Tag: Laurie Lewis

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

Posted on 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

MIXTAPE: The Women in Roots Music Who Inspired Justin Hiltner’s ‘1992’

Posted on by Justin Hiltner

For the past eight or so years I’ve been making this joke that we (the music industry) should “Give women Americana.” As in, if we gave the entire genre — and bluegrass and country and old-time and folk, for that matter — to women and femmes and non-men, I wouldn’t so much miss the men and the music would certainly be well cared for and well set up for the future. 

My point, as I continue to make this joke year after year to many puzzled reactions, is that women and femme roots musicians have and will always be my favorite artists, creators, songwriters, and pickers. As I crafted my debut solo album, 1992 – often with incredibly talented women like producers and engineers (and pickers) Cathy Fink & Marcy Marxer, mastering engineer Anna Frick, photographer Laura E. Partain – the music that inspired, informed, and challenged me most through this release was all made by women. (Ask me sometime about my monthly Spotify playlist, Don’t Need No Man.)

When BGS approached me to make a Mixtape to celebrate 1992, I knew I had to share some of the women who helped me realize, musically, artistically, socially, emotionally, that there could be a home for me in bluegrass, largely because they had created such a home exactly for me. Here are a few of my bluegrass, old-time, and country inspirations, all of whom have filtered into this album in one way or another. – Justin Hiltner

Ola Belle Reed – “High On the Mountain”

1992 was tracked in Ashe County, North Carolina, in a little town called Lansing nestled into the Blue Ridge Mountains, right where Tennessee, Virginia, and North Carolina meet. I love it out there on the mountain, in the wind, in the clouds, on the rocky little road cuts and switchbacks through the hills. Lansing also happens to be the hometown of a legendary Appalachian musician and bluegrass forebear, Ola Belle Reed. A banjo she once owned and had signed hung on the wall beside me while I tracked every song. I definitely see my album as stemming from the lineage of Ola Belle, humbly and gratefully.

Cathy Fink & Marcy Marxer – “Hold Each Other Up”

I’ve been so lucky to collaborate with folk icons, Grammy winners, and children’s music legends Cathy & Marcy in so many different contexts and scenarios, every single one delightful and fulfilling. They’re amazing mentors and encouragers and while we recorded 1992 we had to take the chance to channel their amazing attitudes and worldviews into a COVID-inspired (or -instigated) track, “Hold Each Other Up.” I love getting to pick and sing with these two, and their engineering, production, wisdom, and guidance all made this record possible.

Laurie Lewis – “I’m Gonna Be the Wind”

Long before I ever got the chance to tour and perform with Laurie Lewis she was a hero of mine, someone I looked up to and knew would be a bluegrass legend and stalwart who could or would accept me for who I am. Turns out, often in bluegrass, it is okay to meet your heroes, because when we met and I got to work for her, it turned out I was absolutely right. Her writing style, her artistic ethos, and the way she infuses pure bluegrass energy and her personality into everything she does reminds me I can be who I am, play the music I play, and write the way I write. This song picks me up whenever I’m down and gives me self-confidence and optimism when I need it most.

Alice Gerrard & Hazel Dickens – “Mama’s Gonna Stay”

I never had the honor of meeting Hazel before she passed in 2011, but Alice Gerrard and I have become friends over the past six years and honestly, if 17-year-old Justin knew he’d become friends with this Bluegrass Hall of Famer, he’d die. We happen to share a birthday, too. Alice is a gem, a trailblazer, an unassuming and unrelenting activist and organizer and community builder. She inspires me in all of the above, but especially in her willingness, across her entire career, to write music about things no one else was writing about. This song, which Laurie Lewis turned me onto (she performs it as well), is a perfect example.

 

 

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Elizabeth Cotten – “Wilson Rag”

Playing shows and recording totally solo is often terrifying. Especially as a bluegrass banjo player used to playing in five-piece lineups. It took many years and lots and lots of practice time and experimental shows to figure out how exactly I wanted to arrange songs, build shows, create and ride a storytelling arc during my shows, guide an audience, and do all of that confidently with just a voice and banjo. Artists and pickers like Elizabeth Cotten gave me frames of reference for what I was doing that felt solidly bluegrass, but still building a show and sound that feels fully realized and not lacking for being minimal.

Missy Raines – “Where You Found Me”

Missy Raines is another hero of mine that I feel so lucky to now call a friend. Despite coming from different generations and very different circumstances we have so much in common. It just sometimes astounds me that we can have seemingly endless conversations around if bluegrass (or country or roots music) are accepting and open; meanwhile one of the winningest pickers in the history of bluegrass and the IBMA – that is, Missy Raines – has always been both accepting and open. Who needs the sexist, homophobic, womanizing, problematic elements of bluegrass when you have absolute badass legends like Missy!? I once covered this song for a “Cover Your Friends” show and it continues to devastate me to this day.

Caroline Spence – “Scale These Walls”

When I first moved to town, Caroline Spence was one of maybe four or five people I knew in all of Nashville. We spent a lot of time together in those early years, back in 2011 and 2012, and pretty soon after that we wrote a song together, “Pieces.” We both loved it a lot, performed it here and there with different lineups and bands, but it never landed on a record ‘til now. “Scale These Walls,” from Caroline’s most recent album, is constantly stuck in my head. I love how it showcases her jaw-dropping skill for writing dead-on hooks that feel so organic and never corny. I love this song.

