dynamics. There are infinite ways to make the songs more and more complex and sophisticated as you progress in your musical abilities.

On City of Gold, I did kind of stray away from that “three chords and the truth” format a little more than I did on my last record. It was fun, because we were working on these arrangements as a band, which was a lot different process than I’ve ever done before in the studio. I’ve always gone in with my songs and gathered musicians that I don’t normally play with on the road – studio musicians. I have a lot of my bluegrass heroes on the record, and you’re kind of learning the songs and playing them by a chart, but for this album, we really took the time to develop more complicated arrangements and add in new sections that stray away from the key. These songs are a little less accessible to the standard bluegrass jam. But I think there’s still a few that people could learn to play at any level.

• • •

CH: Okay, now we’re going to talk specifically about some of the songs on the new album, City of Gold, starting with the first song, “El Dorado.” Right now I am rewatching Deadwood, so I am super into this song. As a kid, you took a field trip to Coloma, the site of California’s first gold strike and it was the first time you heard about the legendary El Dorado, the City of Gold. In the song you sing, “El Dorado, city of gold, city of fools.” You said, “Just like gold fever, music has always captivated me.” So who are the characters in the song – like gold rush Kate from the Golden State – and how do you connect with these fools?

MT: I wrote the song with Ketch and I don’t know [exactly] how it came about… [But I told him,] when I was a kid, every school would send the kids off to gold country. You’d go to different places. The person who taught my class how to pan for gold, for some reason I have like a very vivid memory of him. He had this gold nugget on a chain around his neck and he showed us how to pan for gold. He was like, “You might find a flake of gold, but if you find an actual nugget of gold, we’re not gonna let you keep that, you have to give it back to us.” [Laughs] I remember being like, I really want to find like a nugget of gold and just squirrel it away and not tell this guy about it. So that kind of stuck with me.

CH: Literally every kid in your class thought that!

MT: Yeah! Like, we’re gonna strike it rich at this goldmine!

We were kind of doing some research on Coloma and found that it’s in El Dorado County. That seemed like a good place to start with a song just inspired by that character, but also thinking about all these characters who came together and we’re all trying to strike it rich. I feel like that is such a theme in our society. You know, we have these like little, mini gold rushes – everyone being like, “This is the next big thing. We’re all going to make so much money off of this.” But for me, I didn’t get into music thinking this is gonna make me rich, but it is something I’ve chased after for many years now.

CH: What do you think is the current gold rush? Is it dispensaries? Vape stores?

MT: The thing that just popped into my head, it’s a couple years old, maybe like a year past its prime, is crypto currency. I think I don’t know where that stands. But I think we’re a little bit past that.

• • •

LN: The second track on this album is “Where Did All the Wild Things Go?” Which is a song about gentrification’s corrosive effect on the character of once-vibrant neighborhoods nationwide – which I can very much relate to living in Brooklyn. I’d love to hear about your neighborhood where you live now. Is there a specific tradition or neighborhood institution or restaurant or store that is so special about your neighborhood? That you’re passionate about preserving? And how are you and your neighbors trying to keep your neighborhood weird and wild?

MT: Well, my neighborhood is East Nashville, and before I got there, it was totally different. It’s just in constant flux. It really changed so much when we had the tornado hit [in 2020] that took out tons of the local businesses that never returned. A lot of people moved out. The pandemic just kind of sped all of that up. Coming out of lockdown I was like, “Whoa, this is so different. Like, where do I even live anymore?”

I don’t really know how to answer how I’m trying to preserve it. I feel like I’m living in a different city every time I come back from tour, basically. Nashville’s always changing, just constantly growing, so many businesses are moving here. I do feel like there’s this constant sense of everyone missing the old Nashville. I don’t think that I was even around for the like “old Nashville” as many people who grew up in the city know it. So maybe I’m part of the problem in a way, really. I moved there just eight years ago…

• • •

CH: The next thing we want to talk about is “San Joaquin,” a new, old-style railroad song. There’s such a romance surrounding trains in song. You’ve always loved singing about trains. There is that long tradition of trains and folk songs. What do you think it is about trains that have captured artists’ hearts since they’ve been around?

MT: I think as artists, especially as musicians, we kind of have this roving spirit, where we want to see the world, we want to travel. I feel like a lot of musicians, myself included, we romanticize trains as this early way of getting across the country. And still, you’ll see musicians from time to time doing a train tour. Of course you have buskers who might hop on a train across the country and play all over the place. Now, I’ve never done that, but I think it’s just this thing that’s romanticized, especially by musicians. I’ve always loved singing [train songs]. There’s so many bluegrass train songs, but I didn’t know a specifically California bluegrass train song, so I felt like it was time to write one.

CH: What’s your favorite train song?

MT: That’s such a good question. The first one that popped into my head was Larry Sparks’ song, “I’d Like To Be A Train.” He doesn’t just want to ride a train. He wants to be a train.

