IB: International Bluegrass January 2017

IB bluegrass INTERNATIONAL

Vol. 32 No. 1 January 2017

I SANG THE SONG

Mac Wiseman’s new project with Thomm Jutz and Peter Cooper 2017 Best Bluegrass Album GRAMMY NOMINATIONS

EARL SCRUGGS CENTER: Remembering Earl

International Bluegrass Editor: Kelly Kessler kelly@ibma.org

Vol. 32 | No. 1 | January 2017

Designer: Erin Faith Erdos erinfaitherdos@gmail.com

STAFF

Paul Schiminger Executive Director

Kelly Kessler Director of Communications and Professional Development

Amy Beth Hale Director of Member Services

Eddie Huffman Director of Convention Services

BOARD EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE

MEMBERS OF THE BOARD

Joe Mullins, Chair Ben Surratt, Vice Chair Denise Jarvinen, Treasurer Regina Derzon, Secretary Alan Tompkins, Executive Committee member

Becky Buller-Artist/Composer/Publisher Jeremy Darrow-Artist/Composer/Publisher Jamie Deering-Merchandisers/Luthiers Mike Drudge-Agents/Managers/Publicists Silvio Ferretti- International John Goad-Print Media/Education Marian Leighton Levy-Recording/ Distribution/Marketing

William Lewis-At Large Steve Martin-At Large Stephen Mougin-At Large Mike Simpson-At Large Wayne Taylor-Artists/Composers/Publishers Bree Tucker-Myers- Event Production Bob Webster-Broadcast Media

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Statement of fact and opinion are made on the responsibility of the writers alone and do not imply an opinion on the part of the officers, directors, staff or members of IBMA. Portions of International Bluegrass may be reprinted provided that explicit citation of the source is made: “Reprinted with permission from International Bluegrass, the publication of the International Bluegrass Music Association, www.ibma.org.�

TA B LE O F C ON T E N T S INTERNATIONAL BLUEGRASS

JANUARY 2016

Cover photo: John Partipilo , TOC Photos: Todd Gunsher

Features 4 Bluegrass (and beyond) 2017 Grammy nominees 6 I sang the song 10 Scruggs Center Center is Remembering Earl 12 WOB 2017 Showcase News 13 Remembering Bob Redford of Walnut Valley Festival 13 Remembering Ken Davidson

Plus 11 New releases 14 Industry news 14 Square Code 14 DCBU’s Hazel Dickens Song Contest 15 Bluegrass Jamboree 16 UNC - Russell Johnson

We value our members. This newsletter is our primary conduit for sharing news across our trade organization. Our goal is to carry news each month from all constituencies of IBMA’s membership. Deadline info: news items and press releases are due at the IBMA office via snail mail or email by the 12th of the month. Submitting before the deadline is encouraged. Email all materials to Kelly here, or mail to 4206 Gallatin Pike, Nashville, TN 37216.

MEDIA GUIDELINES: • Word .doc or .docx files preferred.

• Images welcome. Please send images saved as jpegs at 72 dpi, and not larger than 5 Mb. • Links to video, audio and downloads are all welcome.

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BLUEGRASS (and Beyond) 2017 GRAMMY nominees from the Bluegrass Perspective

IBMA congratulates the following nominees for the 2017 Bluegrass Album GRAMMY: Original Traditional, Blue Highway [Rounder Records] Burden Bearer, Doyle Lawson & Quicksilver [Mountain Home] The Hazel and Alice Sessions, Laurie Lewis & The Right Hands [Spruce and Maple] North by South, Claire Lynch [Compass Records] Coming Home, O’Connor Band with Mark O’Connor [Rounder Records]

IBMA congratulates these bluegrass artists nominated in other categories: Nature’s Symphony in 432, The Isaacs, for Roots Gospel Album [House of Isaacs] Weighted Mind, Sierra Hull, for Folk Album [Rounder Records]

In addition, IBMA congratulates these artists who are friends of bluegrass. This list includes musicians who have played bluegrass, who draw on bluegrass as a source, who have worked with bluegrass players, or written songs in the bluegrass canon, etc.

The Avett Brothers, Americana Album and American Roots Performance Time Jumpers, Americana Album and American Roots Song Rhiannon Giddens, American Roots Performance and Best Folk Album Robbie Fulks, American Roots Song and Best Folk Album Sarah Jarosz, American Roots Performance and Best Folk Album

Find all 2017 nominees at the official GRAMMY AWARDS site.

