We have just learned of this morning’s passing of Monroe Fields, who played bass with both Bill Monroe and Jim & Jesse, and mandolin with Carl Sauceman and Flatt & Scruggs. He was 86 years old and had been battling lung cancer this past few months.
Fields was a successful song writer as well, having written classics like Please Be My Love, a big number for Jim & Jesse, which he wrote with Sauceman.
He also performed on a bevy of Nashville sessions, playing guitar, bass and mandolin, and adding high tenor vocals for Lester Flatt, Jimmy Martin, Kenny Baker, Bill Monroe and more. Fields had songs recorded by George Jones, Tammy Wynette, Aaron Tippin and Lacy J. Dalton in country, and by Karl Shifflet and others in bluegrass.
He had continued performing in late years, often with C F Bailey and Shadow Ridge. A pair of solo albums appear under his name, and another with Bailey.
Here he is performing a novelty song in 2009.
Just recently, Patuxent Music had released an album of live radio programs featuring Fields entitled 1950s – 60s Broadcasts from Monroe Fields with Carl Sauceman and the Green Valley Boys. Though he performed with a number of bluegrass acts, it was with Sauceman that Monroe is most closely associated.
R.I. P., Monroe Fields.
