Category: Earl Scruggs

This is the Earl Scruggs Obituary Category

Dick Bowden on Earl Scruggs

I grew up way Downeast in Maine surrounded by a country music loving family and friends. In the early 50s.

By the time I started school in 1958 I was hearing the sounds of Flatt & Scruggs, Mac Wiseman, Bill Clifton, The Stanley Brothers, the Osborne Brothers, Reno & Smiley, and Jimmy Martin along with reissue LPs of the old Carter Family records.

In those days you bought LPs at music stores, furniture stores, drug stores, etc. I remember Dad and Mom scouring the LPs for anything “with 5 string banjo!” as they used to emblazon the covers back then, as the folk music boom exploded.

I got a guitar from an uncle when I turned 8 and I was off! We all played with thumbpicks then, so I learned the guitar copying Mother Maybelle leads, and runs and licks like Lester, Carter and the rest. I was TOTALLY enthralled with Earl’s guitar pickin’, so I got some finger picks and learned his 3 finger style. I could play all of Earl’s 3 finger breaks by the time I was 10!  I learned to use a capo playing along with Earl’s guitar breaks on those LPs. I “almost” got Dad to buy a 12 string guitar in the mid-60s ‘cuz Earl was picking some breaks on a 12 string – The Soldier’s Return and some others.

Dad bought a new Gibson RB 100 banjo in 1964, that he thought he was going to learn to play. At age 10, I was forbidden to touch it! But I was happy picking the little Gibson guitar I bought with my own money.

Until…

Aug. 30 1964, the family went to see Lester & Earl all the way off in far flung West Grove PA at Sunset Park. We heard it advertised on WWVA radio which came in great up in Maine. At the time I was most hopeful of meeting Buck Graves, as I had become real interested in the Dobro. However, Uncle Josh was far too busy as the band “go-fer,” and I never so much got to speak to him or shake hands.

However…

Lester and Earl stood by their bus talking to fans and getting pictures taken. Mom took a picture of Dad talking to Earl (probably discussing what route the band took to get to the park), and they posed me with Earl. Earl put his arm behind my shoulder, and that was it. I swore that shirt would never get washed (I wish I had saved that shirt). The Flatt & Scruggs live show was absolutely RIVETING, not only for the familiar music, but for the astounding choreography, and general high “cool factor” of each and every one in that band.

All of this experience culminated in me ignoring the rules and pulling that RB-100 out of the case when I got home to Maine again. I played all the LPs again, this time listening to just THAT BANJO. I was MARKED. We soon traded up to a Mastertone, and they rest, as they say, is a wasted life.

Decades later at IBMA in Kentucky, I got a friend to take that photo of 10-year-old me with Earl to the Gibson table where he was signing autographs. Earl very nicely autographed the photo and a Gibson poster. I was nearly 50 years old then, but still too shy and in awe to speak to Earl in person!

Through a producer buddy of mine I got invited to sing at a recording session in Nashville right around 2001 or so. Imagine my shock when into the studio sauntered Earl and Ms. Louise! Earl was gonna pick on the song too! My larynx started to tighten up pretty quick! I got to watch and listen to Earl work, while trying to do my part singing. Too bad that recording never was released.

A couple of years ago on a business trip to South Carolina, a buddy and I took the ride to Boiling Springs, NC. We met a relative of the Scruggs family who told us how to find the place Earl was born down near the Broad River.  While the place looked pretty rough, we still felt we had made quite a pilgrimage. We soon learned that a Scruggs museum was being planned for Shelby. It seemed ridiculous to me that Earl should have a musuem in his home town that would compete with a museum for his neighbor Don Gibson too, but I suppose some Don Gibson fans may feel the same way.

I can tell you I swelled up with pride when Earl appeared on the David Letterman show a few years agos with “Men With Banjos Who Know How to Use Them” — Paul Shafer’s piano break on FMB included.

