More welcome notes from Tony Thomas

BIB editor's note: Thanks again to banjo historian Tony Thomas for his additional notes below on the 2020 BIB post 'Alan Lomax, the banjo, and bluegrass (CORRECTION):'

Just want to underline my comments about Stu are based on not only my extensive research, but on the last years of Stu's life in the 2000s. I knew Stu when he moved to Florida. He was increasingly restricted by his final illness for years, but I had hours and hours of telephone conversations with Stu over the last several years of his life about banjo issues, especially about Gribble, Lusk and York, and more recently I have been working with the Gribble Lusk and York website. I just returned from the US old-time festival Fiddle Hell, where I played banjo representing Murph Gribble's style in two workshops, one on Gribble Lusk and York tunes to be played in G tuning and on tunes that can be played in D.

A posthumous honour for the BIB

The BIB editor writes:

Exactly a year after my retirement as editor, the BIB reopens in order to make public a welcome and important contribution from Tony Thomas, a leading scholar of banjo history; one of his works is cited below.

The contribution arrived in the form of a series of comments on the BIB post Alan Lomax, the banjo, and bluegrass (CORRECTION) of 14/18 Aug. 2020, which mentioned the Black banjo-player Murphy Gribble and the white folklorist and banjo-player Stu Jamieson. Mr Thomas's contribution follows:

First, Stu's views should be primary since Stu is the one who found Murph Gribble by asking his grand aunt in Champion Tennessee who had the best string band in their area in 1946. It is Stu along with Margret Mayo who recorded the band in 1946 and who returned several years later to record the band, and to record Gribble playing not only as a band, but to record Gribble playing solo, using Stu's Fairbanks banjo. Stu was familiar with the style of playing because his grandfather, a person Stu idolized in all things had played the banjo in this style. In the last years of his life I spent hours talking with Stu about this. What Stu noted was the similarities in the propulsive attack of the whole band of which Gribble was the leader.

At the same time all the other sourcing especially my friend Bob Carlin's work is important on this subject. Others I know who have discussed influences with Earl found that Earl said early, being someone born in 24 and a teenager in the 1930s and early 40s talked about doing on the banjo things he heard Charlie Christian do on Benny Goodman records, and also very strong influence like everyone with ears in North Carolina in the late 30s and 1940s, to try to do things that Blind Boy Fuller was doing on guitar on the banjo, and a bunch of other influences. To be sure the Gribble Lusk band had a drive and was banjo-driven with Gribble as the leader deciding to lead the band from banjo (he was reputed to be a great fiddler fron an early age and had become more or less of a professional musician due to limitations in his physical capacities due to being injured in the Great War).

Looking at this band and Gribble's banjo only in a narrow and uninformed view of its similarities to bluegrass reflects not looking at it in relation to Black music which surrounded it, or its crucial role as essentially the only viable Black string band ever recorded while it was still a vernacular band performing for audiences and money, Stu told me that a big problem was when he received permission to use the town general store to record them the first time, the store was packed with with white people who wanted to hear the band under Jim Crow even the band was afraid to go there and perform and Stu's aunt or grand aunt who suggested the place and lived locally received disrespect from local white folk for years for Stu and Margret's treatment of the band members with equality calling them Mr. Gribble and Mr. Lusk and that Stu gave them a ride home about 10 miles in his car rather than letting them walk in the night.

These recordings are really more important than their limited relationship to bluegrass, but of the survival of a significant Black string band tradition. Also quite meaningful is Gribble's three or possible four-finger banjo style, rather than frailing and two-finger picking. We have found that this banjo style was widely used by African American musicians, most notably Gus Cannon all whose 1930s recordings were in this style and who taught anyone who approached him for banjo lessons this style correctly called the guitar style of banjo, Cannon teaching and using all 4 finger as SS Stewart would have taught. There are many other examples of Black guitar-style banjoists, some of international repute, and at least one still getting still able to get encores at the Apollo Theater in NYC in the 1940s. Again this was the preferred popular and parlor approach to the banjo played across the English speaking world, played by Edward VII and his successor as his mother, well known as a banjo fan since the days of Sweeney, had sent both future monarchs and their sister [See comment below - BIB editor] to take banjo lessons with the Bohees. A colleague from Sweden decades ago found the receipts for the lessons in Palace records.

