Jeremy Stephens might be the most-featured musician in the history of this column. We’ve featured his band High Fidelity, IBMA Best New Artist nominees once again in 2021, twice over the past few years. Now he’s released a solo project entitled How I Hear It on Rebel Records.
How he hears it is how he plays it. Stephens’ banjo playing – and for that matter, his flattop guitar, archtop guitar, mandolin, bass, and beyond – is all at once effortlessly timeless and firmly grounded in the present. With acts like High Fidelity (which he founded with his wife and musical collaborator Corrina Rose Logston), the Chuck Wagon Gang, Jesse McReynolds, the Lilly Brothers, and others Stephens continually demonstrates a commitment to traditional bluegrass from long before the Bluegrass Album Band, Tony Rice, the Country Gentlemen, and other second- and third-generation groups began to eclipse their more old-timey, homespun, and gritty forebears. He has a penchant for Don Reno’s outside-the-box pickin’, and the chord-based licks, steel guitar phrases, and electric guitar back-up that were Reno’s signatures.
Even with this perspective on the music — the earliest days of bluegrass being the string band aesthetic that resonates with him the most — his playing is neither antiquated nor backwards. At times, the most striking quality of his approach to the instrument is how in-the-moment it is. His techniques and musical vocabulary are couched so firmly in the past, yet never feel as if he isn’t expressing himself wholly in each and every musical and creative decision he makes. This fact remains true whether he’s playing something well-rehearsed, replicable, and measured or something purely improvisational.
Though this column does focus on instrumental music — there are several astounding, hoot-worthy, slapdash, and gorgeous tunes on How I Hear It — it should be noted that Stephens can be just as present and in-the-moment with his banjo playing and improvisation instrumentally as when he’s singing harmony or lead, often a rare skill in banjo players. Anyone who’s enjoyed a performance by Stephens, the duo with his wife (billed tongue-in-cheek as The Stephens Brothers), High Fidelity, or any of the many bands that have featured Stephens as a sideman, will know just how jaw-dropping this talent of his can be. Acrobatic, nearly impossible Don Reno licks spat out rapid fire from his fingers while singing or playing syncopated against himself – it’s a sight and sound to behold.
How I Hear It tracks “Sockeye,” “Lady Hamilton,” “The Old Spinning Wheel,” and “The Bells of St. Mary’s” perfectly capture the energy and ethereal quality of Stephens’ live playing in a way many more sterile bluegrass albums, and purposefully more modern sounding records, can only aspire to. With backing musicians such as Logston, David Grier, Mike Bub, Hunter Berry, and more, the entire project is the perfect vehicle to highlight and showcase this truly idiosyncratic — yet diversely and expertly pedigreed — style of banjo playing that’s all at both unapologetically old school and well-suited for a long, long lifespan into the future.
In July we put together a playlist of bluegrass songs for summer vacation and once the inspiration was flowing, it was difficult to stop! We thought we should return to the theme, but slightly zoomed out, to include songs from across the roots music landscape. With the summer still shining, enjoy these 17 folk, Americana, and country songs perfect for your road trip playlist.
“Ride Out in the Country” – Yola
Yola was a 2020 Best New Artist nominee at the Grammys and she’s just returned with a new, full-length album on Easy Eye Sound, Stand For Myself. The entire project is lush and resplendent, like the glory days of orchestral, big-sound country-pop in the ‘60s and ‘70s. For this playlist, though, we return to her prior release, Walk Through Fire, and the perfectly country track, “Ride Out in the Country.” Take the scenic byways and crank the volume!
“I Like It When You’re Home” – Della Mae
One of the nicest silver linings of vacation is missing home – and that delicious feeling of returning to your own space and your own bed after being away. And your loved one(s), too! Della Mae captures that sentiment in this jammy, rootsy track from their album, Headlight. Take the day off, drive north, sit by a lake.
“A Little Past Little Rock” – Lee Ann Womack
A truly quintessential driving song. A must-add even if your vacation route comes nowhere near Arkansas. The baritone guitar intro, the shout-along-with-the-lyrics chorus, the whimsically late ‘90s production. A banger. A bop.
“Sunny and Warm” – Keb’ Mo’
Keb’ Mo’ is a master of vibes. His single “Sunny and Warm” showcases the acoustic blues musician in a more traditional R&B light – and the impact and result are simply golden. This track will have you craving your happy place, wherever that warm and sunny locale may be.
“Heavy Traffic Ahead” – Bill Monroe
Look, we’re The Bluegrass Situation! We’ve gotta get our bluegrass kicks in somewhere – bluegrass is roots music, after all. Given that we left this classic by the Big Mon himself off our Bluegrass Songs for Summer Vacation we felt it was worth inclusion here. And worth a mention so that you’ll go check out the entirely bluegrass playlist, too!
“Country Radio” – Indigo Girls
Finally a country song about country radio – and cruising around aimlessly listening to it – that is enjoyable and free of the guilt associated with the false nostalgia, conservative politics, authenticity signalling, and post-2000s country. Especially the kind most often played on the radio! This Indigo Girls track is testament to all the folks out there who love country music, even if it doesn’t always love them back. Don’t worry, it will. Eventually! (Read the BGS interview.)