Molly Tuttle – “Crooked Tree”

Molly Tuttle and I wrote “Benson Street,” a track off my new album, together about five or six years ago. It’s a cute little number about longing told through the lens of an idyllic Southern summer. I love every chance I get to make music or write music with Molly. She’s a constant source of inspiration for me and proof positive that you can be a proverbial crooked tree in bluegrass and still carve a pathway to success. Plus, she’s another great example of a picker who can command an entire audience totally solo. Trying to steal tricks from Molly Tuttle? Couldn’t be me.

Rhiannon Giddens – “Following the North Star”

Rhiannon Giddens is the blueprint. When I think about my artistic future and the way I want to be able to glide between media, between contexts, between areas of expertise and subject matter, between pop and roots and so many other musical communities, I think of Rhiannon. The way she has built her career around her artistic and political perspective, so that no matter what she does it feels grounded in her personality and selfhood is exactly how I want to be as an artist and creator. Plus, I always want to be as big of a music nerd and as big of an old-time nerd as her. 

Maya de Vitry – “How Bad I Wanna Live”

Maya is one of those writers and musicians who just makes me feel seen and heard and understood, and I know I’m only one in a huge host of people who would say the same. The vulnerability and transparency in her writing and the emotional and spiritual availability within it are astounding. Plus, she’s almost always, constantly challenging herself to consider the ways she creates and makes music outside of consumerism and art as a commodity. I moved to Nashville to be challenged, musically and artistically, by those around me and I feel so lucky to have Maya around me and a member of my community.

Courtney Hartman – “Moontalk”

Courtney Hartman’s “Moontalk” makes me feel like every single song I’ve ever written about the moon is good and right and allowable. (We both have quite a few songs about the moon, actually.) “Moontalk” feels like Mary Oliver incarnate in bluegrass-informed picking and singing. It feels meditative and contemplative, but not timid or insular – something I’m always trying to accomplish in solo contexts. I’m constantly inspired by Courtney and the way she centers community building in her music and life. She’s another one who, though she thrives performing and making music solo, you know that music came from a multitude of folks pouring through her.

Dale Ann Bradley – “He’s the Last Thing On My Mind”

I thank a few artists who have inspired and influenced me in a huge way in 1992’s liner notes and Dale Ann Bradley is one of them. I feel like I am constantly ripping off and (poorly) mimicking her vocal runs, phrasing, licks, and delivery. I think she might have the best bluegrass voice of all time, or at least it’s very very high up on the list. When I first moved to town I worked as an intern at Compass Records and just getting to be a small part of the team that worked a handful of her records meant so much to me.

Lee Ann Womack – “Last Call”

Lee Ann Womack is another who I thank in the album’s liner notes, another who I emulate vocally as much as I can get away with. I used to wear out this track and this album, Call Me Crazy, listening on repeat over and over. When I found out this song was co-written by an openly gay songwriter, it rocked my world. I already heard so much queerness in LAW’s catalog, and this confirmation came at a time when I needed to feel like I was given permission to exist in bluegrass, country, and Nashville. I know now that no one needs that permission, but it was critical then.

Linda Ronstadt – “Adios”

During the 1992 recording session I recorded a solo banjo rendition of this song, one I’ve been performing for years at shows. It means so much to me and Linda’s performance is stunning in its power and tenderness, a combination I’m often striving for. I hope to release it some time soon as a single, then again on a deluxe vinyl edition of 1992. It will not be the last time I pay tribute to Linda and her incredible career and catalog – plus, she is a huge bluegrass fan! It just makes sense to me.

Dolly Parton, Emmylou Harris, Linda Ronstadt – “Wildflowers”

When I had the pleasure of being a guest on the hit podcast Dolly Parton’s America, I sang this song and “Silver Dagger” among a few other from Dolly’s catalog that I felt had queer under/overtones. The response to my on-air picking was enormous, and there were immediate demands to release my versions of the songs. Cathy, Marcy and I recorded “Wildflowers” together during the 1992 sessions and it’s one of my favorite tracks that resulted from that week on the mountain. It’s gotten quite a lot of play, which I’m so grateful for, and always gives me an opportunity to talk about Trio and Dolly and how the story in “Wildflowers” parallels many a queer journey. It’s the perfect track to round out this Mixtape and I thank you for reading and listening along.

Photo credit: Laura E. Partain

BGS Top 50 Moments: The 50 Greatest Bluegrass Albums Made by Women

Posted on by Editor

March is #WomensHistoryMonth (although, let’s be honest, shouldn’t we be celebrating 51% of the population’s history every month?!) so it seems like a fitting time to revisit our comprehensive — but by no means exhaustive — list of the 50 Greatest Bluegrass Albums Made By Women.

Published five years ago as an unofficial extension of NPR’s Turning the Tables project, our list included a wide array of female talent from over a century of bluegrass, old time, string band, and other traditional styles of recorded music, from Ola Belle Reed to Laurie Lewis & Kathie Kallick to Molly Tuttle and everything in between.

“We dare not be so bold as to claim that every important bluegrass album created by women is included. We are simply striving to illustrate the far-reaching, undeniable influence that these incredible artists have had on the music, as a whole. Each contributor, many of them groundbreaking, trail-blazing artists themselves, has chosen albums that are personally impactful. Glaring omissions and oversights are almost guaranteed, but therein lies the beauty of this conversation: This collection is merely a starting point, a springboard for a greater dialogue about the place of female creators, artists, musicians, and professionals in the telling of the history — herstory — of bluegrass.”

There’s no question that there are plenty of amazing albums that should be added to the canon since 2017, but each new addition wouldn’t have been given an inch of foothold in the genre without the strength, determination, heart, and amazing music of the women who came before them.