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we wish you a prosperous new year!

thank you for supporting BLUEGRASS

in 2016

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I SANG THE SONG

Mac Wiseman’s singular life captured in song cycle

by Timothy Ghianni / Photos by John Partipilo The three men, who concocted an 11-song CD detailing the life story of Mac Wiseman, form a tight cluster in the living room of the bluegrass legend’s house on Nashville’s fringes.

IBMA co-founder, only living member of the original Country Music Association board, and Country Music Hall of Famer Wiseman sits in the recliner where he spends most of his days, his phone always within easy grasp.

“I get more business done here than anyone would get done in an office,” says the 91-year-old, whose career as a solo artist and as a guitarist in such genre-defining outfits as Bill Monroe and the Blue Grass Boys and Flatt & Scruggs’ original Foggy Mountain Boys, helped create the “language” of bluegrass music. Prior to Lester and Earl, Wiseman played bass for Molly O’Day in recording sessions in Chicago. “We recorded 16 sides for Columbia.’’

The other two men who share co-writing credits on Wiseman’s new “I Sang the Song” – a collection of tales from the early days of his life and his recording career – are unabashed Mac worshipers Peter Cooper and Thomm Jutz. The musical duo previously masterminded and produced Wiseman’s 2014 project “Songs from My Mother’s Hand.”

“I Sang the Song” by Mac Wiseman, Peter Cooper & Thomm Jutz

That earlier album is a collection of Depression-era love, really. Wiseman’s mom would sit by the radio and write down the lyrics of songs she heard and the family would sing them together It was entertainment for the Wiseman family on their 60-something acre farm. A few years ago, Wiseman came upon his mom’s painstakingly precise transcriptions of the songs and wondered what to do with them.

Cooper and Jutz knew right away: They’d record a whole album of Wiseman singing the best of those songs and put it out there if for no other reason than to tell the world that the old musician not only has outlived contemporaries like Flatt, Scruggs, Monroe, Martin and Grandpa, he’s still making music.

“I’m one of the few left of the ones who created this music,” says Wiseman.

Mac Wiseman at home

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Alison Krauss, part of the “I Sang the Song” project, visits Wiseman

Wiseman – who was among the best of bluegrass guitarists – no longer plays an instrument, thanks to the arthritis in his hands. And the genial old fellow is hobbled by remnants of his childhood bout with infantile paralysis; his right leg is 1½ inches shorter than his left. He wears customized Florsheims to make up for that difference. But his voice remains a powerful instrument.

Even as “Mother’s Hand” was still warm, Jutz and Cooper brought another idea to Wiseman, an idea that was actually birthed when they made that first record, when the natural-born storyteller recalled chapters of his life in casual conversation with the two men.

“He would tell us these stories of the world he grew up in that no longer exists,” says Cooper, who in addition to being an executive with the Country Music Hall of Fame and

Museum, hits the road weekends to sing his songs and those of his duet partner Eric Brace. And, if the timing is right and Jutz isn’t busy producing one of his countless projects out at his Mt. Juliet studio, he goes along.

everyone from A.P. Carter to Gordon Lightfoot and who went to Dallas to cut 24 sides with the original Bob Wills band -- enjoys talking about music and musical friends to anyone who scoots up a chair next to the brown recliner.

Cooper says the new album, on Mountain Fever Records, was created in classic American folk song tradition. “We’d write it all here. Work it out as we sit here. Read a line.

No distractions. Mac telling stories, painting word pictures in these songs.

But Cooper and Jutz, sucked in by the soft voice of the great man’s generous spirit, were mesmerized.

And they began to formulate a plan, which they offered up to Wiseman.

“Nobody has ever lived a life like Mac Wiseman,” says Cooper, recounting how he and Jutz would both nourish and nurture their musical souls by sitting in the living room that’s decorated with photographs and memorabilia of that life.

Of course these were not new stories. The old man -- whose musical career has made him a colleague of

They wanted to work with him to compose an album that is actually his autobiography.

Jutz and Cooper would sit in chairs – much as they are on this cold, gray Nashville afternoon. The main difference was that they always came equipped with their laptop computers and guitars. “The process of doing this is Mac would sit there in that chair,” says Cooper, nodding toward the singer.

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I SANG THE SONG

Shawn Camp sings the album’s first single, “Going Back to Bristol”.

