David Morris, Author at Bluegrass Today

Random thoughts on a new bluegrass season

Our roving correspondent David Morris shares a few loosely-related thoughts as we move forward into the 2011 festival season.

THE GIBSONS SOAR. Could this be the year of the Gibson Brothers? A year after Ring the Bell won song of the year and gospel recording of the year from IBMA, the Gibsons are climbing the charts with their latest release, Help My Brother.

If Saturday’s closing set at the D.C. Bluegrass Union Festival in northern Virginia is any indication, folks who catch the act at festivals this year are in for a treat. The harmonies from Eric and Leigh Gibson, always strong, are sublime on the recording and were just as sweet in their live performance. Add the fine fiddling of Clayton Campbell and the exquisite rhythm section of Joe Walsh on mandolin and Mike Barber on bass, and the Gibsons are clearly ready for a strong run toward the stage at this year’s IBMA awards.

Help My Brother will get plenty of support for album of the year – yes, it’s that good – even though the field will be crowded and will, for the first time in several years, include a bluegrass project from Alison Krauss, Paper Airplane.

And Talk to Me, written by Leigh Gibson, is my early favorite for recorded project of the year. It’s a stirring call and response, with the younger Gibson brother and Claire Lynch trading plaintive verses. Those who attended Saturday’s festival got a rare chance to hear a live version by the original lineup, since Claire was backstage after finishing a strong set with her band.

The pickers may be boxed out of individual awards, but not for lack of talent. Adam Steffey practically owns the mandolin trophy and the Boxcars are making a lot of noise with their debut disk, and perennial fiddle winner Michael Cleveland is in top form touring in support of Flamekeeper’s latest, Fired Up. Still, don’t be surprised if at least one of them makes the final ballot as more people hear their work on Help My Brother.

MONROE MOVIE. Ironically, the Gibson Brothers best recorded performance of the year might not be on their CD. As part of the soundtrack for Blue Moon of Kentucky, the much-delayed movie about Bill Monroe, Leigh and Eric recorded the Blue Sky Boys’ Happy Sunny Side of Life. The luckiest fans at Saturday’s DCBU festival got to hear it twice – once in a singing workshop and again on stage. The arrangement is stellar.

The soundtrack, co-produced by T-Bone Burnett and Ronnie McCoury, is in the can, with Del McCoury singing the Bill Monroe parts. Other participants include Earl Scruggs, Ricky Skaggs and Patty Loveless.

The movie itself is coming along more slowly. Filming has been delayed a couple of times, forcing Peter Sarsgaard to back out of playing Monroe because of scheduling conflicts. Sarsgaard’s wife, Maggie Gyllenhaal, is still on tap to play Bessie Lee Mauldin, Monroe’s lover and sometimes bass player. No word yet on the new Bill.

CROWDED FIELD. The voters for bass player of the year will have a tough time picking a winner in 2011. The new Alison Krauss project puts Barry Bales back on stage, and in people’s minds this year, automatically making him a contender. But last year’s winner, Marshall Wilborn, is touring heavily, too, as Flamekeeper pushes Fired Up, and the underappreciated Harold Nixon should receive some attention because the Boxcars are winning so many fans. Add Mike Bubb, seven-time winner Missy Raines and Darren Vincent and the ballot is past capacity.

In fact, the field is so crowded that one of the best bassists in any genre, Mark Schatz of the Claire Lynch Band, may not even make the final ballot. As a technician, Schatz is one of the very best. As an entertainer, he is without peer. But when it comes to IBMA voters, Schatz gets little respect. He deserves a second listen.

Hazel Dickens Tribute

More than a decade ago, bassist Todd Phillips walked into his first rehearsal for a reunion tour by Hazel Dickens and Alice Gerrard, and was caught by surprise.

“I realized things I thought of as traditional or Carter Family were actually her songs,” Phillips recalled in a weekend telephone chat. He had recently won a Grammy for producing a tribute album, True Life Blues – The Songs of Bill Monroe, and hatched the idea of a similar tribute to Hazel.

He signed the contract in 2001, and recorded the first tracks in 2005. But the project still hasn’t been released by Rounder Records.

