Tag: Larry Sparks

WATCH: Larry Sparks, “Mama’s Apron Strings”

Posted on by Editor

Artist: Larry Sparks
Hometown: Lebanon, Ohio
Song: “Mama’s Apron Strings”
Album: It’s Just Me
Release Date: March 31, 2023
Label: Rebel Records

In Their Words: “‘Mama’s Apron Strings’ was a way of life back in the day. Women used them for working in the home and yet sometimes they would also offer up something sweet in their pockets for the children. This generation of folks were great people. Their first love was caring for their family and providing for their needs. It reminds me of my own mom and the ways she cared for our family. When it came time to make a video for ‘Mama’s Apron Strings’ it seemed right to film it at my house. I guess I am a ‘kinda back in the day’ person: my home is 145 years old and I have a few old cars including the 1950 Dodge used in the video. God has been good to me through the years and I hope everyone will enjoy this video for my current single ‘Mama’s Apron Strings.’” — Larry Sparks

Photo Credit: Michael Wilson

WATCH: Ron Block & Clay Hess, “The Old Spinning Wheel”

Posted on by Editor

Artists: Ron Block and Clay Hess
Hometown: Nashville (Ron Block); Peebles, Ohio (Clay Hess)
Song: “The Old Spinning Wheel”
Album: Live at Reverb And Echo
Release Date: October 19, 2022

In Their Words: “‘The Old Spinning Wheel’ is a tune I first heard through Larry Sparks, years ago, on an instrumental album he recorded. It’s an old song from years past, and I always love to play simple song melodies on the guitar.” — Ron Block

“I first heard ‘The Old Spinning Wheel’ from a guy named Dave Starlin. He was one of my mentors starting out. He used to sing it. I usually try to sing the song with the guitar on simple melodies like this. This style of song is so much fun to play.” — Clay Hess

Bluegrass Memoirs: The First Canadian Bluegrass Festival (Part 1)

Posted on by Justin Hiltner

The first Canadian festival, a modest affair billed as a “Bluegrass Jamboree,” took place in August 1972. I was involved in its organization and presentation. Subsequently, the Jamboree grew into an annual festival that’s still running. 

The Nova Scotia-based Downeast Bluegrass & Oldtime Music Society’s website reads: 

The annual family friendly Nova Scotia Bluegrass and Oldtime Music festival is Canada’s oldest, and North America’s second oldest continuously running Bluegrass Festival, and is presented and hosted by the Downeast Bluegrass and Oldtime Music Society, a non-profit organization dedicated to the preservation and promotion of Bluegrass and Oldtime music in Eastern Canada. 

Here’s how it happened. 

By the summer of 1972 I had been living in Canada for four years, working as a professor of folklore and archivist in St. John’s, Newfoundland, at Memorial, the big provincial university.

Deeply immersed in bluegrass, I now stayed in touch with the music I’d left behind via bluegrass friends in the states, I read Bluegrass Unlimited every month, and I got County Sales‘ newsletters and bought new LPs from them by mail.

 

June 22, 1968. Banjo workshop at Bean Blossom, IN: Vic Jordan, Bobby Thompson, Dave Garrett, Neil Rosenberg, Ralph Stanley.
(Photo by Frank Godbey)

When I arrived in Newfoundland in September 1968, I’d just published my first academic article — on bluegrass — in the Journal of American Folklore. I’d been writing regularly for Bluegrass Unlimited. That past June, Bill Monroe had included me in a banjo workshop at his Blue Grass Festival in Bean Blossom, Indiana; and a few weeks before coming to St. John’s, I’d been at the Richland Hills fiddle contest near Dallas, Texas, jamming with Alan Munde, Sam Bush, and Byron Berline and the Stone Mountain Boys.

 

August 18, 1968. Richland Hills, TX fiddle contest: Neil Rosenberg
(b), Sam Bush (m), Byron Berline (f).
(Photo by David Stark)

During the late ’60s and early ’70s, bluegrass festivals were proliferating (I wrote about this in Bluegrass: A History, 305-339) and bluegrass was having success in the popular music business (I wrote about that too, 305-339).

By 1972 I was hearing at a distance about the adventures of my friends from the U.S. bluegrass festival scene. Alan and Sam had made a popular instrumental LP. Now Alan was picking banjo with Jimmy Martin and Sam was singing and playing mandolin with the Bluegrass Alliance. And Byron, working as a studio musician in Los Angeles, had recently recorded with The Rolling Stones. 

As I continued to study and write about bluegrass, I maintained my musical calling, moonlighting in the local contemporary folk and pop music scene. It was several years before I met anyone in St. John’s who played or knew much about bluegrass. 

In 1969, RCA Victor invited me to edit an album in their Vintage series titled Early Bluegrass. Aside from some Monroe LPs, this was the first historical bluegrass anthology. I signed its detailed historical liner notes with “Memorial University of Newfoundland” under my name. It got a good reception in the bluegrass world and introduced me to Canadian bluegrass record buyers. 

In 1971 I signed a contract with the University of Illinois Press to write a volume on bluegrass history in their new Music in American Life series. It was a book that would take years to write, for I had catching up to do. Not only was I out of touch with the bluegrass scene I’d been in before immigrating, I also knew little about the bluegrass scenes in my new home.

 

June 22, 1968. Banjo workshop at Bean Blossom, IN: Vic Jordan, Bobby Thompson, Neil Rosenberg, Dave Garrett, Ralph Stanley, Larry Sparks. (Photo by Doc Hamilton)

Learning About Canadian Bluegrass 

Even before immigrating to Canada, I knew it had bluegrass, thanks to Toronto’s Doug Benson, who put me on the mailing list of his magazine The Bluegrass Breakdown. The first issue had reached me in spring 1968 while I was still in Indiana. It told of bluegrass scenes in Ontario and Quebec.

En route to Newfoundland in September 1968, we entered eastern Canada via the Maritimes — the provinces of Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and New Brunswick. Picking up our landed immigrant passes from Canadian Customs at the Maine border, we drove through New Brunswick and Nova Scotia, where, in Cape Breton, we caught the night ferry to Newfoundland.

During this trip I got my first taste of Canadian bluegrass in an Antigonish, Nova Scotia motel where we watched Don Messer’s Jubilee, a Halifax-produced CBC weekly TV show starring a fiddler who’d been recording and broadcasting nationally on radio since the 1930s and television later. Messer’s prime-time Jubilee was Canada’s second most-watched show, exceeded only by Hockey Night In Canada.

I was pleasantly surprised to see that Messer’s band included a five-string banjo played bluegrass style! To this immigrant’s eyes and ears, Messer was blending bluegrass into his country and old-time sound. Here’s his performance, taken from Jubilee footage, of “St. Anne’s Reel,” a popular Canadian fiddle tune:

The smiling banjo picker behind Messer was Vic Mullen, the youngest member of his band. Born in 1933 and raised in rural southwestern Nova Scotia, he had been working as a musician since his teens, playing with country bands in the Maritimes and Ontario.

In 1969, Mullen left Messer and began appearing with his own country band, The Hickorys, on another Halifax CBC weekly prime-time show, Country Time. There wasn’t much bluegrass on that show beyond Mullen’s occasional southern-style fiddle pieces.

Getting Acquainted 

My first meeting with a Newfoundlander who shared my enthusiasm for bluegrass came early in April 1971 when I had a letter from record collector Michael Cohen of Grand Falls-Windsor. 

By the time we met, Michael’s family owned six furniture stores in central Newfoundland. He’d grown up listening to country music on the radio and began collecting records. After attending university in Ottawa, where he’d heard lots of local and touring American and Canadian country music, he returned to Windsor to work in the family business, continue his collecting (he has all of Hank Snow’s recordings) and play in a country band.

He wrote me because he’d been told about me by a friend. “Early bluegrass and string bands … are my main interest,” he said, introducing himself and welcoming me to make tape copies of his rare records.

I wrote back inviting him to visit us on his next trip to St. John’s. This was the beginning of an enduring friendship. Through him I met others interested in bluegrass and Canadian country. The first was Fred Isenor of Lantz, Nova Scotia, a small community north of Halifax, who got my address from Michael and wrote me a few weeks later.