I’ve felt pretty bad about Earl for the past year or so, it seemed obvious he was “failing” as the old folks say. But if he was still game to get out and perform, then more power to him. When I heard the bad news last week I thought, “God speed, now you can rest ol’ feller.”

Ever since I was 11 years old Earl has been bigger than life to me. He looms over my own life. I’ve picked the banjo for nearly 48 years now because of Earl Scruggs (for better or worse!). But when I think back to the beginning, I still remember his guitar breaks. On the last recording I made in 2010 I didn’t pick any banjo, but I played a Scruggs-style 3 finger GUITAR break on a gospel song! And the last REALLY good, deep catalog discussion I had concerning Earl’s musical legacy was about his his guitar playing, with Jimmy Mills.

Don’t get me started about Earl’s nearly unnoticed baritone harmony singing skills…

Jim Mills remembers Earl Scruggs

This remembrance of the great Earl Scruggs comes from former Ricky Skaggs banjo player, celebrated recording artist and avid banjo collector, Jim Mills.

First of all, let me say that Earl Scruggs was my all time hero on this earth. He was the driving force behind most everything I’ve ever achieved in my life, and it all started when I was around 4 or 5 years old playing in the floor with some kind of toy – Lincoln Logs or something.

By age 10 my older brother already had a good record collection, and when he put on a 33 rpm recording of the original 1949 cut of Foggy Mountain Breakdown, I didn’t know what it was. I didn’t know what any of the instruments were, I just knew I was drawn to “that sound” almost uncontrollably. I had to hear more of it. My brother recalled that I kept asking him to “play it again,” and then to “play it again.”

Most little boys want to be a cowboy, or a policeman, or a fireman when they grow up. But because of Earl Scruggs, I wanted to be a banjo player. And I knew right away that there was nothing else for me to do – absolutely nothing else in this world.

That was only the beginning of the immeasurable influence that Earl Scruggs was to have on me, and having no knowledge of it at the time, it pointed me steadfastly in the direction of my life’s work.

From as far back as I can remember there was always a banjo in our house. My grandfather played clawhammer style, and my dad played some in a two finger style, so I remember seeing a banjo propped up in a corner in a room in our house always. But I was never interested in the least until that day Earl Scruggs came through those little stereo speakers. It was no less than amazing; I’d never heard anything like it. The funny thing is that’s been over 40 years ago, and I’ve still never heard anything like it – and doubt I ever will until I get to see Earl again.

I didn’t get to meet Earl in person until I was in my 20s and already making a living playing the banjo. But like many others, I felt that I almost knew him simply through the endless days I’d spent listening to him on those records. I would just sit in the quiet of my room for hours and focus on those old album covers, and study everything I could see in them. I’d try to get my hands to look like Earl’s, and then I’d try to bend my picks like his were. I had a thin leather strap made like his early straps. I even tried to pry my teeth apart in the front with a toothpick to get the same gap he had in his teeth. But they kept growing in straight, to my disappointment.

I don’t know quite why or how his influence was so strong on me. I know his playing had influenced so many others, both before and after me, but it seems the majority of folks went on with life, grew up, got jobs, got married, had families, and ended up simply playing for their own enjoyment. There is absolutely nothing wrong with that, but for me, honestly, I knew early on that not playing the banjo was not an option for me; it was what I was supposed to do. The influence of Earl Scruggs’s playing had planted a burning desire in me to do nothing else.

When I finally got to meet him years later, he was just as nice as I had imagined all that time, even more so. He was very complimentary, and just a true gentleman.

I was playing an old 1930’s Flathead Style 3 Gibson banjo, and he commented on it saying, “I had an old 3 like that years ago, and it was a good one.” I couldn’t believe it: I was talking to Earl Scruggs about pre war Gibson banjos!