Phillips is too much the gentleman to talk about reasons for the delays, but he is hopeful the project will come out this year, while Hazel, who is 75, can enjoy it. Friends say she has had a difficult winter, and she wasn’t well enough to accept the Washington Monument award from the D.C. Bluegrass Union at its weekend festival in northern Virginia.

“This is really a gift for Hazel,” Phillips said of the compilation, which includes an all-star lineup of musicians – Linda Ronstadt, Elvis Costello, Emmylou Harris, Mary Chapin Carpenter, Claire Lynch, Roseanne Cash and others.

Phillips joked about “stalking” some artists, and having to tell them about Hazel and her music before they would commit. But Costello was ready from the start, wanting to record Don’t Put Her Down. Harris offered to do A Few Old Memories, and Lynch added Beyond the River Bend.

At least two more tracks will be added, at the behest of Rounder boss Ken Irwin. Phillips said he couldn’t discuss those tracks, but he took the call from Irwin as a good sign. “It’s going to happen,” he said.

Hazel also recorded tracks for her first solo project in years, but that release, too, has been on hold since last fall. Irwin said at the time that discussion of either project was “premature,” an odd comment given that the tribute project has been in the works for so long. There is some speculation that the delays are related to Rounder’s purchase by the Concord Music Group, or because of licensing problems involving some of the performers.

“I’ve never worked on anything this time consuming,” Phillips said. Ever the diplomat, he left it at that.

Another Award For Hazel Dickens

Hazel Dickens, a pioneer who helped clear the bluegrass trail for Claire Lynch, Alison Krauss, Rhonda Vincent and others, will soon collect another award for her mantel.

Dickens, 75, is the second winner of the D.C. Bluegrass Union’s Washington Monument Award for outstanding contributions to bluegrass music. The award will be presented April 16, at DCBU’s second annual festival in McLean, Va. By coincidence, Claire Lynch, who embraces Dickens as a trailblazer, will be among the headliners at this year’s festival.

“Hazel is the real deal,” said Randy Barrett, president of DCBU. “Her songs have a unique universality that belies her humble beginnings.”

Dickens lives in Washington, DC, now, but grew up in a coal mining family in Mercer County, West Virginia, and had her first musical success in Baltimore in the 1950s. She had moved there to work and quickly became part of a thriving local music scene.

She rose to national prominence in the 1970s when she paired with singer Alice Gerrard, recording a handful of highly regarded albums.

Dickens continues to perform, but her most vital roles were showing the way for female-fronted bands, and as a songwriter. Her best songs are gritty blue-collar anthems or tales about women who couldn’t be kept down, such as Old Callused Hands and Working Girl Blues. The combination of those achievements makes her exclusion from IBMA’s hall of fame puzzling.

But she has collected plenty of other awards. Dickens was inducted into the West Virginia Music Hall of Fame and won a distinguished achievement award from IBMA in 1993. Her song, Mama’s Hands, was IBMA’s song of the year in 1996, after Lynn Morris recorded it.

Still no word from Rounder Records on the fate of a new album from Dickens or for a star-studded tribute album recognizing her music. Both projects were nearing completion when they were thrown off schedule by studio damage in last year’s floods in Nashville.

Last year, Bill Emerson was the inaugural winner of the Washington Monument Award.

Remembering a Songwriter’s Songwriter

You could stock a jukebox or your mp3 player with Harley Allen songs and never grow tired of listening.

Harley wrote songs about the common themes in all our lives – love, longing and desire – without sounding trite or tired. He wrote from the heart, and his lyrics went straight to the hearts of those who listened.

Today, many of those hearts are broken. Harley Allen is gone, far too young, at 55. He died of cancer Wednesday at his Nashville home.

Those unfortunate folks whose only exposure to Harley is his Wikipedia entry will come away cheated. They’ll know he was the son of a bluegrass star, Red Allen. And they’ll read that he was best known “for providing background vocals on the song, I Am a Man of Constant Sorrow” on the soundtrack of O Brother, Where Art Thou?

But to those in the business, and those who bother to read the fine print on CD jackets, Harley was much more than the son of someone famous and a background singer.