Revisit our list of the 50 Greatest Bluegrass Albums Made By Women here.

16 Bluegrass Songs for Summer Vacation

Posted on by Justin Hiltner

It’s summer, our second in the “after times,” where road trips, national parks, and scenic byways are king. As you head off on your COVID-aware vacations this summer, don’t leave all the driving music to indie, easy listening, country & western, or rock ‘n’ roll. The chop of the mandolin, thump of the doghouse bass, and rapid-fire roll of the five-string banjo are just as suited to soundtrack your sunny forays. To prove that point, here are 16 bluegrass songs perfect for inclusion on your summer vacation playlists. (Listen to the full playlist on Spotify below.)

“Highway” – Claire Lynch

Bluegrass being an itinerant livelihood and a nomadic community, traveling songs are just as expected a feature as murder ballads, train tunes (a form of travel song unto themselves!), and moonshine running tales. This modern classic via Claire Lynch — written by Lynch and Irene Kelley — is a perfect example of the form, more ‘90s country offered by a string band than a traditional, four-on-the-F-style grassy track. It’s delightful — and perfectly winsome and longing when you find yourself listening while traveling down the highway.

“Handsome Molly” – Tim O’Brien

Our July 2021 Artist of the Month Tim O’Brien’s rendition of this bluegrass classic is a far cry from, say, a Flatt & Scruggs’ cut. O’Brien’s has a slight transatlantic bent — with a distinct island detour, perhaps through the sunny Caribbean. If you’ve found a craving to set your foot on a steamboat and sail the ocean ‘round deep inside your soul, this one’s for you.

“1952 Vincent Black Lightning” – Del McCoury Band

Another track with a transatlantic story, this ever-popular, most-requested number covered by the Del McCoury Band is a road trip staple — whether you get in or on your vehicle to hit the highway. It would be a sin to make a bluegrass summer vacation playlist and not include “1952 Vincent Black Lightning!”

“Val’s Cabin” – Laurie Lewis

A rare example of a bluegrass song actually about summer vacations, this Laurie Lewis original, “Val’s Cabin,” begins as a simple retelling of childhood memories — nostalgia being a common rhetorical device (and when attempted by many other writers, a well-worn trope) in bluegrass. But Lewis, a veteran through-hiker, wilderness excursioner, and backpacker as well as a Grammy-nominated bluegrass singer and songwriter, tinges the story with melancholy and the existential questions raised by the ever-worsening climate crisis. The song is as evocative as it is gorgeous; though the singer can’t find the way to “Val’s Cabin” any longer, every listener can.

“Paddy on the Turnpike” – Vassar Clements

If you ever happen to find yourself Crossing the Catskills on a summery jaunt, “Paddy on the Turnpike” must be in your listening rotation. Avoid the tolls, but still go for a ride on the turnpike with Vassar Clements’ wild, unpredictable, jaw-dropping, wonky fiddling. “Paddy” is a blank canvas for Clements and a study in bluegrass’ unending affinity for flat seven chords.

“Don’t Give Your Heart to a Rambler” – Tony Rice

A hit in nearly every jam circle that ever circled, “Don’t Give Your Heart to a Rambler” is almost as if “Gentle on My Mind” had been written by a much less kind or compassionate protagonist. Tony’s solo vocal stylings are as iconic as his six-string licks, nearly obliterating any memory of this song ever having been sung by anyone else. What’s more, the titular advice of the track still stands. Just don’t.

“Highway 40 Blues” – Larry Cordle & Lonesome Standard Time

Because “Interstate 70 Blues” just doesn’t roll off the tongue. And that melodic hook should go down in history as one of the best country licks to ever lick! Cordle wrote one built for the long haul with “Highway 40 Blues.” It’ll keep you good company as you go wherever and back.

“Banjo Pickin’ Girl” – Annie Staninec

Is there any better reason to go around this world than being a banjo picker? There are never enough banjo pickin’ girls and this anthem, no matter how many times it’s picked up, studied, and retooled by another banjo pickin’ girl, always SLAPS. (Clawhammer pun intended.) Fiddler and multi-instrumentalist Annie Staninec, who’s traveled around the world making music quite a bit herself, gives an excellent old-time rendition of this favorite.

“A Crooked Road” – Darrell Scott

Darrell Scott turns a literary device pretty common in songwriting on its ear, with a tender eye for detail and emotion that he brings into all of his musicmaking. Life is, after all, about the journey — not the destination. Why not take the crooked, and thereby, the road less traveled? 

Plus, take this song as suggestion: The Crooked Road, Virginia’s Heritage Music Trail, is well worth a visit. Put this song on and take the Crooked Road.

“Up and Down the Mountain” – David Parmley & Continental Divide

Work life doesn’t suit you? Does “paradise” mean a fiddle and the open road? If so, “Up and Down the Mountain” is for you and your road trip playlist. Especially if you’re planning on trekking through the Rockies, Sierras, Ozarks, Applachians, or what-have-you. Turn off cruise control, watch for the runaway truck ramps, and go up and down those mountains! David Parmley & Continental Divide know something about geography and topography, after all…

“Roving Gambler” – The Country Gentlemen


Not sure why you’d be headed to Las Vegas during one of the hottest summers on record, but if you’ve got your sights set on a casino — wherever it may be — crank up “Roving Gambler” and hope your 2 a.m. slot machine binge or your evening “re-learning” blackjack ends more amiably than with gunfire. Speaking of which, perhaps “Blackjack” deserves a slot on this playlist…

“Travelin’ Prayer” – Dolly Parton

The kick-off of one of Dolly Parton’s masterpieces, her 1999 bluegrass album The Grass Is Blue, “Travelin’ Prayer” was actually written by Billy Joel. Yes, that Billy Joel. The original, from 1973’s Piano Man, featured banjo playing by Eric Weissberg and Fred Heilbrun. So of course the tune stands up to the bluegrass treatment and then some, between Stuart Duncan’s haunting fiddle cadenza to begin the track, the rip roarin’ tempo and train whistle harmonies, and the lonesome feeling of being away from your baby while he travels the world. We’re gonna assume Dolly’s blessed pen and ink added the lyric: “And keep him away from planes / cause my baby hates to fly!”