A few years later the Arts Council of North Carolina honored Earl with a Lifetime Achievement Heritage Award, and they called me to play banjo at the presentation. It was a last minute thing and I really didn’t know what to expect. When I got there to rehearse with the rest of the band, I had no idea who “the band” was going to be. It turned out to be none other than Horace Scruggs (Earl’s brother) on guitar, and Jim Shumate (Flatt and Scruggs’ 1st fiddler) on fiddle. I just about fell out.

All the newspaper and television folks were there as well, and to top that off, Earl and Louise were sitting in the front row only ten feet in front of me! I had to play Earl’s Breakdown for them and the rest of the packed crowd that were there to see Earl. That was the only time I remember ever really being nervous playing a banjo. I’ve said before that it doesn’t bother me at all to be on stage in front of 50,000 people as long as there is a banjo hanging around my neck. But put Earl Scruggs in the crowd and it’s a different story.

That’s another thing… I was always in awe of the man. I didn’t get to go to all the picking parties at the Scruggs home as much as some did, as I was usually on the road working with someone. But when I did visit with Earl in his home, even though he was very relaxed and as gracious as could be to me, I very seldom could ever completely relax around him. Not that I worship any man, but he meant so much to me I guess, that I never saw him as just a normal guy. He was always bigger than life to me.

After his Memorial Service at the Ryman Auditorium last Sunday, at the graveside service in Madison, I stood there and thought back on all that this great man had not only given to me, but to the countless others that he would never know.

I stayed until the very end, and watched as they covered up that mound. And I cried as they laid my hero down.

Share your thoughts on Earl Scruggs

Given the popularity of the many touching tributes to Earl Scruggs we have published this past week (with more to come), it seemed fitting that we give our readers a chance to weigh in as well. Those that knew him well have shared their direct experiences with Earl, but we know that his millions of fans and admirers also have stories to tell.

To that end, we have created a special permanent page at Bluegrass Today where reader tributes will be archived.

You are all invited to contribute your own thoughts, be they simple words of condolence, personal anecdotes or remembrances, or more detailed observations about how Earl and his banjo have shaped your own musical journey. All these are part of the history of the man who changed the banjo, and we hope that you will add them to the record.

To weigh in on Earl’s legacy, visit this page and tell us what Earl Scruggs meant to you.

Roland White on Earl Scruggs

These remembrances of Earl Scruggs come courtesy of Roland White, who worked for several years as a member of Bill Monroe & The Blue Grass Boys, Lester Flatt & the Nashville Grass, and later with The Kentucky Colonels (with his brother, Clarence White), Country Gazette and The Nashville Bluegrass Band

Lester told me once that when he and Earl joined Monroe, “the music took off like an unbridled horse. We were off and running.”

I first met Earl and Lester in 1960, backstage at the Grand Ole Opry. I had come out with Leroy McNeese. We drove out to Nashville from California in his El Camino for a DJ convention.

We were in town for a week and a half, and listened to Flatt & Scruggs on the Martha White shows every morning where they announced where they would be, and went off to see them at local shows. They got to recognize us, and Earl invited us over to his house where he gave us an album (can’t recall which), and a picture of them out in front of their bus.

In 1961 I was drafted into the Army, and once when I had a weekend pass, I hitchhiked to Ash Grove in Hollywood to see them perform. When I got down there it was just in time to see their second set, and when I went in to the dressing room after the show, they all laughed because I was in my dress uniform with short hair.

One day in 1967 after I came to Nashville as a Blue Grass Boy, Lamar Grier – who was playing banjo at the time with Bill – said let’s go out and see Earl. He wasn’t traveling with Lester and the band then after suffering an injury, but he could still play. We picked with him all day.

Earl was a big influence on my mandolin playing, believe it or not. When I first heard Dear Old Dixie on the radio, I didn’t know what the heck that was! I called the station and they told me who it was, and I went to the music store in Burbank, CA and ordered the record. I had a couple of Monroe records, but this was the first time Scruggs banjo had caught my ear.