 

August 18, 1968. Alan Munde, Neil Rosenberg, unidentified fiddler.
(Photo by David Stark)

Fred, Vic Mullen’s contemporary and friend, worked at the local brick factory, and had a music store in Lantz. He was a record collector, a Bluegrass Unlimited subscriber, and a musician. He played mandolin and bass in The Nova Scotia Playboys, which he described to me as an “authentic (non-electric) country” band. They had represented Nova Scotia at the 1967 Expo in Montreal.

Fred had purchased his mandolin, a 1920s Gibson F5, for $100 at a Halifax pawn shop in 1960. Only later did he learn that its label, signed by Lloyd Loar, meant that he now owned an instrument like that of Bill Monroe, who’d just been elected to Nashville’s Country Music Hall of Fame. 

Our correspondence began with shared unsuccessful attempts to put together a Bill Monroe tour. I’d planned to speak with Monroe at a New England festival that summer. But the festival was cancelled; that plan fell through. In March 1972, Fred wrote of other plans:

There is a possibility of a one day bluegrass jamboree in Nova Scotia this summer. Not really a festival but if we can put it over it will be a start. Perhaps Michael has mentioned this to you. As you played with Bill Monroe and helped run Bean Blossom [I’d told Michael about this when we first met] I thought possibly you could offer some helpful suggestions, in other words some do’s and don’ts. 

He explained that with a limited budget the event would have to utilize local talent. 

Please do not mention this to anyone as definite … so far Vic Mullen and I just talked briefly about this and will be discussing it further on Monday night. 

He asked if I’d be able to visit him and take part in the program. 

I responded enthusiastically, calling the jamboree a festival, offering my suggestions, and saying I’d be driving through Nova Scotia in August and hoped to visit him then.

Meeting Vic Mullen 

In June 1972, Country Time came to St. John’s to tape some shows. I asked Vic if he’d do an interview, explaining to him that I was working on a book about bluegrass. He agreed. 

Still in his thirties, Vic had been playing country music professionally for a quarter century. He’d mastered instruments — mandolin, fiddle, guitar, five-string banjo — as needed, working on the road with a series of increasingly high-profile bands. Bluegrass chops were just one aspect of his professional tools — a flashy banjo piece, or southern-style hoedown fiddle as part of the show, that kind of thing. He’d worked with some bluegrass bands in Ontario, done TV, etc.

In the late fifties he started his own band, The Birch Mountain Boys. Working at first in southwestern Nova Scotia, he teamed up with Brent Williams and Harry Cromwell, young African Canadians from his home county, Digby. They played bluegrass in the Maritimes for several years before Brent and Harry started playing country and Vic joined Messer. 

Now Mullen was fronting his own national CBC TV country music show. He liked bluegrass and enjoyed playing it, but as a bandleader he chose it rarely. Most people in his audiences didn’t know the word “bluegrass” when they heard it and even if they liked it, it was just nice country music to them. Bluegrass was a niche genre. It had enthusiastic fans and great performers, but they were in a minority.

Vic was supportive of his old friend Fred; he understood Fred’s enthusiasm. He knew about BU and the bluegrass festivals that were happening in the States, but he didn’t think the festivals were going to catch on in Canada. Of Canadian bluegrass fans, he said that: 

Altogether in a group, there’d be a lot of people. But they’re spread out from coast to coast and particularly between here and Ontario … there wouldn’t be enough people for an audience in any one area, it’d be just too far for them to get there. 

Still, he was planning to be at Fred’s Jamboree. In our interview, Vic had given me an insider’s introduction to the world of Canadian country music. From him I heard for the first time many names and facts that would become familiar to me later. I was encouraged that a musician of his caliber, experience, and reputation would be there.

A week after the interview, I wrote Fred and told him I’d be catching the ferry to Nova Scotia on August 1, driving to Lantz the next day and staying to get acquainted. I explained that this was just the start of a crowded trip for “some hurried field research on bluegrass music … in Ohio, Kentucky and Indiana.” I closed by mentioning that I’d had a pleasant experience interviewing Vic. 

Fred’s reply came a few days later. He was looking forward to my visit, he said, and then, referring to my earlier letter, told me the event would be a jamboree — “outdoors, just one evening.” Referring to a nearby farmer who held dances in his barn, Fred explained: 

John Moxom is building an outdoor stage as soon as his hay is made and it appears now that we will be holding it either Friday, August 4th or August 11th. All the local bluegrass musicians are willing to help and take a chance on it being a flop. We hope to find out if there is enough interest to try something bigger and better next year. I know you have a busy schedule but if August 4th turns out to be the date we would sure like to have you present. 

By the end of July 1972, I was headed first to visit Fred in rural Nova Scotia. Then I’d drive to New England, stopping near the border at Woodstock, New Brunswick, to see Don Messer’s Jubilee perform at a county fair, and then going to Vermont where my family was vacationing. After a short rest I’d be heading for West Virginia to join my photographer friend Carl Fleischhauer on the trip we described in Bluegrass Odyssey.

On August 1, I headed for the Canadian National ferry terminal in Argentia, Newfoundland, ready to sail west for some bluegrass. 

Rosenberg is an author, scholar, historian, banjo player, Bluegrass Music Hall of Fame inductee, and co-chair of the IBMA Foundation’s Arnold Shultz Fund.

Photo of Neil V. Rosenberg by Terri Thomson Rosenberg, all other photos by Neil V. Rosenberg. 

Edited by Justin Hiltner

Bluegrass Memoirs: ‘Industrial Strength Bluegrass’ and the Dayton Bluegrass Reunion (Part 3)

Posted on by Justin Hiltner

(Editor’s Note: Read part one of our series on the Dayton Bluegrass Reunion here. Read part two here.)

Working on CityFolk’s Dayton Bluegrass Reunion, I heard local terminology for the culture in which this music grew. “Industrial working-class Appalachian migrants” was rarely spoken. “Hillbilly” was said sometimes with disdain, sometimes with pride. The preferred in-group term was “briar.” Briars came from the Appalachian hills, transplants proud of their continuing organic down-home connections. I was told that the call letters of WPFB, where Moon Mullins had represented bluegrass for two and a half decades, stood for “We Play For Briars.”

Don Baker’s introduction to the second act of the reunion framed a dramatic shift of scene from Mullins’ milieu to a younger Dayton band: The Hotmud Family.

Inspired by the New Lost City Ramblers, this band began in 1970 playing old-time music based on pre-war hillbilly recordings. The band included Suzanne Thomas Edmundson, Dave Edmundson, and Rick Good, along with a succession of bassists. Suzanne, born in Dayton of Kentucky parents, was a second-generation briar. According to Jon Hartley Fox the Hotmuds were “perhaps the most significant band to emerge from the vibrant scene of the 1970s in southwestern Ohio” (Industrial Strength Bluegrass, 140-1). 

They began including bluegrass in their sound during a 1974 appearance at the Mariposa Folk Festival. In blending old-time and bluegrass, they placed special emphasis on vocal harmonies, something many old-time bands overlooked. Between 1974 and 1981 they made eight albums and appeared widely at bluegrass and folk festivals. Here’s their 1975 bluegrass/old-time blending of “Weary Blues,” a song originally recorded in 1929 in Atlanta by Chattanoogan Jess Young’s Tennessee Band as “Old Weary Blues”:

The Hotmud Family came to be associated with Dayton’s Living Arts Center, described by Hotmud banjoist Rick Good in Industrial Strength Bluegrass (153-57). Established in 1967 by the Dayton Board of Education, this facility offered after-school instruction in the arts for grades 5-12 students in East Dayton. 

In 1975 it began providing programs aimed at the local Appalachian-based culture. It turned to the Hotmud Family, now a nationally known band with an enthusiastic local fan base from their weekends at Sam’s Bar and Grill. At the Center, Hotmud gave lessons, ran a song circle, and led informal jam sessions. Once a week they held a live Country Music Jamboree, which was broadcast over WYSO, the Antioch College radio station. The Center closed in 1977, but the Jamboree continued with other performers at other local venues until 1986. 

Act Two of the Dayton Bluegrass Reunion opened with a solo rendition of “Red Rocking Chair” by former Hotmud lead vocalist Suzanne Thomas Edmundson. Then came the group’s reunion, when Thomas was joined by the other founding Family members Dave Edmundson and Rick Good along with bassist Gary Hopkins. They did three pieces and an encore. During the 1980s the band gave occasional reunion performances. This was one of their last.