• • •

CH: The song “Next Rodeo” you say, “…Reflects the miles I’ve put in with my band, Golden Highway, which has clocked in well over 100 shows.” That’s in the press release, so it’s probably 200+ shows at this point, and we’ll give a shout out to Bronwyn Keith-Hynes. Let me know if I’m mispronouncing anyone’s name–

MT: We have so many nicknames for Bronwyn in the band. We saw a YouTube comment on one of our videos where I introduce her and someone said, “What’s the fiddle player’s name? I couldn’t catch that.” Someone wrote “Ron Winky Pies.” We often call her Ron Winky Pies.

CH: Yes, that sounds right. Well, she is a hell of a fiddler. Also Dominick Leslie on the mandolin, Shelby Means on bass, and Kyle Tuttle, who is playing banjo. Can you talk about the ease and connection you feel with Golden Highway? What’s the feeling that you get when you’re on stage – and, when did it start gelling for everyone?

MT: After I made Crooked Tree, first I started thinking about who I wanted to take the songs on the road with. On the record I had the band name Golden Highway, but I didn’t actually have a band yet, so it’s kind of funny. I did it in reverse a little bit.

Dominick played on the whole record. I called him and I was like, “Hey, do you want to play with me next year?” And he said yes. So I had one band member. I was just trying to fill in the rest of the band thinking like, “Who’s gonna bring the most personality to this project? Who’s gonna bring a unique voice?” The whole record was all about being who you are, [about] individuality. I wanted to choose people who I felt like their personalities really shine through – and their music and their playing and their stage presence.

I got my dream band. We’ve all been friends in one way or another for like the past decade, so it was a cool experience. I’ve never had that before where I have this band in my head, I imagine the people playing together, and then it happens and it’s better than I could have imagined. It felt really cool. In the past I’ve had wonderful bandmates, but it’s never been this kind of brainchild where I’m trying to concoct my dream bluegrass band that will have this unique personality to it.

We all got together and everyone already knew each other and already played together in different configurations just through the bluegrass scene over the years. It all kind of started gelling really quickly. Our first couple shows we’re just kind of like, “Wow, this is something special!”

• • •

CH: We do want to ask a question about Jerry Douglas, who co-produced the record with you and is the master of the Dobro. How has your relationship with him as a producer shaped how you think about your own recordings?

MT: On this record, especially on “Stranger Things,” I just felt like I needed to hear him play on it. We had this funny thing we’d say in the studio, “Make us AKUS” – make us Alison Krauss and Union Station – cause they’re like our heroes. [Laughs]

When we got to that song we’re like, “We need that iconic Jerry Douglas dobro part.” It’s such a spooky song and he just knows how to accompany a song [like that] so well and that’s part of why I felt like he was the dream producer. He understands the musicianship side of things. He’s such a master of his instrument, but then he also has this deep connection to songs and vocalists and just knows exactly what to play behind the vocal.

That’s something I really kind of leaned on him for, just getting the best performance out of everyone, instrumentally. He has just the greatest ear. He hears a pitchy note here or like a wrong note there and really pushes everyone to do their best performance, but then he also has this side of him that’s extremely tasteful and he knows how to get behind a song and not overpower it.

LN: I want to talk about “Down Home Dispensary,” which is such a fun song. I’m fascinated by the way you’ve framed this issue, which is very hot in the news… legalizing marijuana. The way it’s framed in “Down Home Dispensary” is like a very fun political pitch about how Southern culture can evolve and is evolving. Why did you feel it was really important to frame this as a “Down Home Dispensary?” And do you notice an evolution in the way that Southerners and your audiences, more broadly, are relating to marijuana use?

MT: I think like the South is still the holdout. It’s not legal in most places in the South, but I feel like it’s become almost a bipartisan issue, where people are getting behind it. We play it and we’ve been playing it live and people are cheering no matter who they are. They’re like cheering for the “Down Home Dispensary,” because it’s this thing that’s become normalized in our society, but it still is technically not legal. That was one that Ketch and I originally wrote to be an Old Crow [Medicine Show] song and then they didn’t cut it. It’s so much fun!

CH: It’s sort of like a book end to “Big Backyard.” The world can be your down home dispensary, your backyard. You can make home and freedom anywhere.

MT: I thought it was like a funny angle to to go about it. You’re talking to a politician and just being like, you should really do this, because you’re gonna make a lot of money like this is in your best interest.

LN: How has living and working in Tennessee changed how you see your responsibilities as a feminist artist?

MT: I’m confronted with things in Tennessee that I never imagined would happen. Where I live, abortion is not legal in Tennessee at all, it was one of the first states to basically ban it for any reason.