When I got the record I just fell in love with the sound. I went out and bought a Mastertone Gibson in 1955, and a neighbor helped me get started. I studied Earl’s banjo for a couple of years until Billy Ray Lathum came along to play with me and Clarence in The Country Boys.

I ordered all the Flatt & Scruggs records to figure out what he was doing. Clarence and I would just listen and listen, over and over. Clarence would also sit down with banjo from time to time to figure out what Earl was doing. He was a big influence on both of us.

He was so very, very nice… always reached out to shake my hand. He was a wonderful friend, and his musical influence is monumental.

Earl was a real treasure – we’ll never forget him.

Scruggs funeral audio available online

WSM has posted the audio from this past Sunday’s Celebration of Life for Earl Scruggs at The Ryman Auditorium in Nashville.

Hosted by Eddie Stubbs, it includes personal and musical tributes to Earl from Del McCoury, Ricky Skaggs, Béla Fleck, Charlie Daniels, Emmylou Harris, Vince Gill, Patty Loveless, John McEuen, Jim Mills, Marty Stuart and many others, interspersed with video and audio of Scruggs over the years. The centerpiece is Stubbs’ intimate and thoughtful eulogy, which could only come from someone who knew him well.

Even long-time fans and serious students of the man who changed the banjo will come away with a deeper understanding of the one and only Earl Scruggs.

Listen to the archived audio at wsmonline.com.

Album of the Week #19 – Foggy Mountain Banjo

On Sunday, my father (Joe Mullins) and I sat and listened to every minute of a funeral for a man I had only been around once. Why would the passing of someone who I didn’t even know personally cause my eyes to swell up with tears?

Even though I only had the privilege of seeing Earl once, he has dramatically changed the course of my life. Let’s look at only a handful of reasons why my life has been altered due to Earl Eugene Scruggs.

For one, there is enough evidence to suggest that there would not be bluegrass music without Earl Scruggs. The middle finger on his right hand transformed the banjo from what was often little more than a stage prop, to a powerful tool for solo and accompaniment playing with seemingly endless possibilities. Earl’s unique style of playing the banjo was the missing piece to Monroe’s puzzle, and solidified what we now know as bluegrass.

In addition to having played an integral part in creating the music we all know and love, Earl has influenced my life in deeper ways.

My father has been professional banjo player for thirty years. Ever since I can remember, I have heard my dad picking Cripple Creek and Reuben. Had there never been a Scruggs’ style banjo, my father may have never picked one up, which would result in him not having a job for much of my childhood. It would also not allow me to currently hold the positions of publicist and webmaster for Joe Mullins & The Radio Ramblers.

Taking a step even further back, my grandfather, Paul “Moon” Mullins’ life was changed drastically thanks to Earl Scruggs. He told me that the first time he ever heard bluegrass music was when he saw Lester Flatt & Earl Scruggs & The Foggy Mountain Boys playing at the courthouse in Frenchburg, KY. This powerful moment transformed three generations of his family. Paul then learned how to play the fiddle while serving the Army in Alaska. He later became a fiddler for The Stanley Brothers and The Boys From Indiana, among others, and wrote the bluegrass standard, Katy Daley.

He and my father also formed the popular eighties and nineties bluegrass band, The Traditional Grass. Moon was also a well-loved and influential bluegrass disc jockey for forty-five years. My father continues to follow in these musical footsteps with his contributions to different bluegrass bands and projects over the years, has been a bluegrass disc jockey for twenty five years, and now owns and manages some of the most influential bluegrass radio stations in the Ohio Valley. In addition to writing for Bluegrass Today, I continue this tradition by being an on-air radio personality and managing a bluegrass record store. None of this would have happened without my grandfather seeing Earl Scruggs in Frenchburg, KY all those years ago.

I’m sure my story is just one of millions about lives that have been transformed due to the power in Earl Scruggs’ right hand. It is just one more example of the harvest which has been reaped from the seeds Earl started sowing over sixty years ago.