“His songs were always a perfect marriage between lyrics and melody,” Lou Reid told me. “Most, if not all of my albums include a Harley Allen song. He wrote from the heart, always. It was real. That was why it was good.”

Many other bluegrass and country artists joined Lou in recording Harley Allen songs, including Alison Krauss, Del McCoury, Rhonda Vincent, Ricky Skaggs, the Grascals, Alan Jackson, Garth Brooks and Kathy Mattea.

Harley sang the same way he wrote – straightforward, heartfelt and honest. In many ways, he was the Ronnie Bowman of the early 1980s – handsome, engaging on stage, and graced with a lovely singing voice. But his voice won’t be his legacy.

“While Harley was a fine musician and singer, he was always a songwriter first,” another first-rate writer, Brink Brinkman, recalled a few hours after Harley’s passing. “He was a master at his craft and his songs were crafted like fine furniture. Not a wasted word. He could relate to everyone, as the pictures in his songs hit universal emotions. He had a direct line to people’s hearts.”

He was, as Brink noted, “a songwriter’s songwriter.” Indeed, some of us write song after song, hoping for one memorable line that resonates. Some of Harley’s songs seem to have a memorable line in every verse.

Lou Reid and Brink Brinkman, talking separately, both wrapped up their comments the same way. “We lost one of the good ones today,” Lou said.
Brink put it this way: “We sure lost a good one.”

A look at Facebook entries shows many similar emotions, from well known bluegrassers like Tim Stafford and Don Rigsby to fans who knew him only from afar.

Carl Jackson, a celebrated writer himself, described for us the impact of Harley’s passing.

“Harley was one of the most talented songwriters this town has ever seen. He understood the the marriage of lyric and melody as well as any writer I’ve ever known or worked with. Far beyond that, he was a great friend who trusted me enough to share some of his innermost thoughts and feelings.

My heart broke this morning to hear the sad news.”

Many of the messages, like Harley’s songs, came from the heart. They represented, as Harley Allen wrote in High Sierra, one of his best known songs, “so much passion turned to pain.”

UPDATE 12:45 p.m. – We just received this comment from Tom T. and Dixie Hall…

“Harley was and always will be loved by fellow writers and music fans alike. He was, is, and will continue to be the stuff of legends, and history will make ‘note’ of it!”

Missy Raines – Ides of March

As a songwriter, I’ve been curious about the origins of a somber tune Missy Raines wrote called Ides of March since I first heard it in 2008. So with March 15 approaching, I decided to ask.

Missy was a few weeks shy of her 21st birthday when her dad, Bob, died unexpectedly on March 14, 1984. It took another 21 years before she reached the point where she could address the staggering loss in a song.

Over lunch in Charlottesville, Va. – coincidentally where she lived at the time of her father’s death, Missy recalled the day in 2005 when Ides of March came pouring out:

“I went into a room, turned on a tape recorder and I just played. Something happened and I actually started to cry. I just kept playing while I cried. The rest of the world went away. When I stopped and played it back, I had the song.”

Even before I heard the story, I was drawn by the song’s spare, haunting melody. The first time I heard it, at a concert in Westminster, Md., Missy was accompanied by Chris Sexton on cello and Mark Delaney, who had set aside his banjo for a piano. I can still hear that performance in my head three years later. Missy, too, remembers. “It was really special to me,” she said.

The song contains three distinct parts, the first representing “the anguish of the loss” and the second about “the beauty of what I missed.” The third part is notably brighter. “To me,” she said, “it resolves into that place of hope.”

So how does she perform a song written from such a raw, emotional event without becoming emotional herself? Most times, she gets by because the song takes her to a place she wants to be. But two years ago, by coincidence, her agent booked a March 14 show near where she grew up in West Virginia. With some of her father’s relatives in the audience, “I had to fight back the tears” while playing the song.

After another show, the full circle nature of the song that grew out of the pain of losing her father took on a new dimension. A husband and wife, hearing the same hope in the song that Missy did when she wrote it, told her they decided after the first time they heard it to play the song in the delivery room when their child was born.