The limits of this interchange reflect the limitations and stereotypes of knowledge about African American and world banjo playing as well as what would have been in the air both for Earl Scruggs and Murph Gribble (he preferred "Murph" to Murphy) in their times in music. Consult my essay "The colored champion banjo pugilist of the world and the big world of the banjo", a chapter in University of Illinois Press’s prize-winning anthology Banjo roots and branches, published in 2018.

It is a bit bizarre that Stu's views and reporting is not put at the center. Stu found the band by asking his grand aunt what was the main local band where she lived. Stu recorded the band and witnessed their playing. Stu returned in 1948 or 49 to the area and was able to invite the band members to his grand aunt's house to record them again under better circumstances with Gribble actually playing Stu's very high quality banjo. Stu was a banjoist, and immediately identified the banjo approach Gribble used as his grandfather played banjo in the guitar-style like Gribble. Stu was prone to some exaggeration, but he was right on the beam on what Gribble was doing as well as some of the similarity to the Scruggs style which had become popular by time Stu wrote his invaluable field notes. Our knowledge of the banjo playing really starts with what Stu left us.

Late delivery

The BIB editor (retired) writes:

On 31 Aug. it was announced that news that came in during my absence (14-19 Sept.) would be dealt with on my return. Here it is:

Dark Shadow Recording announce that Chicago's Henhouse Prowlers, Bluegrass Ambassadors to the world, and headliners of the bluegrass section of the 2022 Westport Folk and Bluegrass Festival, released on Friday 15 Sept. their latest album, Lead and iron, comprising eleven tracks, all written or co-written by Prowler members. Full details are on the Dark Shadow press release.

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South London's The Vanguards (Jack Baker, mandolin; Alex Clarke, guitar; Chris Lord, banjo; Laura Nailor, fiddle; and Pete Thomas, bass) are interviewed by Lee Zimmerman in 'England’s Vanguards take their name seriously', the latest in his 'Bluegrass beyond borders' series on Bluegrass Today. The feature includes two videos and an audio track. The Vanguards played at the 2017 Westport festival, and followed this with a 2019 tour of Ireland centred on the festival's launch party. Chris Lord is also editor of British Bluegrass News, to which Jack Baker contributes the regular 'Tab corner', which always includes solid helpings of bluegrass history.

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More bluegrass history: the good things in the Bluegrass Unlimited weekly newsletter no. 149 include an invaluable article from BU archives on Ola Belle Reed by Rhonda Strickland, published in the June 1983 issue under the title 'Preserving traditional music without killing it'.

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Rick Faris, singer, songwriter, recording artist, and luthier, who toured Ireland several times during his eleven years on mandolin and guitar with the Special Consensus, will be moving his Faris Guitar Co. to an 1800-sq.-ft workshop at the Kentucky Guitar Works in Owensboro, Ky, More details and a statement from Rick are in John Lawless's feature on Bluegrass Today.

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East Nash Grass (USA; see the BIB for 7 Apr.), who have not yet visited Ireland, are young musicians who embody well-established bluegrass practices: individually they've all played in different bands, and as a band they've held down a long residency at a particular venue - in their case, weekly at Dee’s Country Cocktail Lounge in Madison, TN. On the Bluegrass Situation (BGS) Thomas Cassell interviews the ENG's James Kee (mandolin) and Cory Walker (banjo) about the experience of their residency, their rapport with audiences, their new album, and more. The interview includes three videos - one of them a two-hour live performance at Dee's.

© Richard Hawkins

Sounding the Well of Souls (4)

The BIB editor writes:

A substantial part of Well of souls is dedicated to showing the development of the cultures of black enslaved people in the New World. It is a task for which Gaddy feels her being white may disqualify her, but which she sees as a necessary reparation for the ways in which those cultures have been ignored or misrepresented in the past.

In this overall cultural survey, the banjo at times falls out of sight and hearing. As regards sight, the publishers could have partly remedied this. They chose, however, to print illustrations on the same paper as the text; this works well enough with line drawings and diagrams, but much less so with monochrome reproductions of paintings, where clarity is easily lost. As regards hearing, it does appear that though the banjo was a recognised part of ritual and sacred activity, it was not indispensable. But for those who want to hear music of a kind that was played on the banjo long before white musicians took it up, some of the earliest documenation of the instrument includes transcriptions of music played in Jamaica in the 1680s, and these pieces can be heard on the Musical Passage website, which presents them in their historical background.