“Road to Columbus” – Kenny Baker

Growing up this writer frequented a bluegrass jam in Granville, Ohio, about 25 miles east of the state’s capital, Columbus. Like clockwork, every week as the jam wound down around noon on Wednesdays, Troy Herdman — a local bluegrass community stalwart, Doc Watson-style flatpicker, and mentor of many who lived in or around Columbus — would call this tune. Everyone would chuckle, and we’d play “Road to Columbus” as everyone, but especially Troy, hit the road to Columbus. 

Herdman passed away last week at the age of 91. I certainly wouldn’t be the musician I was today if it wasn’t for Troy, and I know quite a few others who would say the same. So no matter where I travel, I always keep “Road to Columbus” nearby. Especially when I’m headed home to Ohio.

Many pickers speculate over whether Kenny Baker and Bill Monroe were referencing Columbus, Ohio, or Columbus, Indiana. But, according to Roland White — who introduces the song with an anecdote from his time on the road with Monroe — it’s about Ohio. For this Ohioan, that’s confirmation enough!

“That’s How I Got to Memphis” – Tom T. Hall

His own recording of one of his most popular hits may sound more like straight up and down country than ‘grass, but even the most casual fan of Tom T. Hall knows that this Bluegrass Hall of Famer is bluegrass to his core. If you’re headed down I-40 from Nashville — or, really, towards Memphis from any direction, no matter how direct or circuitous, this song is a must-add for your road trip playlist.

“Where Rainbows Never Die” – The SteelDrivers

This song is about a decidedly different kind of journey, not often referred to as a “vacation,” but even so it’s a poignant, encouraging, and downright delicious song to background any journey. If you’re road weary — or life weary — “Where Rainbows Never Die” is a certified pick-me-up that doesn’t shy away from reality, like the grit and coarseness in Chris Stapleton’s lead vocal wrapping you in its warmth. There’s a comfort in life not being sugar-coated — and in knowing somewhere, west of where the sun sets, rainbows never die.

“Home Sweet Home” – Flatt & Scruggs

Home never feels so sweet as when you’ve just returned after a long, restful, relaxing vacation. So we’ll close our summer vacation playlist with Flatt & Scruggs’ rendition of this tune pulled directly from the American songbook, “Home Sweet Home.” We hope a banjo roll always greets you at your door, and if not, this playlist will at least cover that for you. Wherever you roam, there’s no place like home! And no music like bluegrass.

Editor’s Note: Check out our follow up playlist, Take the Journey: 17 Songs for a Sunny and Warm Summer Vacation

The BGS Radio Hour – Bluegrass Duets, New & Old

Posted on by Shelby Williamson

Every week for the past few years, we’ve brought you a radio show, and now podcast, revisiting all the great music recently featured on the pages of BGS. This week, we bring you a special episode for our Duos of Summer series — a musical recap of our 2019 collection of the 22 Best Bluegrass Duos.

APPLE PODCASTS, SPOTIFY

We’re listening to some of these classic duos, and exploring bluegrass’ longstanding and continuing tradition of wonderful duet harmony, be it sibling or otherwise. And while most fans of the genre may recognize names like Flatt & Scruggs or the Monroe Brothers, here you’ll also find newer acts that are following the path laid by those hall-of-famers.

Head to the original story to explore the full list while you listen!

When Springtime Comes Again: 12 Bluegrass Songs for Spring

Posted on by Justin Hiltner

We hope, wherever you’re reading this from, that snow, frost, and the cold are truly retreating, giving way to longer days, warmer weather, and the gorgeous, humid, cicada-soundtracked days of summer. But, before we get to full-blown bluegrass season – and, hopefully, our first live music forays since COVID-19 shut the industry down in early 2020 – let’s take a moment to intentionally enjoy spring with these 12 bluegrass songs perfect for collecting a wildflower bouquet, romping and frolicking in the meadow, and pickin’ on the back porch while the evenings are still cool. 

“Wild Mountain Flowers for Mary” – Lost & Found

A classic via Lost & Found, bluegrass certainly does not lack metaphors and analogies for love built around spring and the flowers re-emerging – see “Your Love is Like a Flower” below – but this somewhat melancholy track is an exceptional example of the form. And that banjo solo by Lost & Found founding member Gene Parker will stop you dead in your tracks.

“There Is a Time” – The Dillards

Famous for the rendition sung by Charlene Darling of the ever-popular Darling family on The Andy Griffith Show, this haunting, seemingly timeless folky melody from The Dillards – who also played members of the Darling clan – cautions, “…Do your roaming in the springtime/ And you’ll find your love in the summer sun.” The suspensions in the banjo roll linger on the minor chord, echoing this sentiment and categorizing spring not by its own, shining qualities, but by the darkness in winter and fall. A true classic.