That was really like a dark moment in our history as a country to just be going backwards completely. It’s something that I’ve feared since I was a teenage girl, like, what if this got taken away? And what if I couldn’t make decisions for my body? I can’t [access this healthcare] in the state where I live, I could maybe travel somewhere else if needed, but who knows if [someone else] could. They could make it more and more impossible to have access to this. It just breaks my heart for all the people who now don’t have that choice and don’t have the privilege of being able to go somewhere where they can get this health service.

[When writing “Goodbye Mary”] I was thinking about a story my mom told me growing up of my grandmother, whose name was Mary. She had a friend who was in an abusive relationship and she wanted to leave this relationship, but she ended up getting pregnant. So my grandmother and her friend, she would push her friend down the stairs, they would try anything to get rid of the baby. It’s a really, really dark story. But it’s somewhere that we’re going again, as a nation. When we were writing it, we were talking about my grandmother. That’s not something that happened to my grandmother personally, but it’s something that her generation had to deal with.

LN: I think it’s so important to link abortion access to women’s experiences of intimate partner violence. A lot of people who claim to be pro-life don’t want to admit that access to abortion is also access to freedom and the ability to leave an abusive situation. It’s just one more way of actually having freedom in your own body. That’s a really powerful story. It’s just so important, I think, for musicians to be talking about this issue, especially those of us that live in Nashville or are working in country and folk and bluegrass.

MT: It’s really scary to talk about, I was so scared to put that song on my record. Jerry was the one who was like, “We have to.” It was his favorite song. He was like, “If we’re gonna record one song, it needs to be this one.” And I was like, “I’m scared.”

This issue is one I care about so deeply. And it’s one of the most important social issues to me. But it’s also like, you get kind of the most backlash for it.

LN: Have you played this live yet?

MT: We haven’t, no. We’ve worked it up. And once the record is out, I think we will start playing it. But we haven’t tried it live yet.

LN: You got this.

MT: Yeah, totally. Thank you.

LN: Thank you. Thank you for this telling this story. I think that the bluegrass community needs to hear it and the world needs to hear it. I think it’s really important.

• • •

(Editor’s Note: This conversation has been abridged and lightly edited for flow and grammar. Cindy Howes’ and Lizzie No’s full Basic Folk conversation featuring Molly Tuttle will be available next week on BGS – or wherever you get podcasts.)

Photo Credit: Chelsea Rochelle

Kathy Kallick Honors Her Mother’s Legacy While Establishing Her Own

Posted on July 8, 2022June 20, 2025 by Editor

Kathy Kallick’s first musical influence was her mother, Dodi.

Music historian Larry Ehrlich wrote, “Dodi Kallick’s voice could be as tender as Carter Stanley, as plaintive as Piaf, or as cutting as a straight razor. It could bring sorrow to your heart or a smile to your lips.”

Although central to Chicago’s folk scene, Dodi never recorded in a studio. But an uncovered reel-to-reel of radio broadcasts inspired Kathy Kallick to follow her 2002 project, My Mother’s Voice, with an 18-track sequel. On Disc 1, Kathy invited friends to perform the songs she learned from her mother, and Dodi’s voice is heard on Disc 2. The collection’s title track, “What Are They Doing in Heaven Today,” appears on both.

Since 1975, when Kallick began performing with Good Ol’ Persons, her voice and songwriting have been central to the Bay Area’s bluegrass and folk scene. That group not only launched a highly talented group of women into bluegrass, but it added new concepts, melodic lines and interpretations to the genre. Since that time, Kathy has released more than 20 albums, many of them filled with her original songs, and she has won awards for her children’s albums.

With the exception of a bass-player change, The Kathy Kallick Band’s current configuration has been together since 2009. They continue to record and tour, and as individuals and a band, they contributed to her new tribute to her mother.

<a href="https://kathykallick.bandcamp.com/album/what-are-they-doing-in-heaven-today">What Are They Doing In Heaven Today? by Kathy Kallick</a>

BGS: Why have you made another tribute album to your mom after 20 years?

Kallick: My Mother’s Voice was a project that my mother was very involved in, choosing the songs, giving me the lyrics, talking about where she learned the songs. And when I got to the end of that project, she said, “but there’s still so many more songs.” And I said, “Well, Mom, maybe we’ll have volume two.”

Then these recordings were discovered a few weeks before she passed away. I couldn’t listen to them for a long time because it just made me too sad. After about three years, I started being able to listen, and they were so beautiful. And I remembered our conversation about volume two. She passed away 13 years ago. After thinking about it for years, there finally came a time when I wasn’t in the middle of a band recording or a solo recording or duet record. That was about four years ago.

How did you choose the other musicians who accompanied you?

The musicians were chosen for different reasons. I loved recording “Footprints In the Snow” with the Kathy Kallick Band, because this current band can really chomp on a bluegrass classic and do it justice. And “Footprints In the Snow” is one of the most iconic bluegrass songs to me. I definitely hear Bill Monroe’s version in my mind.