“White Noise, White Lines” – Kelsey Waldon
If you catch yourself daydreaming, in a dissociative or meditative trance as you keep it between the lines, Kentucky-born singer-songwriter Kelsey Waldon has the exact soundtrack for you. “Whie Noise, White Lines,” the title track of her most recent album, speaks to that near-trope-ish phenomenon of losing oneself amid the countless miles traveled while living the life of a traveling musician. Waldon, as in most of her music, accomplishes this motif without stereotypes or clichés, and the result is a song that will be a staple on vacation playlists for decades to come.
“Table For One” – Courtney Marie Andrews
A variation on the same theme, this time from Courtney Marie Andrews, “Table For One” is gauzy and lonesomely trippy. “You don’t wanna be like me / this life ain’t free,” the singer pleads, seeking a sense of reality in a life almost entirely abided within liminal spaces. Find peace in the redwoods, but try to hold on to it. You might lose it twenty miles later.
“Two Roads” – Valerie June
Cosmic and longing, Valerie June distills Kermit the Frog’s “the lovers, the dreamers, and me” into album form with her latest outing, The Moon and Stars: Prescriptions For Dreamers. Whatever bug you’ve been bitten by – rambling, restlessness, cabin fever, listlessness – let this song and this album scratch that itch. And as you let the miles fade behind you, on whichever of the two roads you take, don’t forget to look up… at the moon and stars and beyond.
“Christine” – Lucy Dacus
Whether or not you’ve experienced the beautiful, transcendent, and heart-rending forbidden love of being queer — on the outside looking in on love that society has constructed to which you’ll never have access — Lucy Dacus’ fantastic, alt/indie roots pop universe will give you a crystalline window into this very particular iteration of unrequited love on “Christine.” The song feels almost as though you’ve woken from a warm, sunny, time-halting afternoon nap in the back seat of a car yourself.
“It’s a Great Day to Be Alive” – Darrell Scott
Darrell Scott goes two for two, landing on both our bluegrass summer vacation round-up and our rootsy list, too! “It’s a Great Day to Be Alive” is THE song for the moment you realize you’re out of the office, away from your chores, without a care in the world — whether you have rice cooking in your microwave or not.
“Hometown” – Lula Wiles
For those summers when all you can muster is a trip home. Lula Wiles don’t just trade in nostalgia and hometown praise, though, they take on the subject with a genuine, measured perspective that picks up paradoxes, turns them over, and places them back down for listeners. It’s a subtly charming earworm, too.
“Heavenly Day” – Patty Griffin
“Oh heavenly day / All the clouds blew away / Got no trouble today…” The exact intention to be channeling during vacation! Don’t let your summer getaway be one of those vacations from which you end up needing a vacation. Leave your troubles behind, have a heavenly day.
“Midnight in Harlem” – Tedeschi Trucks Band
Your travels may not bring you even within the same state as Harlem, but this song had still better be on your road trip playlist. There’s almost no song better to put on at midnight, wherever you may be roaming, than Tedeschi Trucks’ “Midnight in Harlem.”
“Outbound Plane” – Suzy Bogguss
Every time I step into an airport my anxiety seems to sing, “I don’t want to be standing here with this ticket for an outbound plane.” It’s always true. This writer has not yet returned to the jetways post-COVID, so we’ll see how that goes. At least there will be the security and comfort of this jam (composed by Nanci Griffith and Tom Russell) from Suzy Bogguss’ heyday.
“455 Rocket” – Kathy Mattea
There are plenty of modern versions of muscle cars available and on the road today, but not a single one is an Oldsmobile 455 Rocket! Kathy Mattea represents the rockabilly/Americana tradition of paeans to automobiles and gearhead culture with this loping tribute to a 455 Rocket, an early cut for Gillian Welch and David Rawlings. If you happen to take your country drives in a muscle car, regardless of brand, this track is for you.
“Take the Journey” – Molly Tuttle
What better way to conclude our playlist than with this always-timely reminder from Molly Tuttle? It might be a cliché, though it really is true: It’s about the journey, not the destination. So take the journey! Enjoy its twists, turns, and be in the moment. And take some clawhammer guitar along with you.
Artist:Jesse Lynn Madera Hometown: LA and Nashville Song: “Revel” Release Date: July 23, 2021
In Their Words: “Writing ‘Revel’ changed the way I approach songwriting. It made me understand more about the opportunity we have as artists to positively impact a person’s day. I’ve written a lot of sad, emotional songs, and I’ve seen that those can be therapeutic. Knowing someone is getting cheered up, cheered on, inspired, by listening to one of my songs is pretty mind-blowing. I try to be a source of light for the people close to me, and this is the first time I’ve really been able to tap into that with my songwriting. ‘Revel’ was written around the holidays in 2020, in a living room that was still vibrating with all the good times we’ve had. I needed ‘Revel.’ I needed a reminder of all the light that follows darkness. Being human is rollercoaster enough without a pandemic to further complicate the experience. We’ve all suffered through our share, and hopefully we’ve all experienced the sun coming up over the horizon of despair. This will be no exception. The glow shall return, and we’ll all be reveling in it.” — Jesse Lynn Madera
The roots music community, like the rest of the world, faced an uncertain future as the pandemic essentially wrecked everybody’s plans in 2020. However, a number of musicians and industry leaders figured out a way to navigate the uncharted waters with grace and bravery. The Bluegrass Situation invited five members of the roots community to share their thoughts on how they harnessed their creativity and embraced innovation over the last 12 months.