For Act Three, Baker’s stage directions began: “Beer Sign On.” 

A borrowed neon sign hung onstage now lit up for the reunion of a band associated with Dayton’s bluegrass bar scene, the Allen Brothers.

Formed in the late ’60s to back their father Red Allen, they began performing without him and were touring in 1974 when brother Neal died. After a brief hiatus, the three other brothers (Harley, Greg, and Ronnie) carried on into the early ’80s, recording Rounder and Folkways albums. The new Smithsonian/Folkways album Industrial Strength Bluegrass — which just won Album of the Year at the 2021 IBMA Bluegrass Music Awards — includes Harley Allen’s “Suzanne,” first recorded by the Allen Brothers in 1982, here recreated by Mo Pitney and Merle Monroe:

They continued to play together in the Dayton area into the mid-’80s, but by then Harley had begun a solo career, first joining banjoist Mike Lilly in a band Jon Hartley Fox calls “one of the best bluegrass acts Dayton ever produced” (Industrial Strength Bluegrass 136). In 1985 the Allen-Lilly Band closed a set at the Berkshire Mountain Bluegrass Festival. Harlan County native Lilly led the way into “Little Maggie” with coon dog and motorcycle as Frank Wakefield watched: 

Harley went on to a Nashville career as a singer-songwriter, winning two Grammys and singing on the O Brother, Where Art Thou? soundtrack hit “I Am a Man of Constant Sorrow” before dying at the age of 55. 

At the Reunion, the Allen Brothers put together a band with Harley on mandolin, Greg on banjo, and Ronnie on bass, with Wendell Barrett on guitar, and David Harvey on fiddle.

Here’s how they sounded with a similar band (different fiddler and mandolinist), with Monroe’s “Uncle Pen” enlivened by guitarist Harley Allen’s transformation of Jimmy Martin’s “G run” and a fancy ending, followed by a bluegrass trio rendition of the Paul Siebel’s classic “Louise.”

At the Reunion, they did three tunes and an encore. Then it was intermission time.

The second half began with Baker introducing Act Four, the Dry Branch Fire Squad. This band was led by mandolinist Ron Thomason, a Virginian who had migrated to the region as a child. Around since the mid-’70s, it’s still active today. Thomason came up in Dayton’s regional scene in the ’60s, working in bar bands and on the road with Ralph Stanley. 

Committed to traditional bluegrass, Thomason, now living in Colorado, has had many talented musicians in his band. He is famous for his emcee work, which regularly grows into humorous monologue. Baker’s directions for this act listed two pieces (including one gospel song), separated by:

“Rap — Ron Thomason”

Here’s a sample of Ron’s “rap” — a comic speech from a 2007 California festival:

At the time of The Dayton Bluegrass Reunion, Dry Branch had four albums on Rounder, the start of a long string with that label. Like the Hotmud Family, they were folk and bluegrass festival regulars. 

The band this evening consisted of Ron on mandolin, John Hisey on banjo, Mary Jo Leet on guitar, and Charlie Leet on bass. In 1987 a similar lineup recorded “Aragon Mill,” a Si Kahn song that Ron had learned while working at coal miner’s union rallies with Hazel Dickens:

Act Five brought on another performer still active today, Larry Sparks and the Lonesome Ramblers. Sparks had come up in the Dayton bar scene at about the same time as Ron Thomason. He worked with the Stanley Brothers and Ralph Stanley at the end of the ’60s and made his first album on his own in 1970s. He became a member of the Bluegrass Hall of Fame in 2015 and has a new album out on Rebel. 

At this concert his Lonesome Ramblers had a reunion dimension. Mandolinist and singer Wendy Miller, who’d played on Larry’s earliest recordings and was with the band through most of the ’70s, was back for this evening’s concert. Also in the band were banjoist Barry Crabtree and Larry’s son, Larry Dee, on bass. 

They did three songs: “Dark Hollow,” “Face in the Crowd,” and “Kentucky Chimes,” all regulars from his albums and concerts. He closed with an eight-tune medley of his other hits. There are many videos of Larry’s great singing and lead guitar work. Here’s one of my favorites:

Acts Six and Seven dramatized the transformations of Dayton’s foundational 1956 band — The Osborne Brothers and Red Allen.

Act Six was all reunion. Red Allen had been officially retired since 1984, although he’d recently recorded four tracks on Home Is Where The Heart Is, David Grisman’s new Rounder album, joined on these tracks by son Harley and banjoist Porter Church, who’d been in his band The Kentuckians. 

Red started this band in 1959 with mandolinist Frank Wakefield. In November 1961, in Nashville for the D.J. Convention, they cut six classic tracks at Starday with top bluegrass musicians of the day: Don Reno on banjo; Chubby Wise on fiddle; and John Palmer on bass. The whole great session is on YouTube: 

Sierra Hull reprises Wakefield’s “Mountain Strings” on the new Smithsonian/Folkways album Industrial Strength Bluegrass. The track was nominated for IBMA’s 2021 Instrumental Recording of the Year.

In the early ’60s Wakefield and Allen worked out of the D.C. area, with a radio show in Wheaton, Maryland. In 1964 they did a Folkways album in New York, produced by David Grisman and Peter Siegel. 

Soon after, Wakefield, whose innovative music is discussed by Ben Krakauer in Industrial Strength Bluegrass (182-183), began working with New York band The Greenbriar Boys and later he relocated to Saratoga Springs, New York. Here’s how he sounded in 2008 — still pushing the boundaries:

Red kept the Kentuckians going in the mid-’60s with a succession of great sidemen, among them banjoist Porter Church and mandolinist Grisman, who produced two albums of the Kentuckians on the County label.

In 1967 Red worked briefly for Bill Monroe and took Lester Flatt’s place in the Foggy Mountain Boys when Flatt had heart surgery. The next year he was in Lexington working with J.D. Crowe and Doyle Lawson.

By the early ’70s he was back in Dayton, working with his sons and playing locally what Rick Good calls “bargrass” (Industrial Strength Bluegrass 156). For tonight’s concert Red and Frank’s Kentuckians included Porter Church on banjo, Buddy Griffin on fiddle, Ron Messing on Dobro, and Larry Nager on bass. 

During Red’s four-song set, Red Spurlock and Noah Crase, banjoists who’d played with Red during his early years, sat in for choruses with the band. A reprise of Wakefield’s famous “New Camptown Races” brought guest David Harvey, son of Dorsey Harvey, another influential mandolinist, to play harmony.

The final segment, Act Seven, featured Dayton’s Grand Ole Opry stars, the Osborne Brothers. Two days before the concert the Dayton Daily News said the Osbornes had “achieved the greatest fame of those taking part in this tribute to the flowering of bluegrass music in Dayton.” It would be hard for anyone to follow them. After joining the Opry in 1964 they’d moved from Dayton to Nashville. During the late ’60s and early ’70s, a string of country hits (“Rocky Top” is the best known today) led to industry awards for their vocal work.

With this success the Osbornes’ recordings moved toward a contemporary country radio-friendly sound, mixing pedal steel, piano, fiddle, drums, and electric bass alongside their bluegrass banjo and mandolin. Their live sound also changed. In 1967 they added electric bass; in the early ’70s, a drummer. Next came electric pickups on banjo and mandolin. They did this to make themselves heard in the big country package shows they were playing, where all the other acts were highly amplified. Their “going electric” was viewed with alarm in the acoustic-oriented bluegrass festival world, but it only lasted for a few years.

Throughout these years, their unique vocals remained a constant. They continued to record and tour. Their repertoire drew largely from decades of recordings along with newer material. They now carried a straight-ahead bluegrass band including fiddle and acoustic bass.

This evening, playing with the Osborne Brothers were Paul Brewster on guitar and third voice in the trio, Terry Eldredge on bass, and Steve Thomas on fiddle.  They did four songs, all favorites from their earlier recordings, including a version of “Kentucky,” the Blue Sky Boys hit of the ’30s that they’d recorded for Decca in 1964 and which remained in their repertoire right up until Sonny’s 2005 retirement. Here’s an early ’90s Opry performance of it, introduced by Bill Anderson. The band includes future Grascals member Eldredge on guitar and third voice and Terry Smith on bass, along with second guitarist (and bus driver) Raymond Huffmaster, Dobroist Gene Wooten, and fiddler Glen Duncan. 