When I had the opportunity to record with Molly Tuttle, who I’ve known since she was a tiny child, I picked “Put My Little Shoes Away.” Having Molly play the clawhammer guitar gave it this oomph that was so spectacular to me. We had been at the Grass Valley Bluegrass Festival, and Molly came straight from the festival, a little frazzled, hot and sweaty and sunburned. She ran across the street, got a coffee, and came back, and we started in and came up with the way we wanted to do it. It was just so pleasing and spontaneous.

<a href="https://kathykallick.bandcamp.com/album/what-are-they-doing-in-heaven-today">What Are They Doing In Heaven Today? by Kathy Kallick</a>

“Little Moses” is a song I loved hearing my mother sing, and I sang it with her. Inviting Cliff Perry and Laurel Bliss was a clear choice, because they’re such Carter Family specialists. Their knowledge is deep, and they really have a spectacular way of presenting the Carter Family [material]. And for the title song, “What Are They Doing in Heaven Today,” I thought about who I was going to get on that track from the first second of thinking of this album. And I would come up with different ideas – flying to Nashville, maybe somebody’s coming through town, like that. Then the pandemic happened. And the whole project was put on hold for two years.

Last year, I got together with Laurie Lewis and Suzy Thompson for our birthday lunch. And in the car on the way home, I started thinking about playing the song with those two, and it felt perfect. It was the first time the three of us ever sang together. We got together in Suzy’s backyard, all of us wearing masks, and we started playing this song. And we all started crying. It was so poignant to be together and play music with other people. And of course, that song is so moving.

I met Tristan Scroggins when he was in high school, and I just loved his playing. I loved his rhythm chop, which was so reminiscent to me of John Reischman’s rhythm chop, which to me was the heartbeat of bluegrass. “Sitting on Top of the World” is such an iconic bluegrass song, and there are so many ways to play it, and Tristan has such a wide vocabulary of styles on the mandolin.

<a href="https://kathykallick.bandcamp.com/album/what-are-they-doing-in-heaven-today">What Are They Doing In Heaven Today? by Kathy Kallick</a>

When you were growing up, did your mother teach you about music and singing, or did you just pick it up by osmosis?

I would say it was osmosis with a couple of succinct suggestions. She did show me some things on the guitar. And my father did too. He was a classical guitar player who also played a little bit of folky stuff. My mom said to me, “If you care about the words you’re singing, then sing them so people can understand what you’re saying.” That was a big piece of advice that I have followed for my entire time of playing music. And then singing with her. I learned things by trying to match her phrasing, of course, and come up with notes that sounded nice with her notes. I only sang with her a little bit, but I started singing with her when I was about 6.

Your daughters (Juniper Waller and Riley Thompson) sing with you on this project. Have you always sung together?

Much in the way my mom never consciously groomed me to sing with her, I never did that with my kids either. Every once in a while, we would take out all the guitars and everybody would get to hold one, and Peter or I would show them a chord. But they weren’t particularly interested in it. It was kind of fun to do one time for an hour or a minute.

My older daughter has become a professional musician. She plays in a funk, R&B blues band. She is a dynamite diva on stage with her own style that is very different from mine. And after middle school rock band, our younger kid has never demonstrated any interest in playing or singing. But she definitely was up for singing “Wild Side of Life” with me, which is one that I sang with my mom. It was just delightful and surprising that it happened so easily and worked so well. They jumped right in and just nailed it. Neither of them sounds like me, they don’t sound like each other. But when the three of us blended our voices to sing in harmony on the last chorus, it was so satisfying. And so out of the blue. We’d never done anything like it before, but we may do it again.

<a href="https://kathykallick.bandcamp.com/album/what-are-they-doing-in-heaven-today">What Are They Doing In Heaven Today? by Kathy Kallick</a>

You grew up in the folk world, where women’s voices were an integral part of the genre. In that respect, how was your transition to the national bluegrass scene?

How did I move from the urban Chicago, more egalitarian, folk world, to this southern rural white man’s world? I think the answer is, I didn’t realize what was happening quite at first.

The core of the all-women Good Ol’ Persons group had already been getting together when I was invited to join them. The Bay Area was already inclusive to women when I got here. The men were welcoming. There were other women role models. Then Good Ol’ Persons decided to go into Paul’s Saloon and play three songs and knock their eyes out, with our all-woman band – and that was a new thing. There had been one woman in this band and one woman in that band, but we had this “we’re gonna show them” kind of feeling at the time.

I loved the music, I loved the scene. At the time, I didn’t realize how uphill the path was going to be, and I didn’t realize how entrenched the misogyny was in this style of music. When we started traveling outside of the Bay Area and encountering the actual good old boys’ network, it was surprising and uncomfortable. And I realized at some point that I was a trailblazer. I hadn’t set out necessarily to be the trailblazer, but I was, because I was leading a band. That was often awkward and uncomfortable for people who ran festivals. They began to say, “Okay, there are going to be women performing. Let’s have one female-fronted band.” Festivals would balk at having Laurie Lewis’ band or Claire Lynch and my band, even though the bands are very different. “But we already have a woman.” There is still so much resistance to women having an equal role in teaching, in performing, in what gets played on the radio. These days I like to play in a mixed-gender band. It feels more like a family.