© Richard Hawkins

Sounding the Well of Souls (3)

The BIB editor writes:

Two of the main themes of Well of souls are: (1) the banjo is essentially a 'spiritual device', an expression of the fundamental presence of religion in all aspects of traditional African cultures; (2) however, it would not have come into being without the transatlantic slave trade and the circumstances of slavery in the Americas.

At the risk of over-simplifying, one can say that the banjo functioned as a spiritual device by summoning or evoking spirits through the medium of rhythm. Decoration on some of the earliest instruments suggest that they were marked as 'sacred' objects; but quite apart from external markings, the whole instrument can be seen as a 'cosmogram', the intersection of the earthly and spiritual planes.

On point (2) Gaddy states clearly in her preface: 'The banjo did not exist before it was created by the hands of enslaved people in the New World. [...] "The banjo is African" is often repeated [...] But it is not true: the banjo is a uniquely American instrument, crafted by people of African descent. It is structurally different from any African instrument.' (BIB editor's note: That last sentence does not refer to the many structural changes that have been made since the instrument got into white hands, and which can be said to make the modern banjo thoroughly 'colonised'.)

© Richard Hawkins

September 2023 BU

The September 2023 issue of Bluegrass Unlimited magazine has Bobby Osborne on the cover, and much of the contents of the issue is devoted to aspects of Bobby's life and career. Bill Conger contributes a six-page biographical article; Nancy Posey writes on C.J. Lewandowski of the Po' Ramblin' Boys and the work of preserving Bobby's legacy; and Scott Napier recalls episodes in his thirty years' friendship with Bobby. The December issue of BU will have a similar focus on Jesse McReynolds.

Other articles in the September issue include Cathy Fink on the songwriting of Ola Belle Reed; the song 'Kentucky morning' written by Darrell Scott and recorded by Bobby Osborne; Sandy Hatley on the work of John Holder as a premier bluegrass soundman; Bill Conger again, with an article on Ashby Frank; and the tale of restoring a badly damaged 1922 Gibson A-2 mandolin. The review section includes Mike England's review of the album The UK & Ireland dobro celebration, which includes the work of Johnny Gleeson, Colin Henry, and Ted Ponsonby.

© Richard Hawkins

A bluegrass journey: Woodbine 2002-2023

Woodbine's original lineup (l-r: Tony, Mel, Paddy, Liam)
Dunmore East, 2002

BIB editor's note: Woodbine played their final official gig a week ago at this year's Dunmore East Bluegrass Festival. Many thanks to Tony O'Brien for this chronicle of a band that has been at the heart of bluegrass in Ireland for twenty-one years.

The bluegrass journey of Woodbine began in 2002 when the lineup of Tony O'Brien, Liam Wright, Mel Corry, and Paddy Chanders played Athy, Dunmore East, amd Omagh bluegrass festivals. Mel was only ever in for the three fests and Paddy was in college, so by 2003 Nicola O'Brien was introduced on bass and vocals. The band recorded an album as a trio in ’04 and Paddy returned on mandolin.

Woodbine built up a very loyal fan base over the next four years. Their second album was recorded in 2007 and included a couple of original songs written by Tony. By 2008 Paddy was involved in different genres of music and it was decided to change the lineup with longtime friend Richard Hawkins coming in on banjo to replace Paddy. Richard retired from the band in 2017 and was replaced by Martin Cooney. After COVID, from 2021 the core of the band was back to Tony, Liam, and Nicola with various guests joining for gigs. The band recorded a third album in 2009 that included a banjo breakdown, ’Smokin’ Woodbine’, written by Richard.

Woodbine have played all the Irish bluegrass and bluegrass-related festivals, plus gigs in every corner of Ireland over the years. They were invited to play a special St Patrick’s day concert in Stormont in 2009, and played live on Ryan Tubridy’s RTE radio programme and Marty Whelan’s radio programme on Lyric FM.