Billy Strings, Winner of “Breakthrough Artist of the Pandemic” at the 2021 Pollstar Awards:
It was almost kind of a welcomed break, you know? I was tired, man. We had toured our asses off and I was like, I don’t know if I can do this anymore. Then all of a sudden, this stuff happened and we got a big break. And now I realize how lucky I was. Now there’s nothing I’d like more than to be stuck in some hotel room somewhere after a gig with some random folks at 3 o’clock in the morning, just hanging out and having a good-ass time.
For one thing I wanted to get the quality [of livestreaming] better than what I could do at my house. It started with just me on my couch playing, and the next thing you know we’re doing that tour where we’re playing the Exit/In and gigs around Nashville. It was kind of cool and eerie and weird. I’m just thinking, I know there are people out there watching us, but they’re not here and I can’t see them. When you’re used to playing for crowds, it’s like, man, this sucks! [Laughs]
We did debut a lot of songs at the Capitol Theater when we did our gigs there in February. We played like 16 brand new songs when we were over there. … People will go on fan pages and say, “Holy shit, did you hear that song?!” I don’t want to pay attention too much to that, because it just feels like you’re playing for the internet, but then it is good to get a good little gauge on what songs they’re digging.
I think a fallow season is really important for everyone, or we’re producing from an empty well. Not of creativity, I think creativity is always there, but contrary to popular opinion of the tortured and manic creator, even artists need to sleep and drink eight glasses of water a day. Like all of us, I spent 2020 trying to survive. I had a nervous breakdown. I lost my job. I had a heartbreak. I turned to art, pop culture, movement, exercise, my cats, meditation, to keep me going. …
There was a period of time I didn’t know if I’d make it. I was in a pretty dark place before I got some new treatment for my mental health. I was obsessively walking 14 miles a day, really scared, really not wanting to be alive, in quarantine far from my family, unemployment wasn’t coming through. Scheduling livestreams gave me something to look forward to. Playing music to my supporters, all over the world, it made me feel less alone. I don’t know how any performance will ever beat that. We really needed each other. Singing to people gave me a reason to keep going in the most literal sense. And my supporters also kept me fed! All those $5 tips kept groceries in my fridge. And then Netflix and podcasts, Cardi B’s “WAP,” and my cat kind of saved me. It gave me something to look forward to. That’s the power of art and pop culture, and pets. It cuts through to places we can’t get to. It got me through each day, one day at a time.
Without giving too much away, The Sound of Us spotlights a variety of musicians and the incredible impact their work (or lack thereof because of COVID) has. Some of those highlighted include folks working to bring music to underprivileged neighborhoods, into prisons and hospitals, working on researching lost works of art from the Holocaust and other genocides, and of course, how musicians were affected by institutional racism and the pandemic. When I saw the screening, I cried all my eye makeup off. It’s an incredibly emotional and profound documentary. I am so proud to have been part of it.
Robert Meitus, Co-Founder and VP of Industry Development of Mandolin.com:
Roots music fans tend to have a strong connection with artists and a desire to connect frequently and deeply. Additionally, the nature of roots music itself is built around intimacy, vulnerability and honesty, so that desire for connection really runs both ways. Mandolin’s vision has always been to build a space in the digital world where the noise of the industry fades away; one where a musician and their fans can connect not only through a concert stream, but through other unique experiences like interactive/online VIP events, soundchecks and workshops with artists.
Specifically, Mandolin started with a name that is itself an acoustic instrument and a workforce full of people who had worked a lot with roots music, including among others: myself, representing as an attorney artists such as John Prine, I’m With Her, and Keb’ Mo’; Jason Wilber, longtime guitarist for John Prine; and Larry Murray, formerly of the Luck Reunion. The name and connections naturally led us to develop the roots music connections in our first year, although Mandolin’s technology and services are certainly applicable to all music genres.
I have been a bit surprised at the almost uniformly positive views about integrating streaming into the live festival experience. It helps that cameras have been in place on and around stages for many years already, largely for the IMAG projections on the sides of stages, so musicians are used to this. COVID introduced livestreaming technology and practices to the music world at a much faster rate than would have been the case otherwise, and we have all learned how technology can connect us around the world and accommodate those that may be challenged to attend an event in person. The result is that, coming out of the pandemic, I believe bluegrass and other festivals will be more interested in the hybrid livestream for all sorts of reasons. This may be a bold claim, but I would expect that almost every festival — roots or otherwise — will have a virtual experience component. Think about it: with a phone in hand, every single fan is a digital fan, whether they are streaming at home or on the festival grounds.