How did you your music fare during the pandemic?

The pandemic hit me hard. I stopped playing music for the most part and learned that I’m not a person who sits in a room by themselves and plays music. I tried to make myself do it, and it began to feel like having to do sit-ups. I stopped because I was afraid it was going to ruin my love of music. So, I wrote a novel instead.

How did you get started on that?

Partway through the pandemic, I’d darned all the holes in my socks and sweaters, and I thought I really needed to do something. So, I finished a novel I had started years earlier. Then I started a second novel. And that one really took hold of me. Partway through that novel. I had to stop and write a short story, which I thought would take me about till lunch, but actually took me a month. Then I went back and finished the second novel, which I feel really good about. The thing that is similar to writing songs is the way the novel began to just take over. I let the novel say where it was going, instead of feeling like I had to adhere to my original idea. That’s the same way I write songs. I let the song take the lead and tell me how it’s going to go. This is what my muse does. It lets song or story take over, and I’m not in charge anymore. I love that.

<a href="https://kathykallick.bandcamp.com/album/what-are-they-doing-in-heaven-today">What Are They Doing In Heaven Today? by Kathy Kallick</a>

You’ve been in the bluegrass arena since 1975. What are you most proud of?

Well, there have been a number of musicians who had big starts and made a bigger splash than I did ever, and then sort of wafted away for one reason or another. You know, it’s hard to sustain a music career. It’s extra challenging for women who have children. And I weathered that. I took my first child with me everywhere, with a series of optimistic volunteers who thought going on tour with the Good Ol’ Persons would be such fun. We wore them out pretty quickly, but it worked. I feel really lucky. And also tenacious, because I have longevity, I have managed to continue to play music, to perform, to create, to be inspired. I’m not hugely successful. I’m not a household name. But I’m very proud of the place that I’ve carved out in this music. Nobody else sounds like me, and nobody else does what I do, and I feel good about it.

Do other women tell you that you have been a role model for them?

Yes! And I love that. I think about the women who were role models for me: Of course, my mom is the first one, as moms are for almost every woman. But I am just tickled to be a role model for younger women in the music world and for women my age who were trying to get to play music when people were closing them out. They saw me doing it and thought, “Okay, maybe it can be done. I’m going to hang in there and do it.”

Photo Credit: Irene Young

LISTEN: Molly Tuttle, “She’ll Change”

Posted on November 17, 2021June 20, 2025 by Editor

Artist: Molly Tuttle
Hometown: Palo Alto, California, and Nashville, Tennessee
Song: “She’ll Change”
Release Date: November 17, 2021
Label: Nonesuch Records

In Their Words: “I’ve always loved the rare bluegrass songs that are sung by women about women. Songs like ‘It’s Hard to Tell the Singer From the Song’ by Hazel Dickens, and ‘Ellie’ by Kathy Kallick. I wanted to write my own bluegrass song about a badass woman who lives by her own rules. ‘She’ll Change’ is my homage to the strong musical women who helped me find my own voice.” — Molly Tuttle

Photo Credit: Samantha Muljat

Sister Sadie: Bluegrass Entertainers, Teachers, and Most of All, Friends

Posted on December 4, 2020June 20, 2025 by Editor

Sister Sadie is a bluegrass supergroup featuring no-holds-barred instrumental and vocal talent presented as world-class entertainment. To list each member’s history in bluegrass and their accomplishments would take up more space than this entire interview, but their music speaks for itself. These women have spent their lives perfecting their craft. The band originally formed to play a one-off show at the historic Station Inn in Nashville. Once they started playing, they knew that they had found something special.

Since that night they have gone on to perform on the Grand Ole Opry, receive a Grammy nomination, and rack up two historic awards from the International Bluegrass Music Association. In 2019 they were the first all-female group to win IBMA Vocal Group of the Year and in 2020 they became the first all-female group to win IBMA Entertainer of the Year. These awards represent not only their individual lifetimes’ worth of hard work and passion, but also the work and love that they put into their music and each other.

BGS caught up with three of the band’s founding members — Tina Adair (mandolin, vocals), Gena Britt (banjo, vocals), and Deanie Richardson (fiddle) — for our Artist of the Month interview.

BGS: Since IBMA was virtual this year I haven’t gotten to see any of y’all in person to congratulate you on your award. I imagine this recognition must feel exciting since you’ve all been playing for your entire lives. Does winning Entertainer of the Year hold any special significance to you?