The band have had the honour of many guests joining them on stage for some gigs:

• Various instruments: Clem O'Brien
• Mandolin: Gerry Madden, John Denby, Joe Meehan, Jan Michielsen, Darren Lawrence, Tom Corbett, Roger Green, Sean McKerr, Tom Mindte, Skip Gorman
• Banjo: Tom Hanway, John Brunschwyler, Evan Lyons, James Henry, Hugh McLean
• Dobro: Johnny Gleeson, P.J. Power, Colin Henry, Tom Poole
• Fiddle: Dessie Crerand, Charlie Arkins, George Kaye, Brian Thurber
• Bass: Beth Lawrence

It's been a great pleasure to share the stage with you all, thank you. Woodbine have had a wonderful journey and a big thank you goes to all our families, our many friends, festival and gig promoters for making it all possible.

From all in Woodbine, thanks for creating great memories.

The heart of Woodbine (l-r): Liam, Nicola, Tony

© Tony O'Brien

Songs sung to Sharp - from Martin Simpson and Thomm Jutz

Thanks to John Lawless on Bluegrass Today for news of a project that should be a classic for anyone interested in the links between the folk music of these islands and Appalachia. Topic Records, the venerable UK folk music record company, will release four weeks from today (29 Sept.) the album Nothing but Green Willow: the songs of Mary Sands and Jane Gentry.

English folk singer Martin Simpson and German-born, Nashville-based singer/songwriter Thomm Jutz combine in their settings of some of the songs that Cecil Sharp and Maud Karpeles collected in the Appalachians in 1916-18, the first instalment being published as English folk songs from the Southern Appalachians (1917). A video of a song from the album, 'Edwin in the lowlands low', sung by Tim O'Brien, is on Bluegrass Today and on YouTube. The first single released by Topic, however, is of Cara Dillon singing 'Come all you fair and tender ladies', which can be heard on the Topic website and on YouTube. In another Topic video from YouTube, Simpson and Jutz talk about the origins of the project.

It should be recognised that Sharp and Karpeles went to Appalachia because Olive Dame Campbell, who had already been collecting songs there, was able to show Sharp evidence that the mountain people had the old songs that he was looking for. Her name is on the title page of the 1917 collection, as it includes songs she had collected. The BIB has published several posts concerning Cecil Sharp, which can be found by clicking on the label 'Cecil Sharp' at the foot of this post.

© Richard Hawkins

Edd Mayfield remembered

The 146th Bluegrass Unlimited weekly newsletter includes a link to the BU archives for a forty-year-old article by Doug Hutchens, bluegrass historian and former Blue Grass Boy. Published originally in the August 1983 issue of BU, it chronicles the tragically brief career of Edd Mayfield from Texas, who played three stretches as a Blue Grass Boy before his death from leukemia in 1958, aged 32. Bill Monroe considered him 'a wonderful guitar player and a wonderful singer' and had a high personal regard for him, which can be heard in his voice in 'Bill Monroe speaks about Edd Mayfield - 1965 Ralph Rinzler interview'. So anyone who might say that Monroe thought only Kentuckians could play bluegrass, can be answered with two words: 'Edd Mayfield'.

© Richard Hawkins

Sounding the Well of Souls (2)

The BIB editor writes:

Kristina R. Gaddy's book Well of souls: uncovering the banjo's hidden history can be seen as a companion to the collaborative volume Banjo roots and branches, ed. Robert B. Winans (2018), in which ten scholars meticulously examined the source material by which the stages in the early development of the banjo, from the seventeenth century, can be plotted. Gaddy presents much of the same material in the form of reconstructions of the lived experience of the people involved in each of those stages.

This understandably involves frequent use of phrases such as 'perhaps', 'surely', 'may have been', 'may have used', 'may have come from', and (200) 'How they actually felt is impossible to know'. The book is meant to be a work of reparation, so where different interpretations of an event are possible, Gaddy takes care to put forward one that white readers may find less comfortable. She acknowledges (p. 177):

These experiences I've told you about, reader, may not be as connected as I think they are. I might be seeing deep references to Black history and culture where there are none. [...] But what I realized [...] was that I had to open my eyes to the reality that Black history and culture have been so suppressed and misunderstood by white culture that I wouldn't see connections unless I looked hard. But why had they been suppressed? How had we lost all this information? Why was it that an instrument constantly described as 'Black' and 'African' came to be thought of as a white instrument? The story can't stop here.