Jackie Venson, R&B/Soul Artist and Guitarist from Austin, Texas:
I was pretty well-versed in livestreaming pre-pandemic. I had a series called Jackie Venson Live on Thursdays, which was an effort to help sell tickets to my album release at the Paramount in Austin, Texas, in 2019. I saw the potential in it when it first came out in 2014. I attempted to livestream a concert from Berlin, Germany, but the technology just wasn’t there yet so it was a really bumpy experience. I remember feeling really grateful that the technology existed when the pandemic was ramping up so that I could keep performing once there was no option for in-person shows. There was literally nothing else to do, and when there’s nothing to do I lose my mind and default to the first thing I can think of, which in this case was filling the performance void with livestream performances.
I used my Austin City Limits TV performance as a platform for Black Lives Matter because that episode will be rerun and it’s important to me that this message doesn’t die. The response overall was positive; of course there were some naysayers but that’s why we need to keep repeating the message. During the pandemic I received overwhelming support and positive feedback from the Austin music community. Everyone was on the same page and it seems as though things are changing for the better. I will absolutely continue to stream from home when possible, and I plan to livestream some of my shows from the road for those who want or need to stay home. I think livestreaming will be a staple in the world of live music. It makes live shows accessible to those who are unable to come out due to economic, accessibility, or other issues. (Read the BGS interview.)
Everything was upside down last year, but the greatest challenge was envisioning and delivering an event we had never done, with half the staff, all new software, no roadmap, and little sense of whether anyone would want to gather online 11 months into a Zoomed-out pandemic. Being able to offer a sliding scale registration fee, including free, was absolutely necessary given how hard hit our community was, and despite that approach, we exceeded our modest revenue goals to cover the costs of the new online systems we used. The most rewarding element was definitely having new artists and industry join us for the first time, and to see a sharp increase in BIPOC and marginalized community representation across all panels. That happened because we were able to extend invitations to participate in more accessible ways. We were also thrilled to finally provide honorariums to all panelists this year, which we are committed to continuing.
Personally, it’s a joy to see FAI play a part in curating, commissioning, and compensating artists for meaningful new content and partnerships, which is the central aim of our Artist In Residence program — playfully renamed Artists in (Their) Residences this year for the pandemic. There were certainly some artists we approached who simply don’t do co-writes, some for whom the online process felt odd, and others who, while flattered, were simply too busy with other projects or recordings. But for the most part, there was instant interest, especially when they knew that one of their peers had selected or recommended them. The cross-border collaboration as part of a bigger collective project, reflecting on a traumatic year, with the added element of raising awareness for The Village Fund to support the community rang a lot of “count me in” bells.
We are already full steam ahead with a hybrid event this year, and we’re not looking back. Our focus will naturally be on ensuring that the in-person event is top-notch and delivers the experience we all know and love, but there are thousands of people who can’t attend each year, for myriad reasons, and providing online content, as well as live-streamed and interactive content enables more community engagement, participation, and inclusion, and builds bridges and connections that folks will use as an entry point leading to the growth of our genre and industry. While daunting, we’re excited about the opportunity to innovate what we do and offer, and who we can reach.
Artist:Adeline Stringband (L to R: Chris Coole, Mark Kilianski, John Showman, Adrian Gross, Sam Allison) Hometown: Toronto, Ontario Song: “Hickory” Album:Adeline Release Date: July 23, 2021
In Their Words: “This session was definitely one of the loosest, most off-the-cuff, and most creative I’ve been a part of, and I’d hazard to say the same is true for the other guys. Smack dab in the middle of the pandemic — when none of us had really seen anyone besides immediate family for about a year — we holed up in a cabin in the woods and recorded old time tunes for three days and three nights. Seeing as it was -20º and there was a blizzard outside the whole time, there was nothing to do but pick tunes and roll the tape, and that’s exactly what we did. We learned “Hickory” from the great fiddler Earl White, and you can really hear the group interplay on this track.” — Adrian Gross
Tim O’Brien’s seemingly effortless tenor singing, musicianship, and songwriting have kept him in great esteem in the bluegrass community for more than four decades. One might say “seemingly effortless” is a fitting way to describe his career path, too. So much of it seems natural, as if each new thing was the obvious next step, whether it was creating a Western swing band alter ego within a bluegrass band, recording duet albums with his sister Mollie O’Brien, earning a Grammy nomination with an collection of Bob Dylan covers, or connecting lines between Appalachian music and traditional Irish music, tying back to his own heritage as a West Virginian of Irish descent.
Yet beneath his quiet demeanor is a thoughtful artist who brings a tremendous amount of intentionality to his work. We sat down with O’Brien, our BGS Artist of the Month for July, to ask him about how he got started and how some of these projects came to light.
BGS: When did you first start trying to play music professionally?
TO: In the fall of ‘73 I gave up on the idea of college and decided that maybe I could support myself playing guitar and a little bit of fiddle. I was just learning back then. I saved up for a car and I went to Jackson Hole and played shows in bars and whatever I could get. I had some friends that I had worked with as part of a summer camp out near there that were out there to spend the winter. Then, in the fall of ‘74, I ended up in Boulder and briefly played in a bluegrass band called Town and Country Revue with two guys who were affiliated with a music store that I worked for a short time. Then I met up with a guy that started a band called the Ophelia Swing Band and I joined them for about three years. Our front man was Dan Sadowsky, who later became known as “Pastor Mustard” at the Telluride Bluegrass Festival.