Tina Adair: I’ve been singing on stage since I was 3 years old. As big of a ham as I am now, I was as big a ham back then, too. I’ve always loved the stage and I love entertaining people and making people feel good and having a good time. I think people go out to see shows to get a break from the everyday world and to enjoy music because music is very therapeutic. It’s always been a goal of mine to make sure that people leave smiling bigger than they did coming into the show and feeling like they’re part of something. I know that Gena and Deanie are the same, all we’ve ever known has been music, you know? It’s not just a part of our lives — it is our life. So to get to do this as a profession, just makes us even luckier. And then to be recognized by your peers. Entertainer of the Year has always been something that I’ve dreamed about all my life. It’s been very special and we’re very honored and grateful.

Gena Britt: That’s pretty much everything I would’ve said.

Deanie Richardson: Yeah, that was pretty good. I’d say we’ve all been going to IBMA since we were teenagers. We all dreamed of being nominated for awards, but I don’t know if we ever thought it would happen. And like Tina said, that Entertainer of the Year category is special for some reason, so winning is just the icing on the cake. It means that we’ve not only gone out and played our best, but entertained them. Tina’s a great entertainer. She can grab that crowd and take them on a big journey. They’ll laugh and cry and anything they need to feel emotionally she can do that with an audience. To pull this off, to experience these awards and what we’ve accomplished together as five friends who have grown up knowing each other and going to IBMA that’s the really special part for me.

You all have this connection to mentoring the next generation, which is such a big part of the bluegrass tradition. How do you feel about being able to influence the generation of bluegrass in general and of women and bluegrass?

TA: Each of us has had such a lifelong journey, and we’re not old, but we’re middle aged now. So we’ve got some experiences to share. With age comes wisdom. I’ve been [working] at Belmont [University] for 20 years now. Personally I love that college age, because it’s such a transitional period in a person’s life. That’s the age where you’re coming into being a young adult and learning to make decisions. I love to be involved in lives at that point in time. I love to be able to provide advice to the kids and share any kind of tips. One of the best pieces of advice I always give to my students that I learned from one of my mentors is to do something every day to help forward yourself towards a goal or the career that you want to go after. Whether you spend five minutes on it or 10 hours that day on it, do something every single day.

And then, as far as influencing women and everything, I hope I can be an influence to a female that doesn’t fit the typical mold of what people think you’re supposed to look like in society. You know what I mean? People who need to be encouraged to get on stage or find the courage to want to learn how to play something even if they’re just sitting in their living room. I think that’s important — having that self-confidence and awareness of knowing who you are and knowing what you stand for. And being okay with yourself. Lord knows I’m not a size four, but it doesn’t matter. I’ve got the confidence of a size two. I love people. And I think if you give love to people then they’re gonna give back to you. I really feed off the energy of an audience because if I’m interacting with them and they’re interacting with me, then they’re invested just as much as I’m invested in them, you know? If I can influence one person that may have thought they couldn’t do something but changed their mind after seeing a Sister Sadie show, then that’s made our journey worth it.

DR: We’re not ones to harp on this whole “We’re women, blah, blah, blah.” But there are lots of women out there who paved the way for us like Laurie Lewis, Lynn Morris, and Kathy Kallick. We look up to them and they made it possible for us to win these awards. Somebody said the other day in an interview, “No woman has ever won this award” or all-female band or whatever. It is a male-dominated business, but there have always been women in this genre. There have been women always working towards what we just accomplished and they helped us get to where we are. And I hope that we’re paving the way for the next group of women to come right behind us. I think we’re working past saying, “Here are some women, and they just did this.” Because, you know what? We’re freaking good. And we just did this. Eighty percent of my roster that I teach is young girls playing fiddle and I want them to not have to worry about being a man or a woman. I want them to just want to be good, or to be the best, and to get out there and do this because that’s their goal.

Gena, I had a question for you because you played in Petticoat Junction, which is another historically significant, all-female group. Do you feel like there’s much of a difference performing in an all-female group now versus back then?

GB: Back then, there were a few other all-female bands, and at the time, if you called a promoter to book a show or something, they would say, “Well, we’ve already got a female band that weekend. We don’t need another female band.” I think we’ve grown so much since then. It hasn’t completely gone away, but we have stepped away from that. Yes, we are women, we are in our 40s, we all have these jobs that we’re doing, like, I have a day job and everything. But people are recognizing our music and we’ve been given these awards, because we’re carrying our own and we’re doing as best we can as musicians.

It’s great to see all of that progress. Bluegrass has this thing where men age into reverence, kind of no matter how talented they are. If you’ve been around for long enough, then people recognize that you have some wisdom which is turned into social capital. But women don’t seem to get that same treatment. It seems like it’s much harder for them to age into legends. You just stop hearing about them as much. It’s a really unsettling phenomenon. So I think it’s doubly exciting for you all to, uh, as… I’m trying so hard to not say, and I’m not saying at all that you guys are —

TA: Just say it, Tristan!