According to Baker’s stage directions, the closing act consisted of:

“Music — Medley”

An earlier draft reads:

“[medley in B natural: each unit from each of the 7 segments chooses a song which they play when their turn comes]”

My memory of this is vague, but I think that’s just how the Dayton Bluegrass Reunion ended, in B natural. But it wasn’t over quite yet. In that day’s Dayton Daily News columnist Nick Weiser had announced: 

“Following the Dayton Bluegrass Reunion at Memorial Hall, the Canal Street Tavern, located at 308 E. First St., will have a reception for the audience and the participants of the Bluegrass Reunion Show. Mark Bondurant will open the show at 9:30 with a reception to follow after the show. Many of the musicians from the Memorial Hall show are scheduled to get together and jam at the Canal Street Tavern reception. Admission is $1 at the door.”

I went with my camera…  Next time!

(Editor’s Note: Read part one of our series on the Dayton Bluegrass Reunion here. Read part two here.)

Neil V. Rosenberg is an author, scholar, historian, banjo player, Bluegrass Music Hall of Fame inductee, and co-chair of the IBMA Foundation’s Arnold Shultz Fund.

Photo of Neil V. Rosenberg: Terri Thomson Rosenberg.

Neil would like to thank Tom Duffee, Rick Good, and Al Turnbull.

From Death Metal to a Fishing Boat, How Billy Strings Finds Renewal (Part 2 of 2)

Posted on by Editor

Billy Strings has had his foot on the gas since he was a teenager, bringing his prolific picking to hundreds of shows around the country each year and winning over a throng of devoted fans in the process. His bluegrass bona fides may be obvious from the outset — he’s quick to cite such greats as Bill Monroe, Doc Watson, and the Stanley Brothers as some of his first musical influences, and no honest spectator could deny his talent on the guitar and mandolin — but astute listeners will also note elements of rock, jam bands, and even heavy metal in his performances, especially as Strings bounds around the stage.

The Nashville-based, Michigan-raised musician’s latest album, Renewal, comes on the heels of an exceptional year: His Rounder Records debut, Home, won the 2020 Grammy award for Best Bluegrass Album. And even as much of the music industry was grounded from touring, his innovative approach to livestreams and digital performances moved the Pollstar Awards to dub him the Breakthrough Artist of the Pandemic. But that breakthrough was more than a decade in the making, and the forces that shaped Strings as a prodigious young picker are still at work today, pushing him creatively in the studio and on stage as well as calming him at home between gigs. Here, in the second half of our BGS Artist of the Month interview, Strings tells us about his upbringing, his latest influences, and the way he unwinds between shows.

Editor’s Note: Read the first part of our interview with Billy Strings.

BGS: Tell me about where you grew up. How do you see its impact on your work today?

Billy Strings: I was born in Lansing, Michigan on October 3, which is my grandpa’s birthday. My mother, who lived in Kentucky at the time, had gone up to Lansing to visit her dad on his birthday, and that’s when I decided to show up. [Laughs] So that’s why I was named Billy as well, because that was my grandpa’s name — I was his little birthday gift.

We lived in Morehead, Kentucky, for a couple of years before coming back home to Michigan, where I really grew up. I grew up in a little town called Muir, population 600. My dad is an incredible guitar player, so he taught me how to play. He was always showing me music when I was a little kid: Doc Watson, Bill Monroe, Lester Flatt, Earl Scruggs, Jimmy Martin, Larry Sparks, and stuff like that — a lot of good bluegrass. We’d hang out at this little campground and play music next to the river by the fire. That was my childhood, man, just sitting there picking by the river.

It was real good until I got to be a teenager and started to turn sour. I had to run off and figure out a new life. I took what my dad taught me when I was a little kid, and all of a sudden I realized that bluegrass is actually pretty sweet and people love this shit — that maybe I could do something with this; that it’s not just something that I do with my dad that I should be halfway embarrassed about.

Who are the artists that you feel really inspired by right now? And are those different than the ones that you feel like you were listening to a lot when you were a kid?

For the most part, it’s still Doc Watson — he’s the main nerve — and Bill Monroe, and Lester Flatt and Earl Scruggs, Ralph Stanley and Carter Stanley, the Stanley Brothers. But I listen to a lot of different shit. I listen to death metal, and lately, I’ve been getting into this music from Mali that Béla Fleck was showing me — some really amazing stuff. And Memphis trap: I’ve been listening to Young Dolph a bunch. There’s just an energy to it. I grew up around crack houses. I’ve seen that shit that they’re rapping about. It just gets me hyped: He’s talking about coming out of nothing and becoming a self-made millionaire. I listen to it before the shows sometimes to get myself hyped up.

You played in rock bands in high school — groups with music that might not sound a lot like what you’re doing today. Is there any lesson or anything from that time that you feel like you still turn to or still apply to the music that you make?

Yeah, performing live. I never learned how to perform in a bluegrass band. I learned how to perform in a metal band. I learned music by playing bluegrass when I was a little kid, but by the time I was doing it on stage it was in a metal band — we were headbanging and running all over the place — and I still can’t help but get into the music like that. I can’t just stand there and play.

You have been in Nashville now for a little while. Has anything that has surprised you about it, good or bad?

I really love Nashville. A lot of your favorite musicians, that’s where they live. You’ll see your favorite singer in the grocery store. I get calls for sessions, and it’s from people who I grew up listening to and who I’ve idolized for my whole life. Like Béla Fleck’s record just came out, and I played a handful of songs on that. I was so honored to play with David Grisman, and Chris Thile, Sam Bush, Stuart Duncan, and Edgar Meyer — all these cats that are just… well, I don’t feel like I’m really in that league. It really was an honor. And there’ve been several things like that! I went from listening to these cats on a record to being on a first-name basis with them… texting and being friends. It’s a trip.

What’s one thing that’s brought you joy recently?

Fishing. I love bass fishing. I grew up doing that with my dad as well, but I didn’t do it for a long time because I was so busy. When the pandemic hit, I started fishing again. I go out there in rain or shine. I just like it for the solitude. Last night, I was in front of thousands of people, and to come home and go out on my boat and be alone in nature — to check out the blue herons and the fucking ospreys, eagles, fish, everything doing its thing — it’s brought me a lot of joy, brought me down to Earth. I put my boat in at 5 o’clock in the morning when the sun is just coming up. I like being out there alone at that time of day. It’s just good for my mind.

And yet it’s so clear from your performances that interacting with listeners gives you a certain joy, too. What are the forms of feedback that you value most from your audience when you’re playing live?

Sometimes when we finish a solo, everybody starts cheering real loud, the whole place gets real loud. That feels good. But sometimes I look out there and I look around and I see individual people and I literally play to them. Last night, we played in Montana and I was looking around and there was this one dude just standing there with his beer just completely still. I didn’t even know if he was enjoying it or not. So I just walked up to the front of the stage and stared directly at him and I just started playing right to him. [Laughs] So he started laughing, and then he took a drink of his beer and started bobbing his head a little bit. I think he just started getting into it by the end of the show.

I’ll look for things like that. The audience is really in control of how I’m feeling up there. Sometimes, when they’re just on fire, I can’t help but have a good time. They feed us the energy, and we give it back to them. It’s reciprocal.

Photo credit: Jesse Faatz

MIXTAPE: Jeremy Garrett’s Melting Pot of Influential Music

Posted on by Editor

My mind has been concentrated on making music for my latest record, Wanderer’s Compass. I let Wanderer’s Compass be a collection of as many influences in music I’ve had as possible. I’ve been playing long enough that I used to learn my fiddle parts from an LP and move the needle back to catch the solo parts. Then of course over time, with the advent of the internet, the influence highway, so to speak, became much wider. I’ve always thought it is hard to put music in a box, since it is art, even though I essentially understand the reason for genres. To me the whole point of art is to let all of your influences and experiences be the palette in which to create your vision. This playlist is really fun for me to listen to, and I hope you enjoy it as well. — Jeremy Garrett

Dire Straits – “Where Do You Think You’re Going?”

This song was off a record that I heard early on in my life and the soul that Mark Knopfler brought to this song continues to influence me to this day.