We did some bluegrass things, but we weren’t portraying ourselves as a bluegrass band. We had strings, but it was mostly a swing band. I had been playing guitar and fiddle at this point and ended up borrowing a mandolin for a while until I eventually got my Nugget in ‘76. We were into that Cab Calloway kind of a hepster swing and there was another violin player in the group named Linda Joseph so we’d play some twin fiddle parts in a Western swing style. We tried to make big band arrangements with a lot of call and response between the instruments. We were making it up as we went along, but very much enjoying it.
We made a record, [Swing Tunes of the 30’s & 40’s], for the same label that my solo record came out on, a Denver label called Biscuit City. That record came out in ‘77, but I quit the band right before the record came out. I briefly moved to Minneapolis but I went back and did a little run of gigs with them in the summertime. I went back and was trying to dig in in Minneapolis, and then Pete Wernick called and suggested that we should get a group together. My girlfriend at the time, shortly before we ended up getting married, was thinking that maybe we should move back to Colorado anyway. So we went back in January of ‘78 to start up Hot Rize.
Your description of the Ophelia Swing Band’s material reminds me a lot of Red Knuckles and The Trailblazers. I’ve always enjoyed the Trailblazers portion of Hot Rize shows because the music is so good but it’s almost hiding behind the facade of a well-presented comedy show. Sort of like Homer & Jethro. How did you end up presenting it in that way? Or playing that music in the first place?
What happened was, Pete said that we should get a bluegrass band together and promote these two records. I had just put out Guess Who’s in Town on Biscuit City and Pete had just released Dr. Banjo Steps Out. I said, “That sounds good, I’ll do it, but I’d like to venture out into some other kinds of music other than straight bluegrass” and I mentioned Hank Williams kind of stuff or Western Swing. I asked Pete if he’d ever play Dobro. He had never played Dobro, but he said he’d look into getting one (he ended up getting a lap steel) and said we could work some of that stuff in.
Our first guitar player was a brilliant instrumentalist named Mike Scapp [who also played with the Ophelia Swing Band]. He didn’t last very long though and when he quit, Charles Sawtelle had been playing bass, but switched to guitar. When Nick Forster came along we told him we were doing this country and western material and he said that he had a Charlie Christian Gibson [electric archtop] guitar and played that kind of stuff. So all of a sudden, we had electric guitar, steel guitar, acoustic guitar, and bass. (Charles would go back to the bass for that because he didn’t play that kind of music on guitar.) So, when we would play four sets at a bar or something, we’d feature some of that stuff on the third set just to break it up. We would say, “We’re going to bring another band up here,” but we would just stay on the stage and switch instruments. We’d make a joke about the name of the band — we had different silly names that we used — and it was just a stage patter and a bit of a different kind of music.
Then, about two years into the band, we had a formal concert at the City Park in Denver in a nice theater sponsored by the Denver Folklore Center. I’m not sure who said it but I think it was Charles who said, “Why don’t we do a quick change? We’ll wear cowboy outfits and actually be a different band.” So we worked out the basic formula in rehearsal where Pete would introduce us while three of the four change clothes and then we’d come on and he’d make his quick change and all of a sudden we were a different band. That night, we called ourselves Red Knuckles and the Trailblazers. Rather than this just being some bar, these were mostly bluegrass and folk music fans and Pete and Charles were well-known in that community at that time. So we changed clothes and played a part and never let on that we were the same people and everybody knew it, but they got into it. That seemed to work, so we kept doing it.
The following fall, we played in Louisville at the free bluegrass festival that was put on by Kentucky Fried Chicken. We were interviewed by a radio host there and she said, “Well, I want to interview Hot Rize, but who I really want to interview is Red Knuckles and the Trailblazers.” So we said, OK, and acted like the Trailblazers. When she asked us stuff about where we’re from, we were just making up these answers. All of that stuff about us being from Wyoming, Montana, which is on the border of Wyoming and Montana, and the Eat Cafe was all just jokes that we might have said while we were driving around in the car. But it became our story after that interview. After we’d finished we all looked at each other and said, “Well, I guess that’s our story. Now we have to remember it.” [Laughs]
That’s how it started. I had always wanted to play that music so I wanted to do the music justice, but the act was about not taking yourself seriously. It helped Hot Rize immeasurably to have that as a foil. Whenever we’d mention the name of that band we’d make a snide remark about them as if they were a different band and we were rivals. This helped create an understanding that this was a lighthearted event which helped a lot.
Yeah, I could imagine it helped a lot. Not only as a way to stand out with something different, but since you guys were from Colorado playing a progressive style of bluegrass I’m sure the Hot Rize material sounded even more like traditional bluegrass when juxtaposed against the Trailblazers.
That’s why we got Entertainer of the Year the first year that they awarded it at IBMA; we had a show. At that time you had bands starting like Doyle Lawson & Quicksilver, The Johnson Mountain Boys, and the Nashville Bluegrass Band. The Johnson Mountain Boys were also working on a show, but those other two bands were still standing by their individual microphones. I loved those bands a lot and still do but having a show was good for us because it took a little stress off the music and let our music just be what it could be. We weren’t measuring ourselves against those other bands quite as much as we might have been otherwise.