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One answer to the last question may occur to anyone who was in the UK in the mid twentieth century. At that time the minstrel show - decadent, fading, but not completely dead - preserved an idea of a link between banjos and African-Americans; the revival of 'traditional' jazz, in which the plectrum banjo was a distinguishing feature, brought black New Orleans jazz veterans back into prominence; and the 'Banjo' chocolate wafer bar, on the market till 1954 and briefly reintroduced in the 1970s, carried on its wrapper a stylised logo of a chocolate-brown singing face. Moreover, Pete Seeger's How to play the 5-string banjo clearly informed the many thousands of 'folk' enthusiasts who learned from it that the banjo had African and African-American roots (a point also made in one of the comments on https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RiP8Tfa8bB8)

In the sixty years since then, however, all the people and all the cultural events prominently associated with the banjo have been white - the Seegers, the Kingston Trio, Earl Scruggs, Bill Keith, Bela Fleck, 'The Beverly Hillbillies', 'Bonnie & Clyde', 'Deliverance', 'O brother' - and in that context a musician of the stature of Taj Mahal could be seen as one more offshoot of the folk revival.

© Richard Hawkins

Sounding the Well of Souls (1)

The BIB editor writes:

There is one week left for BIB readers to take advantage of the discount offered to them (see the BIB's sidebar) on purchase of Kristina R. Gaddy's book Well of souls: uncovering the banjo's hidden history, published by W.W. Norton & Company. The book sets out to be thought-provoking and succeeds. Some of my own thoughts will appear on the BIB in the next few days; but in short, anyone interested in how the banjo evolved and its history up to the mid nineteenth century should read it.

Note: the tenor banjo, as used in Irish music, does not appear in this story, and does not belong there. The tenor has no historic connection with the banjo's African ancestors. It dates from about 1900 (give or take a few years) and in tuning and playing style it is essentially a member of the mandolin family which has been given - for the sake of volume and tone - a sound chamber that was developed for the banjo over fifty years earlier by European-American instrument-makers, making use of European drum-tightening methods.

© Richard Hawkins

More detached notes (updated)

Dark Shadow Recording announce that Chicago's Henhouse Prowlers released on Friday last (18 Aug.) 'My last run', the fourth single from their new album Lead and iron, which is scheduled for release on 15 Sept. The song can now be heard on Bluegrass Today.

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New Zealand-born fiddle maestro George Jackson, now resident in Nashville, TN, has just released an album of orginal compositions for fiddle, George Jackson's Local Trio. In an article on No Depression he asks the question Why make a fiddle album? and gives his own reasons for doing so, concluding: 'at its core it’s art for the artist, music for the musician, deep cuts for the appreciator. And that’s music at its most thrilling and risky and rewarding.'

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Alan Munde, one of the finest performers and most prolific composers for banjo in the history of bluegrass music, has a new album out, Excelsior, on Tom Mindte's Patuxent Records label. The album is reviewed by Braeden Paul on Bluegrass Today, with a playlist sampling all the tracks.

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Recent Bluegrass Unlimited podcasts include interviews with past visitors such as Molly Tuttle, Raymond McLain, and Jeff White. The 144th Bluegrass Unlimited weekly newsletter also includes a Spotify playlist of the recordings of Lorraine Jordan & Carolina Road, and (from the BU archives) a July 2010 article by Nancy Cardwell on Jesse McReynolds at eighty years of age.

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On 4 August Steve Hochman published on the Bluegrass Situation (BGS) a history of the Kentucky Colonels, one of the most enduringly influential West Coast bands. The figures in the cartoon at the head of the article look nothing like any of the members of the band, but don't let that worry you. The article includes seven videos illustrating stages in the career of the Colonels and of Clarence White, their epoch-making lead guitar player.

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Pete 'Dr Banjo' Wernick, founder of the Wernick System and apostle of the art of jamming, has contributed to the Deering Banjo Company blog a valuable article on how to recognise chord changes, and why they matter. This article was originally published in the late lamented Banjo News Letter.

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Taylor Hagood, author of Stringbean: the life and murder of a country music legend (published earlier this year), will give a talk at the American Banjo Museum on 9 Sept. 2023. More details are in John Lawless's feature on Bluegrass Today.