Larry Sparks – “Blue Virginia Blues”

Larry is a master of song delivery, selection, singing, and incredibly soulful guitar playing that is old school, yet crosses any boundaries from that world into the new because art like that knows no bounds.

Tony Rice – “Urge for Going”

From the album Native American, this track is the epitome of how to produce a song to pull all of the essence from it for the listener to hear. Any bluegrass musician can tell you that Tony Rice is the man to listen to for song production, not to mention his unmatched guitar skills.

Jeremy Garrett – “Wishing Well”

“Wishing Well” is an original and on this track I stretch way out on the fiddle for a jam.

David Grisman – “Fish Scale”

David is one of the best and truest musicians of our time. This is a one-of-a-kind song from a one-of-a-kind artist, David Grisman. I particularly love Tony Rice’s playing on this track.

The Stanley Brothers – “The Lonesome River”

This is one of history’s most eerie and interesting sounding bluegrass duos. Their songs and the way they sing them are my personal favorite sounds of the traditional bluegrass era.

Strength in Numbers – “Blue Men of the Sahara”

This ensemble was one of the most creative in acoustic music. This particular song showcases what happens when you marry music stylings from around the globe, and Mark O’Connor rips a fiddle like nobody’s business.

Merle Haggard and Willie Nelson – “Pancho and Lefty”

This cut is pure magic if you ask me. I love everything about it, from the wacky-sounding synth stuff to the magic that Haggard brings when he comes in for his verse. Sends chills up my spine.

George Jones – “Choices”

There may not be any better country singing than this right here.

Jimi Hendrix – “Red House”

There is perhaps no one more inspiring to a musician who wants to tap into soul and vibe. Hendrix is the one who paved the way for all of us in that regard.

Deep Forest – “Sing with the Birds”

This music was an indicator for me at an early age that I loved world music and the technology that continues to evolve to help create some of it. This is programming at its finest and it’s flowing with creativity.

Jeremy Garrett – “Nevermind”

This is a Dennis Lloyd cover that I love to perform. Dennis is an Israeli pop artist. It’s a culmination of my bluegrass chops on fiddle, guitar, mandolin, along with effects, experimentation, and programmed beats.

Photo credit: J.Mimna Photography

Bluegrass Memoirs: ‘Industrial Strength Bluegrass’ and the Dayton Bluegrass Reunion (Part 2)

Posted on by Justin Hiltner

Editor’s note: Read part one of Industrial Strength Bluegrass and the Dayton Bluegrass Reunion here

In 1987 I became involved with CityFolk’s Dayton Bluegrass Reunion, “An All-Star Salute to Dayton’s 40 Year Bluegrass History.” Between October 1987 and March 1989, I worked by mail and telephone to help shape the Reunion, planned for April 1989. 

While this was to be called a “concert,” executive producer Phyllis Brzozowska envisioned it from the start as musical theater. I liked her idea — I’d long thought of bluegrass that way. My experience on the stage started at age 12, in a little theater company production of Our Town, Thornton Wilder’s 1938 Pulitzer Prize-winning play about a small community in the early 20th century. Wikipedia describes the play this way:

“Wilder uses metatheatrical devices, setting the play in the actual theatre where it is being performed. The main character is the stage manager of the theatre who directly addresses the audience.”

In Dayton, playwright Don Baker would have a role like that of the stage manager in Our Town, acting the part of a loquacious emcee, telling the story of the Dayton bluegrass community. He would work from a script that Larry Nager was writing. As he spoke, a screen behind him would show slides relating to the narrative’s cultural and historical points.

The concert was divided into seven acts, “Segment/Settings” of 12 to 15 minutes. Each featured a different group of musicians and had room for three to five songs and an encore. Don’s narrations opened each act. Planning reflected concerns about the content and sequence of the acts. How was forty years of artistic ferment to be represented? 

When I spoke of the project to my bluegrass buddies, the first question was always “Will the Osborne Brothers reunite with Red Allen?” This 1957 show gives a good portrait of the band’s sound and repertoire — cutting-edge bluegrass of its era:

As the bluegrass festival movement ramped up in the ’70s, Allen and the Osbornes occasionally crossed paths. The Osbornes were doing well on the country charts with songs like “Rocky Top” that featured Bobby’s solo and trio high lead:

Allen, considered one of the classic bluegrass lead singers, had gone on to work in several good bands. He still approached audiences as he had in Dayton bars. Larry Nager explains: “Red loved the spotlight, making the crowds laugh (often at jokes more fitting for a stag party than a bluegrass club)” (Industrial Strength Bluegrass p.89). An on-stage festival reunion with the Osbornes had been tried, didn’t work out, and was now out of the question. 

Who else would be in the concert? At the start planners thought in terms of contrasts in categories like venues (working-class bars; upscale nightspots, colleges), audiences (industrial working-class Appalachian migrants, yuppies, college kids), and radio (country, folk).

As we’ll see later, these categories overlapped; that’s what gave the region’s bluegrass such vibrancy. Beyond categories lay personal dimensions: certain bands and musicians were like oil and water. The production committee faced artists’ and fans’ differing perspectives, values, and priorities. Terms bandied about during production meetings included “First Generation, Second Generation, Urban” and so on. 

Another planning challenge: the concert featured some working bands, each on their own professional trajectory. But as a reunion it also featured retired individuals and groups. 

The final concert performance sequence reflected our work to keep tension levels low, make things flow, and illustrate the artistic collaborations that had come out of this cultural scene. 

My primary task was writing the introduction for the program, seeking to explain why CityFolk was presenting hillbilly music as heritage.

I was assisted by Barb Kuhns and Larry Nager, who were writing artist bios and gathering illustrations for the program. Musician and producer Nager knew the history from the inside, as his chapter, “Sing Me Back Home: Early Bluegrass Venues in Southwestern Ohio” in Industrial Strength Bluegrass (pp. 77-100) attests. Kuhns, professional librarian and fiddler with the Corndrinkers, an old-time group, had been active in promoting the music of some of the lesser-known pioneers in the local scene of which she’d been part for many years. 

With just over a month to go until the show in April, I spent a March weekend in Dayton helping the planning production staff finalize concert details.

In early April CityFolk sent news to the press of the coming event. “Dayton show will reflect Kentucky bluegrass roots” was the title of a 12-paragraph story in Sunday’s Louisville Courier-Journal, Kentucky’s equivalent of the New York Times. On Wednesday, the Dayton Downtowner, a weekly, carried two stories, and on Friday the Dayton Daily News (a supporter of the event) ran two generous stories.

On Friday night April 22, 1989, each of the concert goers who filled Memorial Hall — a Beaux-art national historic site (1907) of 2500 seats in downtown Dayton — received a 16-page 8 ½ x 11 program. Its cover duplicated the concert’s posters.

On the first page was Phyllis Brzozowka’s introduction. Next, an essay by former Dayton newspaperman Tom Teepen, who told the evocative story of his experiences with the music in Dayton. 

My piece, “Industrial Strength Bluegrass,” filled the next four pages. Then came seven photo-packed pages devoted to “The Artists”: Paul “Moon” Mullins and Traditional Grass, Noah Crase and the Valley Ramblers, The Hotmud Family, The Allen Brothers, Red Allen, The Dry Branch Fire Squad, Larry Sparks and Wendy Miller, Frank Wakefield, David Harvey, and the Osborne Brothers. 

The booklet closed with several pages of lists: a “Selected Discography” including addresses for local and national retailers; planning production staff; thanks for assistance; CityFolk staff; board of trustees. Its endpapers were a map of southern Ohio, with portions of Indiana, Kentucky, and West Virginia. A lot to look at while waiting for the curtain to rise!

Behind the curtain, Baker’s Lime Kiln workers provided lighting and a stage manager. I was part of the backstage crew. And the sound was something else! Afterwards Phyllis wrote:

Pete Reineger, from the National Council for the Traditional Arts and a local crew…ran an equivalent of 4 stages with 36 open microphones throughout the performance.

I have been unable to locate any recordings of this event — no tape, no video. I saved a copy of Baker’s stage directions, which lay out the concert’s sequence. But Larry Nager’s script for his narrative, which told the history of Dayton bluegrass in seven segments, one for each act, no longer exists. In it, he recalled, Don’s role was that of “the omniscient voice of the hillbilly diaspora.” 