“Little Annie” – Molly Tuttle, Alison Brown, Kimber Ludiker, Missy Raines

A staple of impromptu pickin’ parties and jam circles, “Little Annie” is properly ensconced within the bluegrass canon, but is infused with new life in this application by Tuttle’s lead vocal, a slight queering of the lyric that’s perfectly at home in the hands of this veritable supergroup, assembled by D’Addario at Folk Alliance International’s conference in 2018. 

“Texas Bluebonnets” – Laurie Lewis 

Laurie Lewis is effortlessly, archetypically bluegrass even, if not especially, in applications that infuse other genres into the music, like this Tex-Mex flavored, twin fiddle arrangement of “Texas Bluebonnets” that truly never gets old. Yes, that’s Peter Rowan and Sally Van Meter guesting, and Tom Rozum jumping onto lead during the choruses so Lewis can utter the tastiest tenor harmony vocal. Stick around for the Texas double-fiddle break and do yourself a favor and bookmark the track for easy reference. You’ll be returning to it often, as this writer does. 

“The First Whippoorwill” – Bill Monroe 

The birds returning in spring are a sure sign of the seasons changing and the warm weather returning, though the whippoorwill’s role in folk music has always been as a bittersweet harbinger, never quite viewed without at least some semblance of suspicion, perhaps an acknowledgement of the whippoorwill’s mournful tendency of singing long into the dead of night. This recording of “The First Whippoorwill” is a tasty example of Monroe’s iconic high lonesome sound, with acrobatic breaks into entrancing falsetto woven into the harmonies. 

“Sitting on Top of the World” – Carolina Chocolate Drops

Whether you know this common blues, old-time, and bluegrass number from the Mississippi Sheiks, Doc Watson, John Oates, the Carolina Chocolate Drops, or any other of its many, many sources the fact still stands: Don’t like peaches? Don’t shake the tree. Demonstrably a song for spring, summer, and beyond.

“Roses in the Snow” – Emmylou Harris

Though BGS calls sunny southern California home – and BGS South is relatively temperate and mild in Nashville, TN – we know there are climes across this continent where spring promises snow as reliably as thaw. Emmylou Harris released her iconic bluegrass album in 1980 and its title track is another homage to love bringing warmth, newness, and growth even in the cold: “Our love was like a burning ember/ It warmed us as a golden glow/ We had sunshine in December/ And grew our roses in the snow…”

“Each Season Changes You” – The Osborne Brothers

Love is as fickle as the breeze! There’s a small irony in the song’s central conflict, that the singer’s love changes their mind as often as the seasons change – which, when taken whole, seems like a much more stable, predictable love than most? Even so, and done in so many different iterations, the central metaphor still holds, forever baked into the vernacular of these folk musics.

“One Morning in May” – Jeff Scroggins & Colorado

If you’ve been a bluegrass fan over the past five to ten years and you don’t immediately hear Greg Blake’s voice singing “One Morning in May” whenever it pops into your head, something must be awry. During Blake’s stint with Jeff Scroggins & Colorado, this spring-centered track was a highlight of their live show, a clean, modern rendering of what’s a properly ancient folk lyric. Lost love, war, nightingales, and yes, springtime – it has everything! 

“Your Love is Like a Flower” – Flatt & Scruggs

Perhaps the song that defines the form. Flatt’s languid, lazy phrasing seems to underline the leisure of spring that grows into the laziness of summer. The rhythm of love, tied to the seasons and the budding blooms. Another timeless sentiment, distilled into a favorite, stand-by bluegrass number.

“Springtime in the Rockies” – Lead Belly

You know the film and the country hit, but have you heard Lead Belly himself tell the story of hearing the tune from “Gene” coming by and playing him some music? Worth a listen and worth inclusion on this list, which would suffer if it didn’t include “When It’s Springtime in the Rockies” in one form or another!

“Spring Will Bring Flowers” – Balsam Range

Processing grief and loss through the ever- and unchanging seasons is a common thread through rootsy songs about spring. This more recent recording from powerful North Carolina bluegrass vocal group Balsam Range hearkens back to springy, ‘grassy numbers from across the ages – its intermittent banjo licks a call back to Jimmy Martin’s “world filled with flowers” in “Ocean of Diamonds.” 

Background photo by velodenz on Foter.com

True to Her Activist Roots, Folk Legend Peggy Seeger Still Longs for Peace (Part 2 of 2)

Posted on by Editor

At 85 years old, Peggy Seeger stands as one of the most accomplished figures in folk music. She has recorded 25 solo albums, plus dozens more with her late husband, Ewan MacColl, along with collaborations with her siblings and generations of other folk musicians. She is a multi-instrumentalist who has edited and compiled folk music anthologies, and she ran a well-known magazine featuring contemporary songs for 20 years. All that while touring, writing more than 200 songs, raising three children and serving as an immoveable force for peace and human rights. And hers was the face that inspired MacColl to write “The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face.”

From her home in England, Seeger spoke to BGS about her new album, First Farewell, and what that title really means.

(Editor’s Note: Read the first of our two-part Artist of the Month interview with Peggy Seeger.)

BGS: You wrote “How I Long for Peace” 20 years ago, but it’s really appropriate now. Can you talk about it?

When we decided to make a new CD, my son Calum had me sing to him any song that I hadn’t recorded. Because I lived in the United States for 16 years and wasn’t touring England, I wrote quite a number of songs that my kids never heard. “How I Long for Peace” was one of those. And when Calum heard it, he loved it. So, it went on the album, and so many people are commenting on it. It’s kind of like a hymn, and it has a very singable chorus, and it ties up nations and politics with climate change and the plunder of the planet. When I sing it, I feel such a longing in my heart. I feel the violence of the world. We’ve just had a horrendous murder here. In this country, a young girl who was walking home by herself disappeared. She was found two counties away in a woods. And there’s been a tremendous uprising here on the part of women. But it’s not until men uprise against this that it’ll ever be changed.