Let’s go back one year… Exactly one year before The Master passed away, my father and Jim Mills took the stage of the Southern Ohio Indoor Music Festival for a banjo workshop. Dozens of banjo players sat anxiously awaiting their nuggets of knowledge. Amidst the laughter which comes from old friends spending time together and discussing their passion, the audience walked away with one goal. That goal was to acquire this week’s Album of the Week. Both my father and Jim Mills stressed the importance of Foggy Mountain Banjo on their formative years as a picker. Within in minutes, the Classic Country Connection was sold out of Foggy Mountain Banjo and had already taken down at least half-a-dozen special orders for this Holy Grail of bluegrass albums.

I know that Joe Mullins and Jim Mills are just two of the countless banjo players who spent hours slowing down the LP and soaking in every note of Earl’s five-string. We have all heard these songs performed by banjo players worldwide, and they will continue to be played until they drop the bomb.

When Foggy Mountain Banjo was released in 1961, Lester Flatt & Earl Scruggs & The Foggy Mountain Boys had been getting the job done for nearly a decade. The whole world already knew that Earl Scruggs was the greatest banjo player to ever live, and he wasn’t even forty! The back of the album bears a quote from The New York Times: “Earl Scruggs bears about the same relationship to the five-string banjo that Paganini does to the violin.”

Earl’s importance to American music was immediately understood by all who listened. Unlike many great artists, Earl’s legacy was established long before his death. Foggy Mountain Banjo even boasted of “The Original ‘Scruggs-Style’ Banjo Picking” emblazoned across the back. His unique style of playing already bore his namesake, and he had only been in the spotlight for roughly fifteen years! That is the power of Earl’s banjo.

Most banjo players have AT LEAST one of the Foggy Mountain Banjo standards worked into their repertoire. See how many you can associate with your favorite banjo pickers other than Earl Scruggs.

Side 1Ground Speed

Home Sweet Home

Sally Ann

Little Darlin’, Pal of Mine

Reuben

Cripple Creek

 Side 2Lonesome Road Blues

John Henry

Fire Ball Mail

Sally Goodwin

Bugle Call Rag

Cumberland Gap

In the days before AcuTab and instructional videos, having Scruggs’ versions of all of these songs on one LP was a banjo goldmine! Viewed as the Banjo Bible, it is a must-have for any aspiring banjo player. It was then, it is now, and it always will be.

Although the original album Foggy Mountain Banjo is recently out of print (again!), I’m sure you know someone who has a copy of the old LP. Also, Earl’s versions of these bluegrass standards can be found on many compilations.

Earl’s impact can not be overstated. Today, The Essential Earl Scruggs is the #105 Top Album on iTunes, appears on the home page under New & Noteworthy, and is #1 under What’s Hot. There are also links to a special Remembering Earl Scruggs iTunes page all over the site. His impact on American music will never be forgotten.

While listening to Earl’s funeral on WSM yesterday, as I’m sure many of you were, I was moved to tears when I came to the realization at how much Earl and his music changed my life for the better. This realization came at about the time when the audio from Earl’s lesson on how to play Cripple Creek was streaming across the globe, and my father and I had to move closer to the speaker because noise was coming from upstairs. Unbeknownst to what we were doing downstairs, my little sister was in her room with one of Dad’s extra banjos, trying to learn how to pick Cripple Creek…

“The beauty of simplicity will never be surpassed.” –Earl Scruggs

P.S.- There is one more way which Earl Scruggs almost changed my life. My mother vetoed the proposition by my father to name their firstborn child Eugene after The Master.

The torch is passed

Bill Evans describes this touching tribute to Earl Scruggs from yesterday’s memorial service in Nashville.