“Thomm and I would ask questions [about Wiseman’s life],” added Cooper. Wiseman would regale them with barefoot-in-the-snow Depression tales or perhaps describe how his imagination was fired when, as a youngster, he watched passenger trains go through his hometown of Crimora, Va. at night, the passengers just dark silhouettes bound for distant horizons he could only imagine.

“And when he [answered those questions with stories], it opened up a whole new world of rhymes,” says Jutz, who long ago left his native Germany to become an American and to tell American tales. (In one of his earlier projects, he fashioned songs about the Civil War.)

“It took nine Sundays,” says Jutz, adding that even as the men worked out one song, he and Cooper were “Wanderlust,” says Wiseman, punctuat- latching onto details from Wiseman’s ing Cooper’s retelling of the train story. stories for future songs. “By the time we were done, we had a good idea of what we wanted to do the next “We had notes of stories Wiseman Sunday,” Cooper adds. had told,” says Jutz. “So once we had the idea to do this, all we had to do is And this could be just the beginning, come here on Sunday afternoons and according to Jutz. “Peter and I have say things like ‘Mac, tell me a little bit several ideas. We talk about stuff and about the manganese mine.’” That ideas will begin to form. “Hell, who led to a new but somehow classic knows, we may make another album bluegrass tale called “Manganese with Mac or record more of the songs Mine.” (Manganese is a chemical his mother wrote down.” mined in the Shenandoah Valley.)

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Wiseman says he is pleased with the “I Sang the Song” album that comes in the middle of a busy 10th decade in which his life story has been detailed in a book and “they’re going to make a movie of it,” he says, buoyantly.

Wiseman -- whose regard for the two younger men is apparent by the almost life-sized photo of them that soon will hang on his walls decorated with horses, dogs and mementoes of life as a musician -- was enthusiastic to work with Cooper and Jutz.

“I thought it was a fabulous idea, with their input. They had notes everywhere,” Wiseman says.

He pauses because of the loud hammers at work replacing his roof.

“Damn woodpeckers,” he says. No one in the room laughs harder than Wiseman.

I SANG THE SONG

Peter Cooper, Mark Fain, Sierra Hull, Thomm Jutz, Justin Moses

“Storytelling is part of the human experience,” Jutz says. “I think these stories… well, there’s nobody around in bluegrass music who has done remarkable things as well as Mac.”

In fact, one of the biggest stars made sure she could add her signature vocals to the project.

“Alison (Krauss) heard about this and said she wanted to be part of it,” says Cooper.

“Tom T. Hall always says words dictate the melody,” adds Cooper.

“And if Thomm Jutz has a guitar in hand and Mac is telling stories, songs come out.

Most of the recording – other than the few times Wiseman’s voice appears mainly in an “intro” or “outro” singing “Bringing in the Sheaves” and other warm additions -- was done elsewhere in Music City.

“Mac has such a knowledge of roots music,” says Cooper.

“John Prine says ‘when you say something that is true, it comes out with rhymes,’” says Jutz.

Prine – who sings the title song, with Cooper dabbling in harmony --is just one of Wiseman’s many admirers who participate in this project. Others include the likes of Jim Lauderdale, Shawn Camp, Sierra Hull, Andrea Zonn ….

“It was easy to get all the artists, because they all love Mac,” says Cooper.

But Krauss came out to this house in almost-rural Nashville and sang a duet, an old Wiseman show-stopper and radio theme song called “’Tis Sweet to be Remembered.” That song comes at the tail end… or tale end? … of the CD. “Cool, unexpected things happen for this record,” Jutz says.

“There’s nobody like Mac,” says Cooper. “He’s been recording since 1946. He’s a hero of American music. Most of this album is about a life well lived.”

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HEADLINE HERE

THE EARL SCRUGGS CENTER IS REMEMBERING EARL The Earl Scruggs Center hosts the January 14, 2017 benefit event Remembering Earl: Music & Stories. Emmylou Harris, Rodney Crowell, Sam Bush, Jon Randall, Jessi Alexander and emcee Eddie Stubbs will all share music and stories about the Center’s namesake, legendary banjo master, Earl Scruggs.