© Richard Hawkins

Jan Jerrold, pioneer of bluegrass in Britain: the Dublin connection

On Friday 18 Aug. a major feature by Richard Thompson marked the thirtieth anniversary of the death of Jan Jerrold (1941-93), of whom Richard says: 'His importance in the popularity of bluegrass music in the UK could scarcely be overstated.' The British Bluegrass Music Association (BBMA) commemorates him in its Jan Jerrold Award to distinguished members of the bluegrass community in Britain. Of special interest to BIB readers are these words in the article, quoted from Jan's brother Alan:

'The family moved [from the USA] to Dublin in 1950 after my father’s death. We spent a while in France on the way. Jan moved to London after he got married in 1963.'

Niall Toner has commented to the BIB: 'I had many great discussions with Jan. He was a " one-off"!''

As well as the article's great historical value, readers should also enjoy the ten videos and two audio tracks of bands with which Jan Jerrold was associated, and half-a dozen photos of him with US and British musicians.

© Richard Hawkins

American Bach revisited, and more

Michael J. Miles announces that his new recording, American Bach revisited, will be officially released this coming Friday (4 Aug.). A special concert to mark the release will be held at Space Evanston in Evanston, ILL, on 17 Sept., featuring Michael (banjo, guitar) and Jill Kaeding (cello). The album can be pre-ordered on BandCamp.

Michael also announces his coming schedule of one-off workshops for playing country and classic pop/ rock on clawhammer banjo and fingerstyle guitar. Full details are in his latest e-newsletter.

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On Tues. 25 July the IBMA presented a webinar discussion on the topic of generative AI (artificial intelligence) within the music industry, its copyright implications, and its future relationship with human creators. A one-hour-and-fifty-minutes video of the discussion can be seen on the IBMA Facebook and on YouTube.

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The BIB sends a belated 'Happy birthday' to master fiddler Robert Caldwell 'Bobby' Hicks (left) of western North Carolina, whose 90th birthday was on Friday 21 July. Sandy Hatley describes on Bluegrass Today the celebrations in Marshall, NC, with three photos, a video (also on YouTube), and quotations from those present, including fiddlers Michael Cleveland and Aynsley Porchak. One of the places around the world where Bobby has been is Dublin, where he played c.1996 as a member of Ricky Skaggs's country music band, on rhythm guitar and banjo as well as fiddle. He was inducted into the Bluegrass Music Hall of Fame in 2017; the photo above is taken from his Hall of Fame bio article.

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The Birthplace of Country Music Museum (BCMM) in Bristol, TN/VA, announces a special screening of the film '"I've endured": the music and legacy of Ola Belle Reed' on Mon. 28 Aug., associated with their ongoing 'Women in old-time music' exhibit. A three-minute-plus trailer of the film can be seen here. More details are on the BCMM newsletter.

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Finally, more IBMA news: the Keynote Speech at this year's World Of Bluegrass in Raleigh, NC, will be delivered by fiddle/ violin maestro Matt Glaser on Tues. 26 Sept., under the title 'Hidden threads: bluegrass in the American musical tapestry'. More details are on the IBMA press release, and still more about other aspects of World Of Bluegrass in the IBMA July 2023 newsletter.

© Richard Hawkins

More detached notes

The image on the right illustrates Alison Brown's online banjo teaching on the ArtistWorks website. On this link you can also listen to a 50-minute podcast interview of Alison Brown by Chris Pandolfi in his 'Inside the musician's brain' series. A Spotify playlist of Alison Brown recordings is included in Bluegrass Unlimited's weekly newsletter no. 142.

A week ago (21 July) the Bluegrass Situation online magazine published 'First & latest: Special Consensus' 40+year career', an interview by banjo-player Justin Hiltner with Greg Cahill, founder and leader of the Special Consensus, with YouTube recordings of Special C. numbers from their first and most recent albums.

Following yesterday's BIB post, we note that the Bluegrass Situation (BGS) published yesterday 'It's a great time to be on the Golden Highway', a new interview by Lonnie Lee Hood with Molly Tuttle, BGS's Artist of the Month, and others of her band Golden Highway. The photo above of the band is by Chelsea Rochelle.