Can you talk about the project’s title, First Farewell?

I remember my brother Mike, who was with New Lost City Ramblers — once they broke up they had an annual farewell concert every year. I thought that was marvelously funny. So, I thought First Farewell will make people think. But it’s based on the two farewells that you give at the airport. You know, if you stay to wave goodbye to the person at our airport, you hug, and then they go through where only passengers are allowed. And they walk about 40 yards away, and then they turn to the right. So, the first farewell is the hug, and there is a second farewell where they wave goodbye just before they turn that corner.

In lots of ways at my age, I’m saying farewell to a lot of things, almost daily. When you’re my age, you see your body doing this, doing that, and you feel you’re slowly decaying. And it gives you a new feeling of togetherness with nature. I really have more of an attachment to nature and the birds and the daffodils and the trees than ever I did before. And I’m doing a lot of listening to books about nature. I’m beginning to feel that humanity is this very, very powerful paper-thin sandwich filling between what happens above the earth and below the earth, and we are just this kind of bacteria that is sitting along the edge of the earth. [Laughs]

Because I do feel that nature is calling us. Nature realizes that we are a danger. The same way as we’re trying to get rid of COVID, nature’s trying to get rid of us. And power to her if that’s her best way of teaching us anything, because we don’t learn at all. We just repeat everything that we’ve done before. But the first farewell is the recognition that I am near the goalpost. And within sight of the goalpost. I’ve been running like hell. But I run more slowly now.

Why did you move back to the United States in 2006, and then why did you return to Great Britain?

A tumultuous love affair brought me here permanently in 1959. I became a British subject in 1959 and settled down here. After Ewan MacColl died, 30 years ago, I had a new partner, a woman, my best friend, the only person that I’ve been head over heels in love with. And after four or five years, I had an incredible urge to go to America to find out who I had been before I came here – because I was a child when I moved here. And I immediately became totally involved in England. I grew up in England from age 24 and 54. That’s when I really became an adult. (I shouldn’t say that, because I’m not an adult yet.)

In 1994, I got this terrific urge to go back to America. I wanted my partner to come with me, but she couldn’t. So, I said, I’ll go and see what it’s like. It was the first time I’d lived on my own ever in my life. I toured America endlessly for 16 years. Then I began to realize that I really, really, really missed my kids. So, I just felt that urge to come back here. And now that I’m back here, I’m so glad I came back.

My children live in three corners of London. I can reach any of them in two hours. We talk on the phone, and I’m part of my family that I created again. My American family is very big, but very scattered. And the ones that I was really attached to are all gone. So, what made me move back was a gut feeling of where I belonged. And it’s so wonderful that my children are helping. They’re making it possible for me to keep going.

What do you see as the bright spots in today’s political and social movements? What gives you hope?

On all of the really big issues, what’s happening is small grassroots groups. People who want something done, want something changed, want something different are realizing that the government says it will take care of it — but it doesn’t. So, small groups are forming everywhere, saying, “We have to do this ourselves because our government is not doing it.” I’m part of a group like that here where I live, near the edge of Oxford. And Oxford has just spread and spread and spread and spread until it has incorporated one beautiful old village and then another old village. Then they become surrounded with new housing. And they have taken away the green land, taken away the beauty of the old villages.

I live in an old village called Iffley. Its church was built in the 1100s. And since 1964, 16 of its green spaces have been sequestered for housing. Plunk, they put 20 houses here; plunk, they put 50 houses there. Well, there are four acres left, two ancient fields that have not been touched for 1000 years. And our council wants to put 50 houses on them. I’m part of a group that is acting out of incandescent rage at this. If the housing is put in, it will be the end of our village – the end of it. I’ve always tried to be part of a small group that does something locally.

Parting words?

I’d like to thank you for the attention you gave to Laurie Lewis, because she is so good. She’s wonderful. I love that kind of music. I really, really do. And it’s something that I really miss over here, joining in on the radio with all of that wonderful singing that you can sing along with. I do miss the whole American scene, I do. But I’m a Gemini and I’ve chosen one of my twins, so I live here.

What I would like to say is that I have been very privileged in my life, extremely privileged, unlike a lot of people who need to struggle to make their names recognized. My name was recognizable due to my brother Pete, and my mother, my father. And I came at the end of other musicians who had smoothed the path out for me. I have had every possible advantage: two wonderful life partners, both of whom contributed to my career, and who have pushed me on and helped me. And children who don’t hate me! [Laughs] And a country that I kind of understand.

And enough money that I’m not in need in my old age. “First Time Ever I Saw Your Face” brings in a reasonable amount of income. People still hear it all over the place with some very funny covers. Oh, my god, it’s been covered over 400 times that we know of. There’s a rap version. There’s a country and western version. There’s a gospel version. There’s what I call a barbeque quartets version. There’s one with Scruggs banjo on it. I am just so fortunate, and I’m thankful that I’m being given an old age that makes me visible and worthwhile.

(Editor’s Note: Read the first of our two-part Artist of the Month interview with Peggy Seeger.)