I had the honor and privilege of attending the memorial service for Earl, held at the Ryman Auditorium on Sunday, April 1. There was one incredibly moving moment among many that took place at this service that I will remember for the rest of my life. The Scruggs family gathered a number of banjo players together and asked us to seat ourselves on either side of the center aisle, one banjo player opposite another, on the end of reach row, moving down the center aisle away from where Earl lay.

We held our banjos in front of us and as the casket passed, each of us dipped our instruments down, bringing the banjos up again as the casket moved past us. Kristin Scott Benson was on the same row, opposite me. Ned Luberecki in front of me to my right, Tony Trischka behind me to my left. Noam Pilkelny was in front of Kristin, Tim O’Brien behind her. Richard Bailey, Alison Brown, Charlie Cushman, Randy Escobedo, Warren Kennison, Jr., Dave Talbot, John McEuen and Bela Fleck, among others were up and down the aisle, lowering their instruments in tribute. After the casket was moved through the Ryman, Earl’s banjo followed, carried in a hard shell case.

I can’t express the sense of loss I feel that Earl is gone, however being in the company of so many other players who love him and have been so influenced by him was an incredibly healing experience. Earl’s spirit and music will live on in all of us and it is renewed again each time someone hears that sound and finds their lives forever changed.

Rhonda Vincent on Earl Scruggs

Rhonda Vincent contributed this touching tribute to Earl Scruggs.

The name Earl Scruggs is one I’ve known for as long as I can remember. As a little girl, he was just the man in the hat who played the banjo, with that guy who played guitar with the deep voice. And I saw them sometimes on a funny show called the Beverly Hillbillies.

At that time, I didn’t know he was also the man whom my father listened to so intently on the Grand Ole Opry, who inspired my father so much, that he ordered a brand new Gibson banjo from our local music store close to Greentop, Missouri. Soon after placing the order, my father was in a car wreck, which broke his neck, and left him paralyzed. Through many months in the hospital, he regained the feeling through most of his body, but his life would change forever, and he would have to find a new way to walk with a cane.

That banjo he ordered was sold to someone else, and learning to walk became my father’s focus. But soon after his recovery, he ordered another banjo, a 1965/66 Gibson Mastertone RB250 arch top. With banjo in hand, Dad played along with Earl Scruggs, as he listened to WSM Radio and the Grand Ole Opry.

With only his ears to guide him, my father, Johnny Vincent, taught himself to play the banjo, listening to Earl Scruggs; tuning his banjo to the key of “A” (unaware of a device called a capo), and adapting his fluent guitar skills to the banjo; creating a unique style that I learned to sing to. I was learning valuable information, as I lived through a very special time in bluegrass history.

As a child, listening to bluegrass music on vinyl albums, gazing at the hatted men on each cover, and studying the names of the musicians, my ears definitely deciphered distinct changes in the music as Flatt & Scruggs formed their own group.

This was the sweetest of innocence; just enjoying the music, be it Flatt & Scruggs, Bill Monroe, Jimmy Martin, Jim & Jesse, or The Osborne Brothers. The vinyl records were stacked high on the turntable, and I listened for hours at my home, with my family, just listening and playing bluegrass music. It was totally about the music.

And even though I didn’t realize why, I knew there were distinct differences in the newer music of Flatt & Scruggs and Bill Monroe. Amazed that “who” was playing the banjo made such a difference in the overall sound. How could that one instrument guide the entire personality of a band? I was little. I didn’t know the answer, but my ears knew the difference, even as a tiny tot.

I realize now, that question was in my brain even as a little girl. I had no understanding of the real world circumstances, where the temperament of two bold innovators came together to create the greatest sounds bluegrass had ever known. And later departing to make a name for themselves, for whatever the reason. For me, it was just this wonderful music, with the banjo as the nucleus of that music – and those famous bluegrass musicians were the untouchables, stars of the Grand Ole Opry. We were The Vincent Family in Greentop, Missouri, living in a humble home full of music and love.