Today, Missy not only uses the song to take her “to a place I like going.” She also uses it to audition potential musicians for her band, The New Hip. It’s a test to see how they handle space. Do they honor that space, or do they rush in with a flood of notes. “If they don’t get it, then I don’t want to play music with them. I don’t want someone playing all these hot licks.”

Twenty-seven years after Bob Raines died, Missy continues to honor him, and not just by playing the Ides of March. She still plays the same Kay bass he bought for himself but turned over to her as a young girl.

A Bluegrass Call To Action

Early in a blistering set at the Birchmere Music Hall Friday night in Alexandria, Va., Tony Rice made it clear that music wasn’t the only thing on his mind. Referring to the horrible news from Japan that was just starting to spread, Rice said, “If you so desire, ask your man upstairs to send them some help, because they’re sure going to need it.”

Call me naïve, but I think we in the bluegrass community can – and should – do more than that, though prayers are essential. Japan has a thriving bluegrass culture, with clubs and festivals, and the musicians and fans there play a big role in spreading our music and preserving its roots and traditions.
And now they need our help.

I’ll be the first to acknowledge that many musicians and fans aren’t walking around with money falling out of our pockets – there’s a reason my bumper sticker says, “Bluegrass Musician, Driver Has No Cash.” But many of those without a lot of money do have a lot of talent and celebrity cache that can be put to good use.

So here’s my pitch. Let’s start the Bluegrass Musicians and Fans For Japan fund, set a goal and a date for reaching that goal – and then let’s get started. I’m thinking $100,000 is a reachable target, but maybe I’m shooting too low! And I’m thinking the start of the IBMA conference and festival in late September is a good date to shoot for, although funds would be distributed as they come in.

Here’s what we need to get started:

A bank to set up an account to hold and distribute the money. If you or someone you know is a banker, speak up!
A volunteer board to figure out how to distribute the money, and volunteers to come up with ideas to raise it, get the word out, etc. We don’t need to limit this to cash contributions. The bluegrass community has always stepped forward to help our own in times of need with benefit concerts. We could also auction off donated goods and services – a house concert by a band, signed instruments … the possibilities are endless.
A strategy for getting the word out. For starters, I’m using this article to ask my bosses at Bluegrass Today to donate some advertising space. If there’s a printer in the audience, maybe we can scare up some posters and flyers for upcoming festivals.

I’ll write a $1,000 check to get things started and will volunteer for the board or work in any other capacity.

Trouble finds us all, and some of us get saddled with more than our share. But in ways big and small, the bluegrass community always rises to the occasion. Now is one of those times.

If you’re willing to help or have suggestions, email me at djmorris55@gmail.com, use the comments box on this page or get in touch with the folks at Bluegrass Today. The sooner we get started, the sooner we can help. Thanks!

EDITOR’S NOTE: Of course, we will be only too pleased to offer whatever help we can in this effort.

Frank Solivan’s birthday bash

Monday was Frank Solivan’s 34th birthday, but the crowd who spent it with him in a Rockville, MD, church hall got the present – two and a half hours of pickin’ and singin’ by an all-star lineup usually only seen in Nashville.

The Institute of Musical Traditions show was a homecoming of sorts for Solivan, who settled in the Washington, D.C., area after stint in the Navy, but has been on a national tour in support of his new CD, Frank Solivan & Dirty Kitchen.

Frank and the band – Mike Munford on banjo, Lincoln Meyers on guitar, Stefan Custodi on bass and Frank swapping between the mandolin and fiddle – are fine pickers and singers on their own. But on this night, the friends who joined him added an extra dimension that a couple hundred ticket buyers won’t soon forget.

At one point, Frank was flanked by Wayne Taylor, who had been his boss in the Navy Band Country Current, and by Bill Emerson, who had been Taylor’s superior in an earlier lineup of the band. One of the songs they did, Hello Friend, summed up the generations of talent on the stage and the passage of time, with Frank singing, “I can see the years have us slowed us down. It’s good to see they haven’t changed our style.”

Frank also traded cross-picking mandolin licks with Jimmy Goodreau on the Jesse McReynolds tune, Dixie Hoedown, and sang tenor to Jimmy’s lead on the Flatt and Scruggs song, Gonna Settle Down. For good measure, there was a raise-the-hair-on-the-back-of-your-neck a capella version of the Stanley Brothers’ Paul and Silas by Frank, Wayne and Stefan.