For guitarists, the Bluegrass Situation presents a video (also on YouTube) of Jake Eddy and Jordan Tice playing the Norman Blake composition 'Orphan Annie' on their new Yamaha FG-9 guitars. More details are in the BGS article.

Canada's high-powered old-time trio the Lonesome Ace Stringband have a new album, Try to make it fly, scheduled for release in October, and released a single, 'Sweeter sound', which can be heard on YouTube and represents (as John Lawless's feature on Bluegrass Today puts it) 'a more Americana style of songwriting'.

Finally, another feature by Lonnie Lee Hood from the Bluegrass Situation a week ago: a compilation of seven videos illustrating occasions when the Father of Bluegrass, instead of playing mandolin, played acoustic or electric guitar, sang harmony, or danced (solo or with Emmylou Harris).

© Richard Hawkins

9 July - centenary of great mandolins

Bill Monroe's 1923 Lloyd Loar Gibson F-5 #73987, on display in the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum (photo: Mandolin Archive)

On 8 Feb. 2017 the BIB carried a post on C.J. Lewandowski of the Po' Ramblin' Boys (USA) and his mandolin, the Lloyd Loar Gibson F-5 #72058, shipped out of the factory five months earlier than Bill Monroe's iconic instrument. The BIB particularly commended the two articles (1, 2) that C.J. had contributed to Bluegrass Today, of which we said: 'It's a long story, but instrument freaks will not wish it a word shorter.'

Last Sunday (9 July) was the centenary of the day on which a batch of new Gibson F-5s, including what was to become Bill Monroe's, were approved by the designer, musician and acoustic engineer Lloyd Allalyre Loar (1886-1943). Richard THompson has marked the occasion with a post on Bluegrass Today which is equally well worth reading for all instrument freaks/ nerds/ enthusiasts. It includes four carefully chosen YouTube videos, one of which is a recent shortie from C.J. Lewandowski, reporting on a Lloyd Loar F-5 from the 9 July 1923 batch which he has located (and bought) in Athens, Greece.

© Richard Hawkins

More detached notes

Dark Shadow Recordings announce that Chicago's Henhouse Prowlers/ Bluegrass Ambassadors (veterans of several tours in Ireland) released yesterday (7 July) 'Subscription to loneliness', the third single from their coming album Lead and iron, due out in September. For the 1950s-style country feel, the band is augmented by the twin fiddles of Becky Buller and Laura Orshaw. More details are on the Dark Shadow press release.

Update 14 July: See also John Lawless's feature on Bluegrass Today, where you can hear an audio track of the song.

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Ronnie McCoury, eight times IBMA Mandolin Player of the Year, first played over here as a member of his father Del's band nearly thirty years ago. He talks at length about the experience of playing as a family, both in the Del McCoury Band and in the Travelin' McCourys, in an excellent interview with Lee Zimmerman on Bluegrass Today.

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Another perspective on playing music in a family context: Bluegrass Unlimited's Weekly Newsletter no. 139 continues the promised series of archive articles on the Osborne Brothers with this July 1984 article by Glenna Fisher, with ample, frank, and revealing contributions from both Bobby and Sonny, in their own words. Other good things in the newsletter include a link to Podcast 142 with Dale Ann Bradley.

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Ashby Frank, former mandolin player with the Special Consensus and now a respected songwriter and session musician, has released his version of the Tom Paxton song 'Where I'm bound' as a new single from his album Leaving is believing, with vocal guests John Cowan and Ronnie Bowman. More details are on Bluegrass Today, where you can hear an audio track. Audio CDs can be ordered direct from Ashby.

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Turnberry Records announce the release of a new recording of the David Stewart song 'Tennessee rain' by Greg Blake (over here six months ago with Special Consensus), Rebekah Speer, and Jeff Brown. More details are on the Turnberry press release.

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Intriguing news for banjo players - the Gold Tone Music Group announce two new resonator 5-string banjo models, both with a 24-fret fingerboard, giving a range of three full octaves. This is achieved not by extending the fingerboard over the head (as on the Deering 'Julia Belle' played by Alison Brown or Noam Pikelny's top-tension banjo) but by combining the scale length with a bridge position almost in the centre of the head, with a corresponding effect on the tone produced. The Mastertone™ OB-3EF sells for $1849.99 and the OB-150EF Orange Blossom for $1149.99.