Notes Earl’s son, Gary Scruggs, “All the artists taking part in the Earl Scruggs Center’s upcoming Remembering Earl: Music & Stories are Scruggs family friends and all of them sat in with the Earl Scruggs with Family & Friends band at one time or another…Jon Randall was a member in the Family & Friends band… Eddie officiated Dad’s funeral service and delivered the eulogy in 2012. Like Dad, Emmylou Harris is a member of the Country Music Hall of Fame and both Emmylou and Dad received an Honorary Doctorate of Music from the Berklee College of Music. In the 1970s, the Earl Scruggs Revue shared the stage with Emmylou and her Hot Band on numerous occasions as we did with Sam Bush’s Newgrass Revival.

“I’m sure the Remembering Earl: Music & Stories event will be an exciting and entertaining blend of country, bluegrass and Americana music along with personal stories told by the artists that will be reminiscent of the wonderful picking parties that went on at Mom and Dad’s home in Nashville.”

The event will be in Shelby High School’s Malcolm Brown Auditorium at 7:30 pm. Tickets are $55, $45 and $30. Limited number of VIP packages available.

Just announced is a raffle for a Les Paul donated

by Gibson. For event and ticket details, visit www.

EarlScruggsCenter.org. Special thanks to the City of Shelby and to Cleveland County, presenting sponsors for the Remembering Earl: Music & Stories event.

The Earl Scruggs Center opened January 2014 and has welcomed visitors from 49 states and 13 countries. The Center engages with and serves guests from the community and world as a cultural destination, community gathering place and educational resource. The Center provides opportunities for all to engage with and learn about the life and legacy

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of legendary five-string banjo master Earl Scruggs and the unique and engaging music, history and cultural traditions of the community and region where he was born and raised. The Earl Scruggs Center and the Don Gibson Theatre are projects of Destination Cleveland County, Inc., a citizen-driven award winning unique public/private partnership, a non-profit 501©3.

NEW RELEASES CD Reviews by Kelly Kessler

Ray Cardwell

Darin and Brooke Aldridge

“Tennessee Moon” [Pinecastle Records]

“Faster and Farther” [Mountain Home Music]

If you’re new to Ray Cardwell, and you pop his CD “Tennessee Moon” in your player and find New Grass Revival keeps coming to mind, there’s a good reason for that. It’s not just his soaring, rock-inflected lead vocals that take you there.

Turns out that IS John Cowan and Pat Flynn you hear singing alongside him.

Darin and Brooke Aldridge tap well-known talents on their 8th outing to create “Farther and Faster” – John Cowan, Pat Flynn, Barry Bales, Shad Cobb, Jerry Salley, Vince Gill, Carl Jackson, Tim Surrett and Charli Robinson, all add their parts here. What’s rare is how seamless the results are. You hear the Aldridge sound throughout, with the guest players leaning in to articulate it more clearly.

The infallible groove throughout is powered by Cardwell’s bass. It’s a pleasure to hear Scott Vestal, Andy Leftwich, Rob Ickes, Danny Roberts and producer Pat Flynn pick up that groove and nail it to the wall. The same stew of ‘60s and ‘70s music that shaped NGR – Beatles, Motown, bluegrass, blues, swamp and more – is evident here. In that spirit, Ray swings just as easily through a reggae number, “Sing It to the World” – part Marley, part Police – and a straight-up a cappella gospel quartet (“New Jerusalem”) with lived-in conviction.

Cardwell is represented by Melanie Wilson at Wilson Pickins Promotions.

The crisp ensemble work and crafted harmonies deliver on what can best be described as a set of wide-ranging heart songs. Of course you’ll find here the well-paired vocals you’ve come to expect from these two. And if Brooke Aldridge’s on-fire singing doesn’t move you on this album, you might want to check in with your doc to make sure your heart is still ticking.

Darin and Brooke Aldridge are represented by Brian Smith at Leadership Artists. website video

website video

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WOB 2017 Showcase News

Opening January 16: Apply to showcase at the IBMA’s Bluegrass Ramble

Official showcase performances at the IBMA’s annual Bluegrass Ramble during World of Bluegrass week offer the premier platform for introducing new talent to the bluegrass community. The 2017 Bluegrass Ramble will take place September 2628, once again in beautiful downtown Raleigh, NC, and all emerging bluegrass bands, as well as established bands with new music or new personnel, are encouraged to apply. Each showcase band will perform at least twice during World of Bluegrass Week—once on a convention center stage and once in a local Bluegrass Ramble venue.