Though the Dayton Bluegrass Reunion is now a lost play, its structure can be seen from Baker’s stage directions. However, because I was busy bustling around backstage, I didn’t know how the concert was going over with the audience until later. 

The reunion began with an introduction by Phyllis, following that came sounds from offstage, described in the stage directions as:

Halsey & Meyers Commercial 

Radio Rap — Moon Mullins.

Halsey Myers is still a going concern. Joe Mullins says that the Traditional Grass, the band he worked in with his father Moon from 1983 to 1995, recorded a radio commercial for this Middletown hardware store. It was so popular they got requests for it at personal appearances. Joe and his son Daniel found an old cassette recording of the ad followed by an example of Moon’s colorful on-air WPFB persona:

These radio clips would have been familiar to many in the audience who knew the local bluegrass scene. Paul “Moon” Mullins was the true loquacious voice of Appalachian migrant music — bluegrass — in southwest Ohio. 

As the curtains opened Baker took the stage to tell the story of Mullins and the music. Photos synced to the script appeared on a screen behind him. Some were of Dayton musicians and venues, while others evoked a variety of historical and geographical milieus ranging from Dayton to national and international.

Baker’s light dimmed and focus shifted to the other side of the stage, where Mullins and his band, The Traditional Grass, were highlighted. Mullins had come to Dayton from Kentucky in 1964 to take a job as a DJ at WPFB, a Middletown country station that had been a bluegrass center in the 40s and 50s. Jimmy Martin, the Osborne Brothers and many others had performed there. The short-lived Martin-Osborne band’s hit trio “20/20 Vision” from those days is recreated by Dan Tyminski on the new Smithsonian Folkways album, Industrial Strength Bluegrass: 

In the mid-’60s WPFB had dropped bluegrass but Mullins brought it back. He’d started his radio and musical careers (he’d fiddled with the Stanley Brothers) in eastern Kentucky. Migrant audiences in southwestern Ohio bonded with him. He revitalized the music at WPFB and began playing with local bands. 

I first saw his name in June 1968 when we were both on the flyer for Bill Monroe’s Blue Grass Festival at Bean Blossom, Indiana. I was in the banjo workshop (with Ralph Stanley, Dave Garrett, Bobby Thompson, Vic Jordan, and Larry Sparks); “Paul Mullins, WPFB Radio, Middletown, Ohio” was emcee for the Saturday shows, co-hosting on Sunday with Grant Turner of the Grand Ole Opry.

Twenty-one years later, on the evening of the Reunion, Mullins had recently left WPFB. He’d started The Traditional Grass in 1983 (they would continue until 1995); it included his son Joe, who was singing tenor, picking banjo, and following his dad’s footsteps in radio. Guitarist Mark Rader was the lead singer, and Glenn “Cookie” Inman, bassist. They opened with “Weary Lonesome Blues,” a popular Delmore Brothers song from 1937:

After three more songs, everyone except Moon left the stage and he was joined by members of The Valley Ramblers, a band he’d co-founded with Noah Crase in the late ’60s. Crase was a highly respected banjo player, a former Blue Grass Boy best-known for “Noah’s Breakdown,” the tune that started Bill Keith on his exploration of melodic banjo. 

Editor’s note: Read part one of Industrial Strength Bluegrass and the Dayton Bluegrass Reunion here

Neil V. Rosenberg would like to thank Barb Kuhns, Daniel and Joe Mullins, and Larry Nager

Rosenberg is an author, scholar, historian, banjo player, Bluegrass Music Hall of Fame inductee, and co-chair of the IBMA Foundation’s Arnold Shultz Fund.

Photo of Rosenberg: Terri Thomson Rosenberg

IBMA Awards 2020: See the Full List of Winners

Posted on by Justin Hiltner

The winners of the 31st annual IBMA Bluegrass Music Awards were announced Thursday night via video awards show, hosted by Sierra Hull, Tim O’Brien, Joe Newberry, and Rhonda Vincent.

The “biggest night in bluegrass” was well-adapted to its virtual setting and boasted three Hall of Fame inductions, guitar and banjo tributes to Doc Watson and J.D. Crowe, a continent-spanning collaboration by Rob Ickes & Trey Hensley and Taj Mahal, and celebrations of the 20th anniversary of O Brother, Where Art Thou? and the 75th anniversary of the birth of bluegrass. Marking the occasion, Del, Ronnie, and Rob McCoury opened the evening from an empty Ryman Auditorium, regarded as the birthplace of bluegrass and a former home for the show.

Special performances were shot live at home, in studios, and at various small venues — as well as the Station Inn and the Ryman. Billy Strings paid tribute to Hall of Famer and Male Vocalist of the Year nominee, Larry Sparks, with a cover of “John Deere Tractor” — with double pickguards, to boot. In the Doc Watson tribute, each of the five Guitar Player of the Year nominees (Trey Hensley, Billy Strings, Bryan Sutton, Molly Tuttle, and Jake Workman) took their turn virtually swapping solos on “Black Mountain Rag,” with T Michael Coleman, Watson’s longtime friend and bandmate, holding them all together through the webcams and headphones. Many other unique collaborations, tributes, and performances were peppered throughout the award announcements. The most stunning performances, though — like Vocal Group of the Year and Entertainer of the Year winner Sister Sadie’s “900 Miles” — were from the mother-church setting of the Ryman, where in a pandemic twist, the bands each performed not facing an audience, but with the auditorium’s empty pews as a background.

As IBMA Executive Director Paul Schiminger put it in his speech from the Ryman stage, in a virtual conference year and a pandemic, returning to the birthplace of the genre was “an unexpected gift through it all.” 75 years of bluegrass were poignantly brought together beneath the rafters of the hallowed, though empty, Ryman Auditorium.

Here are the winners of the 2020 IBMA Bluegrass Music Awards, in the order they were announced:

New Artist of the Year

Mile Twelve

Instrumental Group of the Year

Michael Cleveland & Flamekeeper

Gospel Recording of the Year

“Gonna Rise and Shine”
Artist: Alan Bibey & Grasstowne
Label: Mountain Fever Records
Producer: Mark Hodges

Banjo Player of the Year

Scott Vestal

Resophonic Guitar Player of the Year

Justin Moses

Fiddle Player of the Year

Deanie Richardson

Bass Player of the Year

Missy Raines

Mandolin Player of the Year

Alan Bibey

Guitar Player of the Year 

Jake Workman

Collaborative Recording of the Year

“The Barber’s Fiddle”
Artists: Becky Buller with Shawn Camp, Jason Carter, Laurie Lewis, Kati Penn, Sam Bush, Michael Cleveland, Johnny Warren, Stuart Duncan, Deanie Richardson, Bronwyn Keith-Hynes, Jason Barie, Fred Carpenter, Tyler Andal, Nate Lee, Dan Boner, Brian Christianson, and Laura Orshaw
Label: Dark Shadow Recording
Producer: Stephen Mougin

Instrumental Recording of the Year

“Tall Fiddler”
Artist: Michael Cleveland with Tommy Emmanuel
Label: Compass Records
Producers: Jeff White, Michael Cleveland, and Sean Sullivan

Vocal Group of the Year

Sister Sadie

Song of the Year

“Chicago Barn Dance”
Artist: Special Consensus with Michael Cleveland & Becky Buller
Writers: Becky Buller, Missy Raines, Alison Brown
Label: Compass Records
Producer: Alison Brown

Album of the Year

Live in Prague, Czech Republic
Artist: Doyle Lawson & Quicksilver
Label: Billy Blue Records
Producers: Doyle Lawson and Rosta Capek

Female Vocalist of the Year

Brooke Aldridge

Male Vocalist of the Year

Danny Paisley

Entertainer of the Year

Sister Sadie

 

Also honored during the broadcast were three inductees into the Bluegrass Music Hall of Fame: owner of the Station Inn, J.T. Gray, The Johnson Mountain Boys, and New Grass Revival.

The Industry Awards were held on Wednesday, September 30. Hosted this year wittily and absurdly in video format by Béla Fleck and Abigail Washburn, the Industry Awards recognize outstanding professional work within the many arms and branches of the bluegrass industry at large. 

