Channelling Uncle Dave

The BIB editor writes:

East Nash Grass (USA) are six young musicians with a lot of bluegrass history behind them, in terms both of their individual experience in successive bands and their knowledge of older music. There may be other young bluegrass bands who can deliver an old-time number with a similar vitality to the original, but if there are I've not been lucky enough to hear them. It was a treat, then, to see and hear East Nash Grass on YouTube belting out 'Railroadin' & gamblin'' with the same kind of verve with which Uncle Dave Macon and his banjo recorded it in 1938.

East Nash Grass consists of James Kee (guitar), Cory Walker (banjo), Harry Clark (mandolin), Gaven Largent (dobro), Maddie Denton (fiddle), and Jeff Picker (bass). Their video was recently featured on Bluegrass Today. See also these two Mountain Fever press releases (1 and 2) and Bob Allen's four-page feature on the band in this month's Bluegrass Unlimited magazine.

Uncle Dave's recording can be heard on YouTube - for instance, here. A good guide to the words of the song is here.

Update: Thanks to Patrick Simpson of the Dublin Bluegrass Collective, who writes: 'Those East Nash Grass guys are hard to beat. They play in Dee's Lounge, Madison, Tenn. every Monday live on YouTube at midnight Irish time. I normally watch the next day.'

© Richard Hawkins