In addition to the two showcase opportunities, the IBMA showcase package includes these valuable incentives: • Full conference registration package for performing members of group (value $1000+) • Complimentary booth space during business conference (value $600+) • One organizational membership for group (value $205) • Featured profile in conference program and on the WOB smart phone app • Inclusion of one mp3 on the 2017 IBMA Bluegrass Ramble Mixtape via Noisetrade. (Download mixtapes from prior years for free.)

• Featured promotion on social media by IBMA • Priority access to Gig Fair appointments • Scheduled consultation in advance of events on maximizing showcase opportunities

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APPLICATION PROCESS Showcase applications can be made online once the application process opens on January 16, 2017. Applicant need not be an IBMA member. In addition to general application information, the following materials will be needed to complete the application: • Name, email, and role (i.e. banjo, fiddle) of each member of the applying act • One studio recording (mp3 format only) • One Hi-Res artist photo • An artist bio with artist location, names/roles of band members (if known at time of application), description of the artist’s sound, and note of any recently released recordings • A stage plot (PDF or JPEG) indicating locations of instruments, instrument mics, vocal mics, and any other equipment (i.e. amp, pre-amp) Up to 30 showcase artists will be invited in 2017. IBMA showcase artists are chosen in a juried selection process that takes into consideration every applicant’s entertainment value, level of professionalism, potential appeal and quality of work. There are generally more than 150 acts that apply every year.

Official IBMA showcase acts from the 2016 Bluegrass Ramble are NOT eligible for 2017. Official acts from 2015 are eligible. HOWEVER, preference is typically given to acts who have not been selected as an Official IBMA Showcase Act within the past two years.

APPLICATION DEADLINES & FEES Online application for IBMA showcases must be submitted by

February 28, 2017. All applicants are required to submit a $25 fee to help defray selection process costs. If invited to participate as an official showcase artist, there is an additional fee of $500 to offset costs of services and showcase production.

Remembering: Bob Redford Bob Redford, whose 44-year leadership grew a small local music festival in Kansas into the acoustic music mecca now known as Walnut Valley Festival, passed away December 19, 2016. When IBMA launched its “Bluegrass Event of the Year Award” in 1999, the first recipient was the Walnut Valley Festival.

Known to pickers as “Winfield”, the Walnut Valley Festival is renowned for its contests, its marathon jamming, and for the “Land Grab”, attracting campers as much as a month before the official start of the festival in hopes of staking out the best campsites.

From Walnut Valley’s website: “Along with the National Flat Pick Championships and the International Finger Style Championships, the Walnut Valley Festival hosts the International Autoharp, National Mandolin, National Mountain Dulcimer, National Hammered Dulcimer, National Bluegrass Banjo, and Walnut Valley Old Time Fiddle Championships. Over the course of years, the contests at Winfield have attracted more than 3,000 contestants from all 50 states as well as many foreign countries including Australia, Canada, Denmark, Sweden, England, Germany, Italy, Japan, New Caledonia, Switzerland, and Wales.”

Winfield multiple winners include Mark O’Connor, Alison Krauss, Gary “Biscuit” Davis and Steve Kaufman.

coming to town for the festival.’ To Redford, Flottman said, the festival was like a ‘giant neighborhood cookout. We would always have a big rush of people come in when the campground opened, and he just had a ball standing out there where the cars were coming in and waving,’ Flottman said.’

According to the Wichita Eagle “Those who knew Bob Redford will remember him for his loyalty, enthusiasm and generosity…’He was very much a people person,’ [festival coordinator Rex] Flottman said. ‘He just enjoyed everybody

We at IBMA join music lovers in sending our condolences to Bob Redford’s family and friends. We celebrate the life of this generous soul who has done so much for our music and our people.

Memorials have been established in Bob’s name for Tisdale United Methodist Church and the Alzheimer’s Association.

Contributions may be made through the funeral home.

Remembering: Ken Davidson Fred Bartenstein shares this news: Ken Davidson, founder of Kanawha, Poca River, and Tri-Agle-Far Records, died on December 20, 2016 in Dayton, Ohio, at the age of 75. A native of West Virginia, Davidson is known for a series of old time and bluegrass LPs issued in the 1960s and 1970s.

Prominent among them are a series by fiddle pioneer Clark Kessinger. Some of Davidson’s recordings have been reissued in CD format on the County and Bee Balm labels.

You’ll find the Kanawha roster of albums here, and the Poca River roster here.

Contributions in Ken Davidson’s memory may be made to the Brain and Behavior Research Foundation (here). We at IBMA are grateful for Davidson’s efforts to preserve the roots of bluegrass, to honor the musicians, and to help this music find a broader audience.