You’re only older than me! You’re not old, I’m just a baby.

TA: I mean, we’re all one step away from menopause. At least I really hope I am, because if I’m not, there’s something else wrong with me. [Laughs]

GB: I was 18 when I joined Petticoat Junction. That was 30 years ago. I’m 48. That gives some perspective on how long we’ve been out here doing this.

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You’ve been doing this your entire lives and have been actively involved in the scene the entire time and I think it’s reflected in your music. You’re all talented musicians. The music that you play has its own sound, but clearly has a lot of different influences. How do you bridge the gap between bluegrass and folk and country and blues?

DR: Going into the studio and picking material is a hard thing for five people to do, and as women who all have different tastes and different senses of artistic creativity, it’s a challenge. Everybody brings songs to the table and then we choose as a unit what we think works as a band. That’s a hard process for us, but I feel like, at the end of the day, we work really well through our differences. Hell, we’re probably gonna break into a fight, but it’s gonna be alright. We’re gonna make it through it. And at the end of the day, there’s gonna be 12 songs on the record that we can kick ass on. Part of it comes down to Tina has a singing style that works for her, Gena has a singing style, and Dale Ann had one as well. So that brings in the blues, the hardcore traditional, the folky, from each of us.

GB: It’s all those influences. The East Kentucky, Alabama and the blues from Tina, I’m straight-ahead, traditional bluegrass from here in the heart of North Carolina. And it’s like you said, it is a cohesive sound. We’re all together. All those influences do help create our sound.

TA: It’s what brings it together.

You all clearly put a lot of work and love into your music and it’s really paid off.

DR: The one thing I am most proud of about this band is that we started as five friends played that show at the Station Inn. It went from there to another show, to another show, to a record to another record, to a Grammy nomination, to the Opry, to Vocal Group of the Year, to Fiddle Player and Entertainer of the Year. I wouldn’t have won that Fiddle Player or the Year award without this band so I’m truly grateful for all of that. But we’ve done this all by ourselves. We are five women who love each other, who work through our differences, and who have worked hard together.

We’ve done the booking, we’ve done the managing, we’ve done the publicity — it’s all been organic. It’s not something we’ve gone out and pushed, it’s not something we’ve gone out and publicized a great deal. It’s just all happened organically. It took on its own life. Everything that has happened with Sister Sadie has happened because it was meant to happen. And it’s just out of our love for this music and for each other. That is what I’m most proud of. Five women who raise kids, who work day jobs, who teach, who play professionally. Five women who have done this together. I’m super, super proud of that.

TA: Me, too. I want to piggyback off of that because that’s an important point. We didn’t start off to make it big or anything. We just wanted to play music together and instead of doing it in our living room, we thought, “Well, we could do it at the Station Inn, and that would be fun.” Because Station Inn is like all of our home away from home. So that’s how it all started. I think everything has a time and a place and everything happens the way it’s supposed to happen. I think that night at the Station Inn was supposed to happen. That is what led us down this road to accomplishing and achieving some things that have been lifelong dreams of ours that may not have ever come true had Sister Sadie not been formed. We just love each other dearly and hopefully that comes across. I hope the concept of Sister Sadie comes across as nothing more than we’re trying to love. I love people, we love each other, and love making music. We love bluegrass.

Photo credits: Deanie Richardson by Kerrie Richardson; Tina Adair by John Dorton; Gena Britt by Mike Carter

A Role Model and Mentor, Laurie Lewis Still Seeks Out Bluegrass Masters (Part 2 of 2)

Posted on May 8, 2020June 20, 2025 by Editor

Laurie Lewis’ new album, and Laurie Lewis, is as much a tribute to her strong relationships as it is to her musical talents. Featuring old friends like Kathy Kallick, Todd Phillips, and Tom Rozum, and younger collaborators like Tatiana Hargreaves, Molly Tuttle, and Leah Wollenberg, her embrace of great friends and great music is on full display. In the second half of our conversation, the IBMA Award-winning artist talks about her history in the Bay Area, her aspirations and challenges, and the things that give her joy.

Editor’s Note: Read part one of our BGS Artist of the Month interview with Laurie Lewis.

BGS: Years ago, you and Kathy Kallick gave bluegrass a female voice. Were you conscious of breaking barriers at the time? And are you aware of what a model you are to women our age?

I appreciate that in hindsight. In the moment, we were just trying to make the best music we could make together, and we were both in a musical community in the Bay Area that didn’t have the barriers that the outside world had for women in bluegrass. We were doing what we wanted to do, what was fun for us. And not thinking that it was the most special thing or groundbreaking or ceiling-shattering stuff.

It was when I started performing more outside the Bay Area that I began to realize that what we had been doing was unusual. But at that point, I was just headstrong and I was just going to do what I wanted to do and not be stopped. I had disdain for festivals that would only book one girl bandleader at a festival, while they would book 12 male bandleaders at a festival. It pissed me off, but it didn’t stop me. And things are still a little bit like that — it’s amazing how slowly things change.