It wasn’t until my journey to Nashville, coupled by the kind and gentle spirit of John Hartford, that I felt magically transformed, and brought face to face into a new reality. I was no longer listening by the turntable, or through the static of the AM radio. John invited us to accompany him to the home of Earl and Louise Scruggs. Now I’d met the biggest stars in country and bluegrass music before. But that was backstage. A quick hello, a photo, and they were gone. I never ever thought beyond that moment.

And never in my wildest imagination, did I ever expect to be in the home of one of the most famous men in bluegrass music, who inspired my Dad to play the banjo, and who we had heard on the Grand Ole Opry. But here I was, standing in the most magnificent home I’d ever laid eyes on, with the longest white leather couch I’d ever seen.

Why I’d never seen a leather couch before. And white? My brothers would have destroyed that with their dirty shoes. Beautiful gold lamps and fixtures accented the room. Only in the Bible when heaven was described, had I envisioned such a sight in my mind. It was an evening I will never forget.

We had a nice visit, like normal people. Then Earl pulled out his banjo, and we were invited to join in. I must have shook my head in disbelief, thinking my ears were deceiving me. Earl Scruggs just asked us to jam in his living room? I must be dreaming!

This was my first correlation that perhaps someday I could be that person someone was listening to on the Grand Ole Opry. It was like a graduation of sorts, a new confidence. After all, I had now jammed with the greatest innovator of the banjo — Earl Scruggs.

In the years to come, I would even share the stage with Earl Scruggs on a number of occasions. And one time I noticed a familiar silhouette sitting in a car at a Nashville shopping mall. It was Earl sitting in his car, waiting for Louise to finish shopping. I was so excited, I ran up to his open window, not realizing how much I would startle him. And he jumped in fear when I popped my head in the car to say hello.

Earl may have inspired many to play the banjo, but he unknowingly taught me that people are just people. No matter what we do in life, no matter our status or income. It was this great man that I was given the privilege of seeing on stage, sitting in his car at the mall, or jamming in his golden living room. And by the simplest of gestures, you can make a difference in someone’s life; with a display of kindness and sharing what you have with others. And when you make that generosity part of who you are, it shines through in everything you do. This is what Earl Scruggs was to me.

I cherish the times we performed at the same venue. The most recent in 2009 with Steve Martin at the Ryman and in Lampe, MO, filming RFD’s Country Family Reunion in 2010. The last time I saw Earl was in February of 2011, when he graciously joined me for my first radio show on WSM, one of his last interviews.

Earl Scruggs – a dear, sweet human being who inspired most every man that ever picked up a banjo!

Sammy Shelor on Earl Scruggs

These ruminations on the passing of Earl Scruggs are a contribution from Sammy Shelor, banjo player and band leader with Lonesome River Band, and a hugely influential contemporary 5 string stylist.

Earl Scruggs influenced American music as much as any one individual. He definitely had a big influence on me.

My parents said before I could talk, the only thing I would watch on TV was commercials, and Flatt & Scruggs. I saw them when I was 4 years old at the Hillsville VFW, and I can still picture it in my mind.

Earl was always very kind to me, both he and Louise.

When I won the IBMA Banjo Player of the Year, I thanked him, saying that if it wasn’t for Earl Scruggs, none of us would be playing the music we’re playing. I ran into Louise in the hallway the next year at IBMA, and she thanked me and asked if I would like to go talk to Earl. I said of course I would!

What I said the year before, I meant it sincerely. I wasn’t trying to get to Earl; I meant it in all due respect.

I got to talk with him for 2 hours. We didn’t even talked about music. He asked me where I was from, and when I told him southwest Virginia, he proceeded to list off every school he had played in this part of the country. If he couldn’t remember one, Lousie stepped in with the details.

He really loved this part of the country, and talked a lot about that.

I feel fortunate that I was able to get to spend some time with him. Talking to him one-on-one meant more to me than anything I could imagine.

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