The Industry Awards recipients:

Broadcaster of the Year

Michael Kear

Event of the Year

Augusta Heritage Center Bluegrass Week, Elkins, WV

Graphic Designer of the Year

Michael Armistead

Liner Notes of the Year

Katy Daley, Live at the Cellar Door – The Seldom Scene

Writer of the Year

Derek Halsey

Sound Engineer of the Year

Stephen Mougin 

Songwriter of the Year

Milan Miller

The recipients of the Distinguished Achievement Awards, honoring lifelong contributions by forerunners and ambassadors for bluegrass music, were honored with presentations on Wednesday as well: 

Norman & Judy Adams, Adams Bluegrass Festivals

Darrel & Phyllis Adkins, Musicians Against Childhood Cancer

Darol Anger, fiddler/educator

Wayne Rice,  San Diego’s KSON “Bluegrass Special” host

and Jack Tottle, band leader and educator at East Tennessee State University.

The Momentum Awards, handed out via video ceremony on Tuesday, September 29, focus on artists and industry professionals who are in the early stages of their bluegrass careers and the mentors who have helped them reach their young success.

The Momentum Awards recipients:

Industry Involvement

Kris Truelsen

Mentor

Annie Savage

Instrumentalist (2 recipients in this category)

Thomas Cassell

Tabitha Agnew

Vocalist

Melody Williamson 

Band

The Slocan Ramblers

 

IBMA Awards Nominees, Hall of Fame Inductees and Distinguished Achievement Awards Revealed

Posted on by Editor

Nominees for the 31st Annual IBMA Bluegrass Music Awards have been revealed, with six nominees competing for Entertainer of the Year in 2020: Balsam Range, Billy Strings, Del McCoury Band, Doyle Lawson & Quicksilver, Sister Sadie, and Special Consensus. The extra nominee is due to a tie; in addition, the Album of the Year category has seven nominees, also due to a tie.

Three inductees will join the Bluegrass Hall of Fame: owner of Nashville’s iconic Station Inn, J.T. Gray; hardcore bluegrass traditionalists The Johnson Mountain Boys; and one of the premier bands at the forefront of the contemporary/progressive bluegrass movements of the 1970s and ’80s, New Grass Revival.

Additionally, the following will receive the Distinguished Achievement Award: festival pioneers Norman & Judy Adams, Musicians Against Childhood Cancer (MACC) founders Darrel & Phyllis Adkins, fiddle virtuoso/educator Darol Anger, San Diego’s KSON Bluegrass Special host Wayne Rice, and bluegrass innovator Jack Tottle.

The IBMA Awards will be broadcast on SiriusXM’s Bluegrass Junction on Thursday, October 1. However, the annual World of Bluegrass Conference will be virtual-only, due to COVID-19 concerns.

The IBMA Bluegrass Music Awards nominations are below.

ENTERTAINER OF THE YEAR (Tie)

Balsam Range
Billy Strings
Del McCoury Band
Doyle Lawson & Quicksilver
Sister Sadie
Special Consensus

VOCAL GROUP OF THE YEAR

Balsam Range
Blue Highway
Doyle Lawson & Quicksilver
Sister Sadie
Russell Moore & IIIrd Tyme Out

INSTRUMENTAL GROUP OF THE YEAR

Michael Cleveland & Flamekeeper
Mile Twelve
Ricky Skaggs & Kentucky Thunder
Sam Bush Band
The Travelin’ McCourys

ALBUM OF THE YEAR (Tie)

Chicago Barn Dance
Artist: Special Consensus
Label: Compass Records
Producer: Alison Brown

Home
Artist: Billy Strings
Label: Rounder Records
Producer: Glenn Brown

Live in Prague, Czech Republic
Artist: Doyle Lawson & Quicksilver
Label: Billy Blue Records
Producers: Doyle Lawson and Rosta Capek

New Moon Over My Shoulder
Artist: Larry Sparks
Label: Rebel Records
Producer: Larry Sparks

Tall Fiddler
Artist: Michael Cleveland
Label: Compass Records
Producers: Jeff White, Michael Cleveland, and Sean Sullivan

Toil, Tears & Trouble
Artist: The Po’ Ramblin’ Boys
Label: Rounder Records
Producer: Dave Maggard

Tribulation
Artist: Appalachian Road Show
Label: Billy Blue Records
Producers: Jim VanCleve, Barry Abernathy, and Appalachian Road Show

SONG OF THE YEAR

“Both Ends of the Train”
Artist: Blue Highway
Writers: Tim Stafford/Steve Gulley
Label: Rounder Records
Producers: Blue Highway

“Chicago Barn Dance”
Artist: Special Consensus with Michael Cleveland & Becky Buller
Writers: Becky Buller/Missy Raines/Alison Brown
Label: Compass Records
Producer: Alison Brown

“Haggard”
Artist: The Grascals
Writer: Harley Allen
Label: Mountain Home Music Company
Producers: The Grascals

“Hickory, Walnut & Pine”
Artist: The Po’ Ramblin’ Boys
Writers: Slaid Cleaves/Nathan Hamilton
Label: Rounder Records
Producer: Dave Maggard

“Living Like There’s No Tomorrow”
Artist: Doyle Lawson & Quicksilver
Writers: Jim McBride/Roger Alan Murrah
Label: Billy Blue Records
Producers: Doyle Lawson and Rosta Capek

GOSPEL RECORDING OF THE YEAR

“Angel Too Soon”
Artist: Balsam Range
Label: Mountain Home Music Company
Producers: Balsam Range

“Because He Loved Me”
Artist: Dale Ann Bradley
Label: Pinecastle Records
Producer: Dale Ann Bradley

“Gonna Rise and Shine”
Artist: Alan Bibey & Grasstowne
Label: Mountain Fever Records
Producer: Mark Hodges

“I’m Going to Heaven”
Artist: Doyle Lawson & Quicksilver
Label: Billy Blue Records
Producers: Doyle Lawson and Rosta Capek

“Little Black Train”
Artist: Appalachian Road Show
Label: Billy Blue Records
Producers: Barry Abernathy, Darrell Webb, and Ben Isaacs

INSTRUMENTAL RECORDING OF THE YEAR

“Tall Fiddler”
Artist: Michael Cleveland with Tommy Emmanuel
Label: Compass Records
Producers: Jeff White, Michael Cleveland, and Sean Sullivan

“Shenandoah Breakdown”
Artist: Doyle Lawson & Quicksilver
Label: Billy Blue Records
Producers: Doyle Lawson and Rosta Capek

“Soldier’s Joy”
Artist: Jesse McReynolds with Michael Cleveland
Label: Pinecastle Records
Producer: Jesse McReynolds

“The Appalachian Road”
Artist: Appalachian Road Show
Label: Billy Blue Records
Producer: Jim VanCleve, Barry Abernathy, and Appalachian Road Show

“Guitar Peace”
Artist: Billy Strings
Label: Rounder Records
Producer: Glenn Brown

NEW ARTIST OF THE YEAR

Appalachian Road Show
Carolina Blue
High Fidelity
Merle Monroe
Mile Twelve

COLLABORATIVE RECORDING OF THE YEAR

“Chicago Barn Dance”
Artists: Special Consensus with Michael Cleveland & Becky Buller
Label: Compass Records
Producer: Alison Brown

“I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry”
Artists: Jason Barie featuring Del McCoury & Paul Williams
Label: Billy Blue Records
Producer: Jason Barie

“Tall Fiddler”
Artists: Michael Cleveland with Tommy Emmanuel
Label: Compass Records
Producers: Jeff White, Michael Cleveland, and Sean Sullivan

“The Barber’s Fiddle”
Artists: Becky Buller with Shawn Camp, Jason Carter, Laurie Lewis, Kati Penn, Sam Bush, Michael Cleveland, Johnny Warren, Stuart Duncan, Deanie Richardson, Bronwyn Keith-Hynes, Jason Barie, Fred Carpenter, Tyler Andal, Nate Lee, Dan Boner, Brian Christianson, and Laura Orshaw
Label: Dark Shadow Recording
Producer: Stephen Mougin

“On and On”
Artists: Gena Britt with Brooke Aldridge
Label: Pinecastle Records
Producer: Gena Britt