Throw in a guitar trio rendition of the fiddle tune Whiskey Before Breakfast, with local picker Avril Smith joining Frank and Lincoln, and a pair of songs that Frank performed with his mother Lorene singing, and the party was almost complete.

The icing on the cake, in addition to the cupcakes that a local baker provided and Frank helped serve, came when all the musicians crowded the stage for a break-crowded finale of Bill Monroe’s Wheel Hoss.

It was, as Frank said – enunciating clearly because he was, after all, in a church – “a good, old-fashioned cluster pluck.”

And it was one heck of a party.

The Travelers return

He’s been a Bluegrass Cardinal, a Gentleman and a Legend. Now Norman Wright is ready to be a Traveler again.

The Travelers, which Wright and best friend Kevin Church put together in the late mid-1990s, are back together, booking shows and sifting through material for an album on Patuxent Records. “It’s more than being in a good band,” Norman said during a meeting with the band in the living room of his Falls Church, Va., home. “It’s being in a band with people that you like and who will work together.”

Kevin, the son of banjo stalwart Porter Church, was an obvious choice, and the first person Norman approached after Darren Beachley and Legends of the Potomac suddenly disbanded so Beachley could team up with Barry Scott. Kevin and Norman were in the Country Gentlemen together, quitting on the same day in 1991 to form their own band, which in 1996 became The Travelers. Their 1998 release, Ridin’ the Lines (Hay Holler Records) is still sought after for its poignant writing and smooth harmonies.

But that earlier incarnation couldn’t survive a series of departures and inconsistent commitments, so Norman and Kevin moved on. Neither had trouble lining up gigs as sidemen, Norman on the mandolin and Kevin on banjo. But when the Legends dissolved, after one album, Norman was looking for one more shot to reclaim the magic.

Shortly after the first of the year, Norman and Kevin met with guitarist/arranger John Miller and bass player Mike Conner, who toured together as Conner and Miller and as part of Blue Star, an all-star gospel band including Steve Gulley, Jesse Brock and Dale Ann Bradley. All four wanted to see if something clicked. It must have because a week later they were doing a photo shoot and working up arrangements for studio time that had already been booked.

“Within an hour, it was like an old coat. It was just comfortable,” Mike said about the first meeting. They talked and jammed, and Mike remembers not getting home until 5 a.m. The decision for The Travelers to hit the road again was natural.

John explained:

“When the road is calling you, you have to go. We’ve all seen enough failures to be happy when we see the potential for success. I’m here because of the potential to create some really cool music.”

At the second meeting, which I was invited to attend, Norman made clear that The Travelers were four equal partners, not two best friends and two other musicians. “You’re welcome here as long as you want to be here,” he told John and Mike. “We value your opinion just like we do each other’s.”

Kevin said he enjoyed his years with the Country Gentlemen and with the Gentlemen tribute band, but couldn’t pass up another chance to make music with Norman. “For me, it’s the friendship first, the musicianship second, and being able to play the songs that you like. Everything is working out for the best.”

Here are a couple of audio samples from their upcoming Patuxent CD.

When The Judgment Comes (Rick Lang): [http://traffic.libsyn.com/thegrasscast/judgefinalabrev.mp3]

Born with the Blues (Merle Haggard): [http://traffic.libsyn.com/thegrasscast/born_final_abrev.mp3]

Booking inquiries can be directed to Norman Wright or Mike Conner.

Dave Giegerich memorial

David Morris sent along this report on yesterday’s memorial service for the recently deceased resonator guitar master, Dave Giegerich.

A who’s who of the Maryland/Washington D.C./Northern Virginia music scene turned out Saturday in Baltimore for a memorial service for Dave Giegerich, who died a few weeks back at the age of 57.

Tom Gray, Mike Auldridge, Mark Schatz and Mike Mumford were among the more than 400 in the standing-room only crowd at the Maryland State Boychoir Center for the Arts.