It took a while for the promoters to understand it. There were some traditional festivals that wouldn’t let us do that. Out in Grass Valley, California, at the CBA festival, they didn’t even really want electric bass there, but they’ve made an exception for Hot Rize. But they wouldn’t let us do the Trailblazers. The same thing happened at Doyle Lawson’s festival the first time we played there. Milton Harkey said, “Oh, don’t get me wrong, I love the harmonies,” which proved that he had never heard it since the Trailblazers didn’t really have a lot of harmony singing. But after we played his fans got to him and asked why they didn’t let us play that Trailblazers stuff and explained it to him and they started letting us.
For some of those festivals like the one in Grass Valley, I think they just have their rules about what is and isn’t bluegrass. But the other ones like Doyle Lawson’s festival, they just didn’t want a bunch of bikers coming in. They didn’t want hippies taking a lot of drugs with electric music because it might get out of control.
What was it like to play in these traditional, sometimes conservative spaces?
We were always the funny ones. Our hair was too big and too long and our ties were wrong. We wanted to fit in so we wore suits, but we never hid who we were. Bluegrass, since the ‘60s at least, has always had lots of different fans. They might be Northerners or city folks that didn’t grow up with the banjo but they love it and kind of poke fun at themselves for being involved in a way. I think that’s the thing that’s sort of wonderful about music; it’s a free pass. It’s whatever anybody thinks it is and anybody can like any kind of music and art. How you react to it is up for grabs and, in a way, all responses are valid. People all respond to music differently and people will change it to express themselves within it.
Tim O’Brien’s latest album, He Walked On, explores the many realities and histories of what it means and what it has meant to be American. With his well-known ability to tell a story through song and his less recognized, but equally powerful ability to pick and perform covers, O’Brien shares intimate and intriguing stories including the traditions of the Irish Travellers living in the U.S., Volga German immigrants turned sodbusters, or Thomas Jefferson’s children birthed by his slave, Sally Hemings.
Such stories and topics are not uncommon for O’Brien to write about, but in the wake of the murder of George Floyd and the protests that followed, as well as the Black Lives Matter movement, these songs feel even more topical and personal. His music is often presented with a lightheartedness that settles the listener and reminds them not to take themselves too seriously. And while some of that can still be found here, there is a somber tone that reflects the state of the country today. He’s joined on the album by bassist Mike Bub, drummer Pete Abbott, fiddler Shad Cobb, and vocalist (and fiancée) Jan Fabricius.
In the first of a two-part interview, BGS catches up with O’Brien, our Artist of the Month for July, to discuss the songs from He Walked On. (Editor’s note: Read part two here.)
BGS: The songs on this album speak to a lot of current events and the theme is more “political” than some of your previous work — although I don’t like thinking of human rights issues as being political.
TO: Yeah, they are politics nowadays. I think that the artist’s job is to reflect and respond to what’s going on around you and in your life. I don’t know anybody that creates original stuff who’s not doing that. Of course, this is an exceptional year for that. There’s a lot of things going on that were highly, highly provocative such as the Black Lives Matter movement and the pandemic itself and the way the politics entered into that, which was unfortunate. And then related to that is paying attention to history, the developments of technology, and how it affects society. That’s where songs like “Nervous” came from and they’re not “political,” but they’re kind of a report on the state of humanity.
You’ve often written about your experience in the modern world and talked about technology before but usually with a humorous tone. When I heard “Nervous” and “Pushing on Buttons,” it made me think of “Phantom Phone Call” from Chameleon.
You know, actually, I think one of the saddest things I’ve ever written is “Pushing on Buttons.”
Yeah, that’s what I was getting at. There’s usually a lot of whimsy when you’re talking about modern stuff, but “Pushing on Buttons” is pretty somber.
Yeah, I almost left it off because I thought, “Nobody wants to hear how sad this is.” But I was able to get Chris Scruggs in the studio and said, “I ought to cut this song so let’s make it like a Hank Williams number, if I can.”
The tone on the album felt more serious, in general, than your previous work. Do you feel that way?
Yeah, I suppose so. I don’t know how it will ring with everybody, but I felt like this was the thing to do. The Black Lives Matter movement is another step on a long road of reckoning with our history and the racial divide in this country. When stuff gets thrown up in the air like it did with George Floyd it’s time to look at all that’s been going on from day one and try to make sense of it. I could have written these songs like “When You Pray” and “Can You See Me, Sister?” any time. But it was staring me in the face much more so this year. Whimsy is good and all, but I couldn’t ignore these things.
But, in general, I try to stay light on my feet and that’s more of the tone of “When You Pray, Move Your Feet” which is a pretty happy song in a lot of ways. And I hope that means something. “He Walked On” is like, well, the only way to really get through this is just to try and notice the good. Notice when it’s really good and when you don’t just keep going and try to find it again. So it is sort of a mission statement for living in the United States. You have people doing their various jobs — farming, or trading mules, or coal mining, or looking at a computer — and we’re all kind of looking for the same things. It’s nice to have somebody to share your love with and a roof over your head. It’s nice to help other people find that as you’re going along to help yourself.
Songs like “He Walked On” or “Can You See Me, Sister?” — like a lot of songs that you’ve written — are told from a different perspective than your own life experience. How do you approach writing those stories in particular?