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INDUSTRY NEWS ALL CONSTITUENTS

Are you considering opening a Square account for your merch point-ofpurchase sales or online sales? Use this code when you sign up and pay no processing fees on the first $1000 over your first 180 days. You’ll be helping the Bluegrass Trust Fund.

Every new signup using our code helps the Trust Fund save on processing fees, too, leaving more money to go directly to help bluegrass people in times of emergency need. Bluegrass Trust Fund Square sign-up code: https://squareup.com/i/22679E7B

January 2017

ASSOCIATIONS

January 5th Deadline: Hazel Dickens Song Contest The third annual Hazel Dickens Song Contest deadline is January 5, 2017.

The contest, a fundraiser for DCBU, pays tribute to one of bluegrass music’s most beloved songwriters.

From hardscrabble beginnings in West Virginia coal country in 1935, Dickens moved to Baltimore, MD, as a young woman to find factory work and quickly connected with local musicians.

She started performing throughout the Baltimore/Washington region and was soon recognized for her singular mountain singing style and her gift with a lyric. Hazel wrote of coal miners, unionization, hard times, feminism and much more. She died in 2011.

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The contest category is bluegrass, including gospel. Entry fee is $30 per song and all entries must be received by January 5, 2017. First, second and third place winners receive cash prizes and will be announced on February 15, 2017. Entry rules, judging and prize information can be found All proceeds from the Hazel Dickens Song Contest help fund the DC Bluegrass Union. DCBU is a 501(c)3 nonprofit membership organization with a mission to promote bluegrass music in the greater Washington region through education and performance. For more information go to the Hazel Dickens Song Contest page at dcbu.org.

INTERNATIONAL Bluegrass Jamboree: A Tour Report

The Bluegrass Jamboree – Festival of Bluegrass and Americana Music is Europe’s unique annual traveling Bluegrass/Americana package tour. Founded in 2009 (featuring the Steep Canyon Rangers among others), the number of shows have gone up from 16 to 24 in 2016 and the countries included are Germany, Netherlands, Switzerland and Austria. Acts in earlier years were Mike Cleveland, Audie Blaylock, Jesse Brock, Della Mae, Cahelan Morrison & Eli West, Town Mountain, Brennen Leigh & Noe McKay, The Railsplitters, Lindsay Lou & the Flatbellys, Red Tail Ring, Caleb Lauder, Barefoot, Richie Stearns and a few more.

The number of people that have attended the tour grew to over 6500 in 2016. The venues played were high profile theaters, art centers and music halls that present Bluegrass and its roots in mixed programs of Classical Music, World Music, USA Roots, Folk and Pop. We reach out to audiences that are new to the genre and introduce them to Bluegrass as well as the related acoustic music formats. Over the years we have created a strong fan base for the event

and we are steadily growing appreciation for this American music style that is not that well-known over here.

We get very strong support from all kind of media, it definitely helps to only present top performers in a carefully designed line up, so that we are covered in good art magazines and feuilletons* of national and regional media. A large part of the show will be broadcast on Radio WDR3 February 7 at 20:00 CET. It will feature The Honey Dewdrops (Laura Wortman & Kagey Parrish) from Baltimore, The Goodbye Girls (feat.

Molly Tuttle and Alison de Groot) and the most trad act we had on the tour ever: The Truffle Valley Boys! Yes. They are from Italy, where the Truffle grows, but they have that pre mid 50s sound and show style down to perfect. Crowds went totally wild when they entered the stage and worked with that one mic set up. I am sure they would be a sensation in the US as well. [*Editor’s note: I had to look up “feuilletons”. I believe it translates, for North Americans and perhaps other regions, to the Arts section of the newspaper.]

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INDUSTRY NEWS

EDUCATION Breaking Down Bluegrass Russell Johnson and the Steeps help classical musicians discover bluegrass at University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill

By Scott Jared Photo by York Wilson Playing in a new class called the Carolina Bluegrass Band, Liz Short experienced a surreal moment when the band shared a stage with the Grammy Award-winning Steep Canyon Rangers. “We had not even played in front of people, and we’re in Memorial Hall with an audience three times bigger than any I’ve performed for,” said Short, a first-year student at UNCChapel Hill. When she began to play her fiddle and sing “Little Cabin Home on the Hill,” she wondered if she was singing the correct lyrics. “Then I relaxed and thought this is way too great an experience to not enjoy.”