Did you set out to mentor young women?

Life for me just sort of unfolds, and I have to say I don’t set out to do these things in advance. I didn’t decide, “Now that I’m a wise older woman…” to mentor younger people. What actually started it was when younger people started showing up at music camps. I was a little afraid of that, because most music camps I had been doing were with adults. And I was a little afraid of my ability to relate to and coach young people.

When I was first asked to teach at a fiddle camp specifically for young people, I was sort of daunted by it. But the relationships that grew out of that camp have been incredibly important to me. Tatiana was there — she also went to Bluegrass at the Beach when she was like seven, that’s when we met. And Emily Mann, who wrote one of the songs I sang with Molly, was a preteen at that camp.

It has been a thrill to watch them blossom. It has been so gratifying to me. I don’t have children, and that’s a choice on my part, but I really appreciate them. I really enjoy hanging out with them and being able to have them in my life. I didn’t decide to focus on young women, but I suppose just because I am a woman, that has happened. People want role models – to see someone who’s like them. I am more like a young woman than I am like a teenage boy!

Any comments about being a role model?

Well, I feel very, very grateful that that’s happened. I’m really just trying to do the best I can do and play what’s in my heart and express myself in the best way I can, which seems to be through music. I am very gratified that people see me as a role model. I have a feeling of responsibility about that — so I better not fuck up.

Why is teaching important to you?

I get very excited teaching about things that excite me. Music excites me, and I want to spread the gospel. I am evangelistic about things like Chubby Wise’s fiddle playing, and how his solos are the bedrock of bluegrass fiddling. Singing harmonies, and how to work on making a vocal blend, are is endlessly fascinating to me, so I like a chance to talk about it and explore it with other people.

It also helps me, because when I am teaching I go back to the masters and I listen again to things maybe I haven’t listened to in 10 years. I always hear new things and I always learn myself. It keeps the music fresh for me in that way. It’s not just a one-way street. Teaching’s definitely a two-way street.

Do you want to talk about your shyness? You’ve said you are incredibly shy, and yet when you are on stage you fill auditoriums with your presence and your energy. How does that work?

I’ve certainly conquered a lot of my shyness. Shyness is really fear-based. You have to learn to face your fears. And in many, many instances, by facing them they just melt away. They are like a wraith. They just go away. I have learned that over the years. I used to be afraid to talk on the phone. It was so hard for me to call people up and just be a regular person on the phone and have a one-on-one conversation. I made myself do it. I made myself get on stage. I made myself open up to an audience. Sometimes it’s easier to open up to an audience than it is to open up to three people in the room with you. Strength in numbers when it comes to shyness.

I was really shy — and I’m not so shy any more. I still very seldom will talk to strangers. I told Tom yesterday that I was on a hike, and I met this young man and we talked a whole lot (this guy was named after Superman’s father, Jor-El). Tom said, “How did you start talking to him?” And I said, “I don’t know, it was a beautiful day….” and Tom said, “This is so unlike you.” It is unlike me that I would talk to a stranger, but we had a very great conversation. It turns out we were both born in Long Beach, we have a lot in common. … I’m still breaking down my barriers. By the time I’m 90 I’ll be talking to anybody and everybody. You won’t be able to shut me up.

How is today feeling for you? You have this great new album – and the world is upside down.

It’s frustrating, but — it’s just my own little personal problem. It’s really too bad, but so many people are suffering so much right now. I don’t have it in me to be all upset about it being a bad time for me. The album will still be here, the music will still be here when the virus has run its course. The virus is not going to kill my music.

How are you keeping your spirits up?

I go up into the hills and I walk. And right now it’s springtime, it is so beautiful. The world is just so gorgeous. There are wildflowers everywhere. If you can get out into nature, it is the most healing balm that I know of, and that’s what works for me. It makes the human problems seem so small, and it connects me to the universe. It takes me outside of myself.

What’s next for you?

I’m loving playing with the current Right Hands configuration: Brandon Godman on fiddle, Patrick Sauber on banjo and Haselden Ciaccio on bass (along with Tom). We’ve been planning a new album. We’ve got so many things we’re cooking up: new songs and old stuff that we’ve been doing. I feel like we need to have a record of how we sound together.

Do you have a special goal, something that you want to achieve that you haven’t done before?

I would really love it if other people would sing some of my songs and make them part of the folk tradition. That would thrill me more than anything. I would like to get interviewed by Terry Gross. That would be pretty great! Of course, because I’ve been doing this for so long I would like to get broader recognition, but I’m fine with things the way they are. But mostly I’m just very, very grateful that I get to do what I want to do. I can put together a life out of it and I can keep playing. I’m in my 70^th year. I just feel lucky.

Photo credit: Jeff Fasano