I don’t know. Maybe my age is telling me to look at it in different ways. But I don’t know that I was conscious about trying to write differently. Back working with Darrell Scott, I realized that he had so much personal detail in his songs and it made them more universal. Which is counterintuitive, but I’ve noticed that that’s the case. So, “He Walked On” is about changing your perspective and getting a glimpse of the divine. We’re not always paying attention but about one percent of my time, I wake up and go “gee, look at that” and really appreciate it and really be present and in the moment.
In the case of “Can You See Me, Sister?” it was such a fascinating story. I kind of knew about Sally Hemings and Thomas Jefferson because in the early days of Hot Rize, we played in Charlottesville, Virginia. A bluegrass fan brought us around to Monticello and took us on a personal tour. Jefferson is a really interesting character in American history in so many ways, but you and I can relate to him in that he was a fiddler. He was really interested in old-time fiddling. He played tunes like “Money Musk” and they have his handwritten transcriptions of some of these tunes at Monticello. He was a renaissance man — an artist, a writer — and apparently he carried a pocket fiddle around with him. He had a little mini-fiddle you could put in your overcoat pocket.
So I had known some about him but I recently learned more about the children he had with Sally Hemings. It was a great loss for him when his wife [Martha Jefferson] died. He promised her he wouldn’t get remarried and he didn’t. But he turned to Sally Hemings, who had been a slave at Monticello and was brought to France to nanny his daughter. She birthed at least six of Jefferson’s children and I hadn’t realized until recently that a couple of them passed as white and lived their adult lives in white society.
The decision to have a spoken word introduction to “Can You See Me, Sister?” was interesting. I don’t remember ever hearing one in any of your other songs.
Mike Bub brought it up because when I sent the demos around he heard it and liked it, and then I told him what it was about. He said, “Wow, there’s a lot more punch to it when you know what it’s about.” He said most of the radio listeners wouldn’t know that so he recommended having some kind of explanation. It was a conscious choice and it was interesting to write. I don’t usually write stage dialogue. I guess I hone it as I go and I get more succinct and more pointed and more efficient with it as I learn. But this was before I ever performed it on stage. I wanted to have the right introduction that would say what needed to be said; no more and no less.
“See You at the Funeral” is kind of an odd one. It’s about Irish Travellers in America, which is a subset of American society that’s kind of unknown. The song is about the once-yearly reunion in Nashville of the greater clan of the Sherlocks families and their relatives. They have all their funerals and weddings for the year in one week so everybody can be there and then they scatter and go do their own thing. … It’s all the happy parts and the sad parts and the big ball of wax. By the end of that week, you would have a sense of where you come from, who you are, and what’s next. Those rituals are part of what helps us get by. That’s Americana. It’s from a lesser-known part of our history and our society. That is the part that I’m interested in. And if it means something to me, maybe I can make it into something to someone else.
What about some of the covers like “Sod Buster”?
Jan’s family is from western Kansas and her great-grandfather was another type of migrant. Their background is what they call Volga German; they were German farmers that got recruited by Catherine the Great of Russia to farm wheat on the Volga River. Then the politics changed and they were going to have to serve in the Russian army. That’s when everybody started coming to the American plains. The railroads had started and they were advertising for people to move. Her great-grandfather was one of the earliest sodbusters in the late 1800s.
It’s a Bill Caswell song that I just love and I ended up talking to him about it and he said, “Oh, yeah, that’s about my grandfather. He was out there at that time and plowed with a team of horses.” I love Bill Caswell and I love this song. And I wondered why nobody had yet recorded it. So we worked it up and it means something because of Jan’s connection. We go out there sometimes and I really love being out in someplace exotic like that. I grew up where there’s hills everywhere and being on an absolute flat plain with the sky and the grass is an amazing thing.
I’ve always admired how much of a personal connection to all of your music that you have. It all feels very intentional.
John Hartford gave good advice to Hot Rize one time. He said, “You don’t want to get famous doing something you don’t like doing.” So I want to try to aim for the intersection of what people might enjoy and what I’m interested in and it ends up attracting people that think like me. I’m a bit of a bleeding heart liberal, if we got down to it. But I try to mostly put something out that people could enjoy and then maybe give them something to think about and maybe they’ll think poorly of it, or maybe they’ll change. You know, that’s a Buddhist thing. You work towards conscious change. Change and betterment and creativity. You just try to find your opening and hopefully I’ve found a few here.
The “bluegrass songbook,” a suitably vague though well-known concept in bluegrass and old-time circles today, is a phrase that references the collective of songs and tunes most popular and most played by the community that makes up bluegrass and old-time music. Most of the melodies included in this informal — though often gatekept and debated — canon have well established origins, from source recordings, legendary writers and composers, famous performances, and so on. Even so, it’s difficult to trace each and every Bluegrass Album Band hit or Del McCoury favorite back to the beginning, when it was first being adopted and popularized among jam circles, as fiddle tunes, by and for laypeople as much as the performing professionals.
