Hazel Dalgleish Johnson, 79, passed away last Sunday, September 13, 2026. She was the widow of New Grass Revival’s original banjoist, the late Courtney Johnson. Initially, Hazel served as the band’s stage manager, but she was also an accomplished multi-instrumentalist and instrument repairer in her own right. She played music throughout the years including fronting her own group, the Hazel Johnson Band.
Hazel’s dedication to her craft had a lasting impact on the bluegrass community.
Sam Bush shared on social media:
“We, the original New Grass Revival, began our journey in 1971. Shortly after, so did the relationship between our banjo player, Courtney Johnson, and Hazel Dalgleish. They were inseparable until Courtney’s passing in 1996.
Hazel had a background of playing and working on instruments and so we, NGR, put her to work as string changer and stage tech from 1972 until the departure of Courtney and Curtis Burch from the band in 1981.
Having little money and no string endorsements in those early days, we would boil used strings to re-use them until they broke; and all did—usually on stage during shows—and Hazel, sitting on stage behind us, would quickly change them as fast and accurately as she could. It was Hazel who claimed the record, being 23 broken strings on a three set night.
Hazel shared in the band’s good, bad, and hard times, as well as our own unique, distinctive and atypical situations and experiences as early New Grass Revival charted our course through the ’70s. Hazel was a large part of my early life and what a time we all had!
Peace to Hazel Dalgleish Johnson, now reunited with Courtney and no doubt Dancin’ with the Angels.
Love, Sam.”
Founding NGR guitar and dobro player, Curtis Burch, elaborated on her work with the band and shared a humorous tale.
“Hazel Johnson was our string changer. She had a small case that had spare strings for acoustic guitar, five-string banjo, mandolin, fiddle, Telecaster, Fender solid-body electric mandolin, National slide mandolin, and maybe some Dobro strings. All organized by name and gauges. She had an assortment of tools, wire cutters, string winder, needle nose pliers, files, spare ball ends, string pins.
She could replace a broken string in seconds. Most everyone knew about this job that she was so dedicated to. But this is a story that many do not know and I might have been the only person to have witnessed it.
We were to perform on a stage that was on the banks of a lake, maybe in Tennessee, not sure. Hazel and I were at the very rear of this huge stage at the water’s edge. It was starting to get a little dark and sconce light was on the wall near her. Hazel got a guitar string and bent a hook shape at the end with her pliers. Then she caught a bug that was flying around the sconce light and hooked it on the guitar string hook. She leaned over the rail and dipped the string with the bait into the water and immediately caught a small fish and pulled it out of the water!
If I hadn’t seen it with my own eyes, I never would have believed how she caught it even though she had the fish to prove it! There are so many great stories during those years and I cherish them all!
Thank you, Hazel. for your contribution to those memorable times!”
John Cowan posted:
“Our dear friend and New Grass companion, Hazel Johnson, passed away. If you saw NGR between 1974 and 1980, you saw Hazel, sitting right behind Courtney and Sam. She sat on a chair with a small suitcase on her lap. Her job? Making sure that when Sam, Curtis, or Courtney broke a string, she’d hustle to grab them a spare and then change their broken string as fast as humanly possible.
I, to this day, don’t know why we broke so many strings. Perhaps we were playing so fast and furious. Fortunately for me and Hazel, I only ever broke a couple of bass strings in all those years, and there damn sure wasn’t a spare bass to use.
Hazel was an amazing woman. She came from Africa, where her father was a topographer and photographer for National Geographic, and her mother was a horse trainer. Those of us who got to know Hazel over the years knew that she was just as passionate about animals and their care as she was about bluegrass music.
When I joined the New Grass Revival in 1974, I moved in with Courtney and Hazel into their little house in Hiseville, Kentucky. Hazel, having been raised in Africa, had an English accent, and when she’d open her mouth to speak, people were always surprised and perplexed. Hazel, a mandolin player herself, knew a boatload about folk music and bluegrass music, and she loved them equally. She especially loved Norman Blake, and I can remember toking up and sitting in their living room, listening to Fields of November, Whiskey Before Breakfast, and Home in Sulphur Springs.
I also had the distinct pleasure of riding with Courtney and Hazel in their station wagon. Courtney and Hazel would be in the front seat, smoking cigarettes nonstop and drinking either black coffee with chicory or ice-cold Pepsi from a cooler that sat right between them. I was the joint roller in the backseat, and I was pretty good at it, too.
Those were truly heady days for all of us. Riding all over America, sleeping on kind people’s floors, staying at cheap motels, and making an audience one night at a time. We had a singular purpose that no one could talk us out of, and to reflect upon this now makes me grateful, proud, and sad.
Even though, in remembrance, it seems we were all of the hippie persuasion, we didn’t go around telling each other how much we loved each other at the time. But we did, and that’s so clear to me now. Thank you, Hazel.
All my love, Johnny C. (Jell’s).”
Butch Robins also posted:
“Hazel Dalgliesh Johnson has ended her earthly journey. She was a lovely gal, and I have many fond memories of her while I was a member of the New Grass Revival touring the country in 1974. Memories of both she and Courtney will always bring a smile to my heart.”
This writer recalled when I wrote Courtney a letter in 1996 after I learned of his illness. I shared how much his intricate and unique style of picking influenced me to take up the banjo. Sadly, the letter arrived after he died, but Hazel took the time to reply. She sent me a lovely handwritten letter stating that he had passed, but how comforting my words were for her. It had a life lasting effect on me.
R.I.P., Hazel Johnson