But many others were just starting out in music, perhaps sharing a lesson or two with the talented Dobro player, or were fans who had simply enjoyed his music. One man standing in a long line to enter the service said he hadn’t known Dave all that well but felt obliged to attend because Dave “always made you feel like you were his best friend.”

There were many knowing nods in the crowd as band leader Bob Perilla started the service with a simple but telling statement: “All musicians wanted Dave on the gig.” There were many amazing musical moments. But the most poignant came when Dave’s son, Carter, played Isa Lei, a song of love and farewell from Fiji, on the Dobro. Carter, an accomplished mandolinist who studies bluegrass at East Tennessee State University, has only played the resonator for a few months, but you’d never know that from the sound he produced.

The service was followed by a meal and, of course, more music. There was a fine band on stage, but the best tributes to Dave Giegerich were found in the jams in hallways and on the landings. One group played clarinet-infused jazz, another played Hawaiian music and others offered up bluegrass and old time, mirroring the varied musical interests of the man they were remembering.

In a physical sense, Dave Giegerich is gone. But it was clear in those hallways that his song will always be in the wind.

Bass Strummit 2011 report

David Morris attended Bass Strummit III as the winner of Barry Bales’ Have Bass, Will Travel video contest on Bluegrass Today. Here, he shares his thoughts from the workshop. If you need to reach him, he’s probably practicing.

Sorry, honey, but I won’t have much time for household chores this year. I have to spend more time practicing, building up my left hand, using the metronome, listening to more CDs and attending more live shows to help make me a better bluegrass bass player. Missy Raines told me so. So did Barry Bales, Jason Moore and Mike Conner.

That quartet, among the most talented upright bassists in any genre, led 18 other players of various skill levels through two days of detailed workshops at Bass Strummit III over the New Year’s weekend. Like most of the other students, after listening to Missy, Barry, Jason and Mike talk and – especially – play, I left Roanoke late Sunday afternoon thinking about how much harder I would need to work to become a better player. Needless to say, most of my resolutions for 2011 are musically focused.

My takeaway from the Strummit boils down to three simple instructions that are now scrawled on an index card on the music stand in my practice room: Play more. Listen better. Don’t be afraid to make mistakes.

“I think time spent practicing equals confidence,” Missy told one class. Even 15 minutes a day is better than waiting for an hours-long block of time to practice, since that block may never become available. She also advised players not to rush. Practice slowly enough to get it right while using proper technique. Otherwise, the seven-time IBMA bass player of the year said, we’d just be practicing how to make mistakes and reinforcing bad habits.

Barry, who admits he doesn’t practice as often as he should (but obviously practiced a lot over the years), urged workshop participants to learn new songs and try new approaches in the rehearsal room. “Get out of your comfort zone when you practice,” he said. And listen – REALLY listen – to music and eventually your ear will start to hear the changes.

Barry, who holds down the low end for Alison Krauss and Union Station, is self taught. He described his method of learning as “hunt and peck” until he finds something that works. He still recalls the epiphany that propelled him forward after many hours of noodling and listening and practicing. He was in his grandparents’ house, listening to Your Love Is Like a Flower, on The Bluegrass Album, Vol. 2, when he realized he could pick out the baritone part. Some of the mystery was gone, and much music followed.

Barry also recommended that we play like we mean it. “Don’t play like you’re afraid somebody’s going to hear you,” he commanded. Jason, who tours with Mountain Heart, said essentially the same thing: “Don’t be timid. You really gotta pull it. You ain’t gonna hurt it.”

There was another nugget of knowledge that all four instructors repeatedly stressed during the weekend: Don’t overplay. “Yeah, I know a lot of notes,” Mike said. “But I don’t play a lot of notes. I’m a big believer in less is more.”

We’re all a bit overwhelmed right know by all the knowledge that was crammed into our heads in two short days, and maybe a bit intimidated by the talent we shared practice studios with. After Missy played an elegant solo for five of us, one guy interrupted the hush that followed by saying, “Anybody want a good deal on the used Englehardt?” He was joking, I think, but I know the feeling. I might plug away from years and never approach Missy’s artistry. But I’m going to try, even if it’s just 15 minutes at a time.