Short and 15 classmates, many of whom are classically trained musicians, spent the past semester in a new Music Department ensemble called the Carolina Bluegrass Band. The band consists of violinists, guitarists, a jazz bass player, a classical voice major and two banjo players. Only two had ever played or sung Bluegrass.

Bluegrass giant Russell Johnson, a 1985 Carolina graduate and one of the genre’s purest tenors, was chosen as the course’s instructor. He is also an award-winning songwriter, mandolinist and front man for the Grass Cats with 28 years of music business experience that includes running his own record label.

Find of the Century “Russell is the find of the century,” said Jocelyn Neal the music professor in the College of Arts and Sciences who created the band. “He has the complete skillset and an unbelievable resume. He’s taking people who don’t know Bluegrass and teaching them an entire musical art form.”

Neal teaches a History of Bluegrass course, and organized the first Carolina Bluegrass Summit in November to showcase scholarship by Carolina’s faculty and world-class research resources. The resources include the Southern Folklife Collection’s books and commercial sound recordings, along with unpublished personal papers, photos, audio and video recordings.

The band, course and summit form an initiative started by Neal and Mark Katz, the Ruel W. Tyson Jr. Distinguished Professor of Humanities, and funded with a gift from alumnus John A. Powell. The foundation is the Bluegrass history course, which teaches transferable skills in understanding the world through art, music and culture. The initiative also includes the ensemble and summit.

The band’s head-spinning semester of learning new techniques and song culminated in a performance with the

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Steep Canyon Rangers on November 11 and a public concert on December 1.

Johnson says that with the violinists’ classical technique, tone and posture, “one of the coolest things is when they pick up a riff, a kick off or phrase that’s full-blown Bluegrass fiddling and perform it. They are used to reading music and here they’re doing a fiddle kick that would have come straight off the stage of a Flatt and Scruggs show in 1957.”

Fiddling has a different mindset For Short, a Wilson, N.C., native who began violin lessons at age six, the most challenging part of the class has been learning to improvise. “Improv is a big part of fiddling,” she said.

“Fiddling has a different mindset than classical. You have more freedom in it. There’s no right or wrong, although having a classical background can make your fiddling a lot better. It brings a specific tone and a preciseness that I really like.”

William Hall, a first-year student from Nashville, Tenn., saw a poster about the band and auditioned. The classical voice major who Johnson says has a “gigantic voice” knew little about Bluegrass, and was looking for an outlet for his guitar playing. Hall sang and played at an audition, then he and

Johnson talked about playing, singing and music theory.

“I had never flat picked before, which is the guitar style in Bluegrass,” Hall said. “I was used to playing a lot of James Taylor-style stuff, so learning to play a super-specific role is what I’ve had to adjust to. The guitar is always hammering out a particular rhythm. I was used to guitar as accompaniment or as the only instrument.”

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Short and Hall said their bandmates are fast leaners. “Now we have some freedom, where before it was an exact, clean classical sound. We’re learning breaks, solos and kickoffs and some of that involves techniques that are not as precise as classical,” Hall said.

In addition to the academic and performance parts, Neal said the course is one way that Carolina allows students to bring their whole selves to campus: “For students who are interested in Bluegrass, we want them to learn from our faculty, who have expertise and can help students with additional coaching that will enable them to contribute to the richness of campus.”

Johnson said the class made great strides from its first rehearsal: “For many it was their first exposure to Bluegrass and, for most, the first time they had played it with other people.

We’ve gone from individual members knowing one or two fringe/folk songs to being able to perform an hour’s worth of music in a full Bluegrass setting with arranged songs featuring duets, trios, quartet harmonies, twin -and triple-fiddle harmonies, banjo, mandolin, guitar solos.”

Note: Band members include “Charlie” Fischer Brown, Spencer Davidson, Henry “Knox” Engler, Madelin Fisher, William Hall, Emily Harrison, Tanner Henson, Reece Krome, Suzanne Long, Matt Samuel Lopez, Andrew McClenny, Sarah Michalak, Brent Matthew Pontillo, Liz Short, Willem Tax, Abbey Vinson, and community musician Parker Moore.

This article is reprinted by permission from UNC’s website. Thanks to Scott Jared.

International Bluegrass

| January 2017

17

2017

IB

International Bluegrass Music Association empowering the global bluegrass community