MALE VOCALIST OF THE YEAR

Ronnie Bowman
Del McCoury
Russell Moore
Danny Paisley
Larry Sparks

FEMALE VOCALIST

Brooke Aldridge
Dale Ann Bradley
Amanda Smith
Molly Tuttle
Rhonda Vincent

BANJO PLAYER OF THE YEAR

Kristin Scott Benson
Gena Britt
Gina Furtado
Ned Luberecki
Scott Vestal

BASS PLAYER OF THE YEAR

Barry Bales
Mike Bub
Todd Phillips
Missy Raines
Marshall Wilborn

FIDDLE PLAYER OF THE YEAR

Becky Buller
Jason Carter
Michael Cleveland
Stuart Duncan
Deanie Richardson

RESOPHONIC GUITAR PLAYER OF THE YEAR

Jerry Douglas
Andy Hall
Rob Ickes
Phil Leadbetter
Justin Moses

GUITAR PLAYER OF THE YEAR

Trey Hensley
Billy Strings
Bryan Sutton
Molly Tuttle
Jake Workman

MANDOLIN PLAYER OF THE YEAR

Alan Bibey
Jesse Brock
Sam Bush
Sierra Hull
Ronnie McCoury

 

Junior Sisk Hitches His Wagon to the Stars of Traditional Bluegrass

Posted on by Editor

Junior Sisk is on a mission. Although he’s been a fan of traditional bluegrass since childhood, he’s now fully focused on keeping that history alive. That passion for tradition is evident in Load the Wagon, the award-winning vocalist’s first release since disbanding Ramblers Choice.

“The Stanley Brothers, Flatt & Scruggs, Jim & Jesse, and all of them had big hits, but they also had hidden treasures on all those LPs. A lot of them that were never played and they’re not a jam tune. That’s what I’m looking for,” Sisk says. “It’s going to be like new tunes to a lot of folks. That’s what I’m after – to still pay tribute to the founding fathers of traditional bluegrass music, but in the Junior Sisk style.”

The Virginia musician’s recovery mission has unearthed a number of gems on Load the Wagon, like Flatt & Scruggs’ little-known “Lonesome and Blue” and the heartfelt “Lover’s Farewell,” a Carter Family gem suggested by his new bandmates Heather Berry-Mabe (guitar, vocals) and Tony Mabe (banjo, guitar, vocals). Jonathan Dillon (his mandolin player from Ramblers Choice), Gary Creed (bass, vocals), and Douglas Bartlett (fiddle, vocals) round out the lineup.

Sisk also re-cut the song that remains his most requested number, “He Died a Rounder at 21,” from his time with Wyatt Rice & Santa Cruz in the mid-‘90s. Leading up to a show at Station Inn, he invited BGS on the bus for a chat.

BGS: The first song on this album, “Get in Line, Buddy,” will be a familiar tune for fans of the Country Gentlemen. What made you want to record it here?

Sisk: Me and Bill Yates got to be good friends there for a long time right toward the end, and every time we’d play together at a festival, I’d always get together with him and ask him to do “Living on the Hallelujah Side” that he’d done with the Country Gentlemen, and this one right here — “Get in Line, Buddy.” Those are a couple that he sang solo on. It was just great, great singing.

It’s like what I’m trying to do right now. I’m in line with Flatt & Scruggs, the Stanley Brothers, and all that. I’m way down the line, but I’m in line anyway. And it still rings true today when you come to Nashville. When you walk the streets, you see them on the streets. You see them in all the clubs and everything. Everyone’s standing in line. I feel like I’m still standing in line for traditional bluegrass music.

With “Get in Line, Buddy” and “Best Female Actress,” there’s a sad story there, but you find a way to put humor into those songs. It’s not an easy thing to pull off. How do you approach that?

Well, when I go into the studio and start to record, I’ve always done a lot of tongue-in-cheek songs. I’m noted for that, but I sing with a lot of emotion. I sing with a lot of feelings. That’s why a lot of times I’ll lose my voice, to tell you the truth, because I’m singing so hard and with as much feeling as I can.

I love to look out in the crowd and see them either crying, if I’m singing a pitiful song, and if I’m singing a tongue-in-cheek song, I like to see them laugh and carry on. It just makes for a good show, I think. And Charlie Moore has been one of my favorites. He’s one of the most underrated bluegrass artists ever. He’s a great singer.

You also have some songs on here, like “Just Load the Wagon,” which are plain-and-simple funny. I’m curious, where did you get your sense of humor? Was there someone in your family where you picked that up?

Yeah, my dad. He’s a songwriter. He’s probably got a thousand songs at the house for me to choose from. But every song he writes, at the top of the page he writes the date he wrote it, and he writes, “Sing in the key of D and sing like Carter Stanley.” [Laughs] I said, “Dad, you can’t sing ‘em all like Carter Stanley and they can’t all be in D!” But if he had his druthers, that’s what it would be. That’s pretty much me, too. I was raised, born and bred, on the Stanley Brothers’ music.

This one here, I thought the folks would really enjoy, and now that I’ve gotten rid of the Rambler’s Choice name and went to the Junior Sisk Band, I’m trying to pay tribute to traditional bluegrass music, so we brought back the old-style banjo, the mountain-style banjo-playing with the clawhammer on this one. And it’s turning out to be one of my favorite tunes that we’re playing now. It’s a lot of fun and the crowd can react to it. It’s a toe-tapping tune.

You mentioned that the Ramblers Choice name is gone. Why was that an important move for you to shift to Junior Sisk Band?

Well, Jason Davis, Kameron Keller, and a couple of guys left. My dad always says when wintertime comes around and things start getting slow, somebody blows a whistle and everybody switches. It’s pretty much like that. If you don’t have any work, I’m going where the work is. But I was actually straying away from my heart – I was straying away from traditional bluegrass music a little bit. I just did not want to do that. I finally came to the conclusion that what I’m going to do until the end of my career is pay tribute to traditional bluegrass music, and try to keep it alive as long as I can. That’s what we’re trying to do today, is keep it straight-ahead bluegrass, right in the middle of the road, and turn the younger fans onto traditional bluegrass music.

Why is it important for you to carry that torch for traditional bluegrass?

I’m just tickled to death to see the young’uns out here today that come to our shows, or to see them out jamming at festivals and playing the old-style music. You don’t see that a lot anymore. It seems that the younger generations is trying to play every note they know. …When I hear somebody with real emotion, and real feeling, who’s a traditional young’un coming up, I love it. Because we’ve lost so many — Ralph Stanley, James King, and a lot of traditional artists here lately. I think I’m a torch holder and that’s what I hope to be until the end of my career. As long as I’m able to breathe and sing, I’m going to keep their music alive.

It hurt to lose James King, didn’t it?

Oh, it was hard. I was there holding his hand on the day he died, in the hospital. I was on one side and Dudley Connell was on the other. And we told him we would keep his music alive. I’m getting chills now, but it meant the world to me, just to be there. He was a torch holder as well.

You re-recorded “He Died a Rounder at 21” from your days with Wyatt Rice & Santa Cruz. What’s it like to sing about that guy now, 24 years later? Does it bring out a different emotion in the song for you?

It’s still the same. The story in that song is awesome. I’ve grown up with a lot of folks in the bluegrass industry and I’ve seen a lot of ‘em pass away from alcoholism and just the hard life, the bluegrass life. People around home say, “Wow, you’ve got it made. You go on stage and play 45 minutes…” They don’t know about the 15 hours you travel to get there. It’s a hard life. You don’t eat right. You don’t take care of yourself. And I can understand where this guy came from. He only lived 21 years – but 21 years was like a thousand years in his time. I understand that, and that’s why I put everything I got in that song. Because it rings true.

Was there a pivotal moment for you when you decided to go into bluegrass full-time?

In my early teens, I lived and breathed it. I sat at the end of the bed in my mom and dad’s room with an old LP player and played Dave Evans, Larry Sparks, the Stanley Brothers, just trying to learn everything George Shuffler ever did on guitar. I was in it hot and heavy, and eat up with it.

In the early ‘80s, I moved up around the DC area and that’s when the Johnson Mountain Boys came on the scene. I followed them everywhere they went. They brought me back to life, and still today if I get to feeling sad, or get down about the music, I can put a Johnson Mountain Boys DVD in, and it will bring me right back. There was so much excitement and energy, they just tore me all to pieces. That’s what it’s all about.

Photo credit: Susie Neel