Photo credit: Vicki Sharp

5 Uncommon Trad Instruments Played Like You’ve Never Heard

Posted on by Justin Hiltner

We’re all familiar with the standard bluegrass five-piece band (also a common lineup in old-time or string band music), but there are quite a few second- and third-string instruments — no pun intended — that are rarely invited to join ensembles of guitar, fiddle, upright bass, mandolin, and banjo. Dobro is perhaps first on this short list, but accordion, dulcimer (hammered and mountain), autoharp, washboard, harmonica and dozens of other music and noisemakers could be encountered alongside these acoustic staples.

The five musicians below are awe-inspiringly adept at their instruments, each considered more like afterthoughts or casual embellishments in American roots music, rarely considered centerpieces themselves. But no matter how uncommon they may be at your local jam circle, or around the fire at the campsite, after you’ve been introduced to each of the following, you’ll be craving more unexpected and uncommon sounds in your bluegrass lineups.

From bones to nyckelharpa to Irish harp, here are five uncommon traditional instruments played like you’ve never heard them before:

Simon Chrisman – Hammered Dulcimer

A familiar, towering figure in the West Coast old-time, folk, and DIY roots music scenes, Simon Chrisman is criminally underappreciated on a national or international level. He most recently released a duo album with acclaimed banjoist Wes Corbett, he has been touring and collaborating with the Jeremy Kittel Band, and he’s performed and recorded with the Bee Eaters, Bruce Molsky, Laurie Lewis, and many others. His hammered dulcimer chops exist on a plane above and beyond even the most accomplished players on the trapezoidal instrument, throwing in pop and bebop-inspired runs, reaching down to bend strings by hand to achieve particular semi-tones, bouncing along at a rate only matched by a three-finger banjo player’s rapid-fire sixteenth notes. It’s jaw-dropping, even in Chrisman’s most simple, tender melodies and compositions. This rollicking number, named for Corbett’s beloved cat, is neither simple nor overtly tender, but your jaw will find the floor nonetheless.

Rowan Corbett – Bones

Rowan Corbett is a singer-songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, and percussionist best known for his time with seminal modern Black string band, the Carolina Chocolate Drops. Also a longtime member of Baltimore-based acoustic-grunge/world-folk group ilyAIMY and a veteran of Celtic outfit Tinsmith, Corbett is something of a musical chameleon, though it never feels as if he’s just putting on genre costumes to match whatever melodic motif suits the moment. Instead he inhabits each one authentically and wholly. ilyAIMY, for being billed as a folk band, are captivating, passionate, and energetic, perhaps most of all while Corbett fronts the group. But all of his musical moxie across all of his instruments pales when he pulls out the bones — traditional, handheld percussion instruments similar to their more mainstream (if not more vilified) counterpart, the spoons.

It’s no wonder a bio for Corbett begins, “What are those and how does he do that?” Corbett’s percussion skills are precise and technical, laser-like accuracy meshed with generation-blurring soul. During a guest appearance with Rhiannon Giddens at the North Carolina Museum of Art in Raleigh, North Carolina, in September 2019, Corbett brought thousands of listeners gathered on the hillside by the amphitheatre to their feet with his bones and just a couple of bars. This improv/battle video with Greg Adams displays just a taste of Corbett’s prowess on the ancient instrument.

Amy Hakanson – Nyckelharpa

Pandemic aside, if you’ve jammed with an old-time fiddler in the past two years you’ve probably fumbled (if you’re like this writer) or charmingly tripped your way through a Swedish fiddle tune or two. Musicians like Brittany Haas and Molly Tuttle have brought Swedish tunes into their repertoires, birthing dozens of new acolytes of the crooked, wonky, joyful tunes. Many an American fan of Swedish folk traditions were introduced to them by Väsen, a genre-blending, nearly 30-year-old Swedish folk band adored by multiple generations of American musicians, thanks to their status as a favorite band of everyone’s favorite pickers. (Väsen counts Chris Thile, Mike Marshall, Darol Anger, and others among their most vocal proponents and collaborators.)

Nyckelharpa player and scholar Amy Hakanson was first introduced to the instrument by Väsen as well and in 2014 she took her fascination with the heady, engaging music to the source, to study nyckelharpa with Väsen’s Olov Johansson himself at the Eric Sahlström Institute in Tobo, Sweden. Her approach to the instrument — a traditional Swedish, bowed fiddle-like apparatus played with keys — has a storied, timeless air, even as she carefully places the nyckelharpa in modern contexts. This original, “Spiralpolska,” for instance, utilizes a loop machine, ancient droning and modern droning combined.

Sarah Kate Morgan – Mountain Dulcimer

The mountain dulcimer is simple and beautiful in its most common use, a gentle, pedalling rhythm section for languid, introspective folk tunes. Counterintuitively much more common in the hallways and hotel rooms of Folk Alliance International’s conference than IBMA’s or SPGBMA’s gatherings, this writer first encountered Kentuckian Sarah Kate Morgan and her melodic-style dulcimer among the many booths of IBMA’s World of Bluegrass exhibit hall. She was holding her own in an impromptu fiddle jam with mandolins, fiddles, banjos — all instruments much more familiar with picking intricate, free flowing hornpipes and hoedowns. But Morgan doesn’t just strum the dulcimer, capitalizing on its resonant sustain and open tuning, she shreds it. Playing a finely-tuned, impeccably intonated instrument with a radiused fretboard, she courageously and daringly dialogues with whomever accompanies her down every bluegrass and old-time rabbit hole she meets. It’s incredible to watch, not only with the understanding that most mountain dulcimers are treated as an aesthetic afterthought, but also knowing that Morgan’s prowess outpaces just about anybody on any instrument. A truly transcendent musician.