© Richard Hawkins

Detached notes + PS

Recordings recently released by Pinecastle Records include albums by Dale Ann Bradley and Lorraine Jordan. as well as singles by them and by Danny Burns and Danny Paisley. YouTube videos of the singles can be seen on the Pinecastle press release. 'I loved 'em every one', the new single by Lorraine Jordan & Carolina Road, had its radio debut on 30 June and will be available on digital platforms on 14 July.

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Bluegrass Unlimited's Newsletter no. 138 announces that in the coming weeks Jesse McReynolds and Bobby Osborne will be commemorated by archive articles and Spotify playlists. A 1977 article on the Osborne Brothers by Pete Kuykendall, BU editor, can be read here.

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Turnberry Records announce the release of an official video of Mike Mitchell's rendition of 'Love of the mountains', a song written by Allen Mills, bass player of the influential Lost and Found band. The song was sung by Larry Cohea of California's High Country at one of the first (possibly the first) of the Athy bluegrass festivals, and again two months ago by High Plains Tradition at the Durrow Mini-Bluegrass Festival. The Mitchell video can be seen on the Turnberry press release, on Bluegrass Today, and on YouTube.

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Finally, yesterday on Bluegrass Today Richard Thompson commemorated 4 July 1941, when Doc Watson, then 18 years old, played for the first time into a microphone, resulting in the first audio recording of his playing.

PS: John Lawless has reported on Bluegrass Today that Willie Nelson's next album will comprise a dozen of his classic songs, newly recorded with backing by first-class bluegrass musicians. A video of a debut single, 'You left me a long, long time ago', can be seen on Bluegrass Today and on YouTube. His admirers will be relieved to know that Willie's characteristic vocal delivery and sense of timing have not been bluegrassified.

© Richard Hawkins

Danny Burns releases 'Come to Jesus' (update)

The Bonfire Music Group announces that Danny Burns (raised in the north-west of this island, making an active career in Americana and bluegrass in the USA, and on tour here as recently as the eve of the pandemic) has just brought out a single, 'Come to Jesus', from his forthcoming album Promised land. The single features Sam Bush, who also takes part in another track on the album, 'Dirty old town'.

Update 13 July: The official video for 'Come to Jesus' is now out; it can be seen on John Lawless's feature on Bluegrass Today and on YouTube.

The ten tracks of the album include other guest artists: Tim O’Brien, Bryan Simpson, and Aine Burns. One of the tracks is 'Danny boy' (see the BIB for 21 April 2023). The track listing on the Bonfire Music Group press release gives 'Danny boy' as '(traditional)'. That certainly applies to the tune, but Fred Weatherly of Somerset, who wrote the words, should not be forgotten - see the BIB for 15 June 2015.

© Richard Hawkins

Bobby Osborne, 7 Dec. 1931-27 June 2023

Following closely upon the death of Jesse McReynolds (see the BIB for 24 June), the bluegrass world has now lost another member of the founding generation of the music with the death yesterday (27 June) of Bobby Osborne at the age of 91. A photo of the two great singer/ mandolinists together is on Bobby's Facebook.

Bobby and his younger brother Sonny were inducted into the Bluegrass Music Hall of Fame in 1994, a year after Jim & Jesse. Like them, the Osbornes were original and innovative, and often controversial in using 'non-bluegrass' instruments on recordings, and playing amplified mandolin and banjo on live shows. Like Jesse, Bobby Osborne remained vigorously active in recording and performing after Sonny retired in 2005. John Lawless's obituary/ biography of Bobby on Bluegrass Today includes a video of the Osbornes playing 'Rocky Top' in 1967, and one of Bobby's recording - fifty years later - of 'I've got to get a message to you'.

John Lawless remarks on the Osbornes' 'ill-fated association' with Red Allen (1956-8), which however was also the time when their trademark trio-harmony-singing style evolved, with Bobby's phenomenal voice taking a high lead. They went on to win successive vocal group awards on the country music scene. John Lawless's obituary concludes: '[Bobby's] death leaves a gaping hole in the hearts of every bluegrass fan, and we aren’t likely to see his kind again.'

© Richard Hawkins