With material by forebears like Flatt & Scruggs (“Foggy Mountain Breakdown” to “It Ain’t Me Babe”) or Bill Monroe (“Muleskinner Blues” to “Monroe’s Hornpipe”) or the Stanley Brothers (“Ridin’ that Midnight Train” to “Little Maggie”), the Osborne Brothers, Hazel & Alice, Reno & Smiley, and on down the line, it’s not so much a question of why or how their charming, archetypical songs made it to open mics and festival parking lot jams. But in modern times, as in bluegrass days of yore, just as many new, contemporary tunes, songs, lyrics, and melodies are being translated from professional studio recordings, radio singles, and on-stage hits to sing-alongs, play-alongs, and day-to-day jam fodder. And the process by which this happens is, part and parcel, what bluegrass and old-time are all about.
How did “Rebecca” become an almost meme-level instrumental in the past fifteen years? How did Frank Wakefield know that we needed a “New Camptown Races?” How many millennial and Gen Z pickers learned “Ode to a Butterfly” or “Jessamyn’s Reel” note for note? Each modern adoption into the bluegrass songbook, into that unflappable canon, is an idiosyncratic marvel unto itself — and perhaps no modern, original instrumental tune encapsulates this phenomenon better than John Reischman’s “Salt Spring.”
Being a picker myself, I first learned “Salt Spring” in Nashville in perhaps 2012 or 2013, taught to me by fiddlers who encountered the melody from John himself — and through the bluegrass and old-time camp scene in which he’s pretty much a ubiquitous figure, especially on the West Coast, where he lives and grew up. At that point, the song was regarded as a Colorado-grass staple, transplanted east by a regional genre phenotype that celebrates and capitalizes on timeless, sometimes ancient-sounding aesthetics played with chamber music-level intricacies and techniques. The forlorn, winsome — though simple — chord progression in the A part give way to a longing, pensive, and momentum-building B part — and no matter how “Salt Spring” is rendered, as an “everyone play at once” old-time jam song, or a thoughtful chamber-grass slow burn built to a raucous, defiant end, or as a no-holds-barred SPBGMA style MASH number, it’s a chameleonic composition, allowing itself to fit into every single context in which it’s applied.
“Salt Spring” is truly the instrumental song of the post-Nickel Creek, post-Crooked Still, post-grass generation. As string band genre aesthetics dissolve in the global music marketplace, songs like “Salt Spring” typify this generation’s longing for music that feels honest, true, and real as much as it’s approachable, whimsical, and joyful; songs that celebrate the traditions that became the bedrock of these musics, without being predicated upon militaristic and arbitrary rules to “protect” or propagate those traditions.
And, though modest to a fault, unassuming, and generally pretty subdued as a person and performer, Reischman has felt this phenomena metamorphosing his composition all along. With his first recording of “Salt Spring” available digitally and writ large, he’s communicating to everyone who loves the song that yes, he knows what it means to us, what it’s become, and what it could grow into still. It’s no wonder then, that when putting together the roster for this new recording and iteration of the track, that he didn’t simply call on his band, the Jaybirds, but he looked to the very generation that’s chosen “Salt Spring” as its own with Molly Tuttle on guitar, Alex Hargreaves on fiddle, Allison de Groot on clawhammer banjo, and Max Schwartz on bass.
A veteran of The Good Ol’ Persons, the Tony Rice Unit, and many other seminal acts of his own generation and time, Reischman knows firsthand the value of cross-generational knowledge sharing and his new album, New Time & Old Acoustic demonstrates this ethos in both conscious and subliminal ways. “Salt Spring” is a perfect distillation of these values and it’s truly fitting, as the tune will forever be enshrined and ensconced in the indelible, if not somewhat squirrelly and subjective, bluegrass and old-time songbook and canon.
Artist: André Dal Hometown: Lisbon, Portugal Song: “Dal’s Breakdown” Album:Beyond the Tagus River Release Date: June 2021
In Their Words: “‘Dal’s Breakdown’ is an uptempo banjo tune that includes myself on banjo, Gil Pereira (PT) on upright bass, Bob Hamilton (USA) on guitar, Dave Bagdade (USA) on mandolin, Jeroen Schmohl (NL) on dobro and Meade Richter (USA) on fiddle. I first came up with the melody while looking for a breakdown style of tune. My good friend, Hildebrando Soares, came up with the idea for a homemade video inspired by what all bluegrass musicians want, which is to play all day, and on what all bluegrass musicians’ wives want, which is for their husbands to stop playing and do their household tasks.” — André Dal
For a musician who has seemingly done it all and has the awards to prove it, Chris Thile found an excellent opportunity to create a solo record in the throes of the early pandemic. The project of that period of introspection and seclusion is one that has been, in some ways, a long time in the making, as his label Nonesuch had been hinting for some time to make an album centered around faith and spirituality. When the circumstance arose, Thile decided it should be done in as honest and straightforward a manner as possible: performed entirely by himself and recorded within the walls of a beautiful old church in upstate New York.
Titled Laysongs, the album offers a host of incredible performances, including compelling arrangements of Bartok and Bach, re-imaginings of traditional folk tunes, and original pieces inspired by literature. Enjoy this video of Chris Thile, our BGS Artist of the Month for June, performing the album’s title track in the church where it was recorded. And, check out Part 1 and Part 2 of our exclusive, AOTM interview.
Photo credit: Josh Goleman
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