Alannah Thornburgh – Harp

Harp keeps coming up lately! And for good reason. No matter the genre label applied, harp is having a moment. We’ve kept up with Alannah Thornburgh for a few years, featuring her work with Alfi as well as across-the-pond collaborations like this one, with mandolinist (and BGS contributor) Tristan Scroggins. Living in Dublin, Thornburgh plays in the Irish harp tradition, but has toured and traveled extensively in the United States, giving her style a distinctly old-time and fiddle-tune-influenced approach. She takes on the complicated, contextual vocabularies of American old-time music with ease, almost leading listeners to believe that emulating the banjo or mandolin or executing new acoustic compositions or modern reharmonizations of old-time classics is what the harp was designed to do.

An Instagram video of Thornburgh displays a mischievous, winking arrangement of Béla Fleck’s “The over Grown Waltz,” from one of his masterworks, The Bluegrass Sessions: Tales from the Acoustic Planet, Vol. 2. An earworm of a tune well-worn and familiar to any acoustic music fan Generation X and younger, it’s not uncommonly called at some jams, but its hummable melody is secretly, deceptively, subversively complicated. Once again, Thornburgh simply smiles and pushes onward, as if reaching and pulling these intricate licks and banjo phrases seemingly out of thin air on a harp were as everyday an activity as brushing one’s teeth — or a wedding performance of Pachelbel’s Canon in D.

 

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Photo credit: Alannah Thornburgh (left) by Tara McAuley; Amy Hakanson by Amy Hakanson.

Dolly Parton, Brandi Carlile, and the Women Who Wrote Our 2020 Soundtrack

Posted on by Editor

There are a whole lot of ways you can tell the story of 2020, but for us here at BGS, it will be remembered as a year of especially remarkable songwriting from women in roots music.

We lead our playlist with the one and only Dolly Parton, who assured us that life will be good again. Parton’s songwriting is presented in an enticing new book, Songteller, and her ability to articulate complicated emotions — through lyrics that speak to all walks of life — is something that Brandi Carlile picked up on as a teenager. In this video interview from the 2020 BMI Country Awards (with a cameo from Dolly at the end), Carlile explains how Parton’s perspective on equality kept Carlile from divorcing country music completely.

Parton, who turns 75 next month, shares a number of important qualities with a new generation of singer-songwriters she’s inspired. In the case of Brandi Carlile, there’s a sense of belonging that is woven throughout their work, from Parton’s “Joshua” to Carlile’s “Carried Me With You.” Like Parton, Brennen Leigh is able to capture a sense of place and make it relatable, even for a listener who’s never been there. Kyshona Armstrong offers a sense of self-worth and self-awareness in her writing, as Parton does, allowing listeners to know them better. Likewise, Maya de Vitry and Parton share a sense of wonder and joy, portraying landscapes — internal and external — that are imagined, yet vivid.

On Prairie Love Letter, her full-length paean to her homeland on the Minnesota-North Dakota border, Brennen Leigh demonstrates a visceral, evocative grounding – just as Parton constantly speaks of her Tennessee mountain home: with a glint in her eye, and a sorrow in her heart for knowing she had no choice but to leave it. Leigh stakes her claim on both the wide, expansive plains and Nashville all at once, asking her audience “Don’t you know I’m from here?” As if to remind she’s as at home in bluegrass and country — and Music City — as Dolly herself.

“Backwoods Barbie,” “Dumb Blonde,” and “Just Because I’m a Woman” are all perfect examples of Parton’s lifelong radical self-possession. She expresses her agency boldly, confidently, without (visible) second guessing – from her wigs to her infamous tattoos to her nothing-special acknowledgement of her plastic surgeries, struggles with suicidal ideation, and so on, she is her fully realized, autonomous self. As Dolly told Jad Abumrad on Dolly Parton’s America, “Who we are is who we are… I would just bow out if I wasn’t allowed to be me…” Kyshona Armstrong‘s prescient album, Listen, holds similar space, as Armstrong doesn’t simply ask folks to listen; her presence, compassion, and radical honesty demand it. Because, first and foremost, she’s welcoming and non-judgmental in that aim, you will find yourself fully enveloped by her music before you realize the conviction within it.

Maya de Vitry made a gorgeous, poetic foray into heavier, rockier turf with How to Break a Fall, a gutsy, genre-bending set of songs. Their anger, release, and passion, expressed by the folk-rock production style, feels right out of Parton’s post-White Limozeen era, an effortless combination of seemingly disparate musical influences, distilled into something that, almost above all else, feels joyful. Where male-centered rock and roll finds itself often hung up on its endemic toxic masculinity, de Vitry and Parton stride into electrified sounds with their femininity forward, and the result is as charming as it is subversive.

It’s striking, among such an incredible volume of musical output from their Americana and country peers this year, that these women would stand out, above and beyond the still-common glass ceilings imposed upon them for decades. Dolly blazed a trail, but these dozens of writers — and singers and pickers and composers and front women and side musicians and authors and poets — would have crashed through inevitably on their own. With songs like Adia Victoria’s “South Gotta Change,” Sunny War’s “Can I Sit With You?,” “Troubled Times” from Laurie Lewis, the Secret Sisters’ “Cabin,” it’s obvious Dolly Parton’s songwriting legacy will be inherited by multiple generations worthy of carrying it on.

Throughout 2020, the BGS editorial team embraced this wealth of excellent music from women songwriters in roots music. It has been a privilege to share these original voices with our readers, too. Here are 50 of our favorite tracks from 2020:

Photo credit: Daniel Jackson for BGS, Newport Folk Fest 2019