bluegrass

Billy Strings, Molly Tuttle and a certain family named McCoury retained their dominant spots atop bluegrass music with multiple nominations for the 35th annual International Bluegrass Music Association Awards, which were announced Wednesday in Nashville. At the same time, fast-emerging bands East Nash Grass and AJ Lee & Blue Summit made surprising inroads with nominations in major categories as well as New Artist of the Year. The all-woman band Sister Sadie also stood out with eight total nominations, including for top Entertainer, Album, Song, Vocal Group, Female Vocalist, and Music Video, as well as nods in two instrumentalist categories.

Cris Jacobs has been tagged the “King of Baltimore rock and roll” by a leading local publication, but a quick look at his catalog and certainly his newest album suggests there's more. He made his name as a guitarist, songwriter and singer with The Bridge, a soulful jam band that toured the nation and overseas between 2000 and 2010. His solo projects have been well regarded, but he’s not been a force in Americana until recently. After a bit of a mid-life crisis, he turned to his first love - bluegrass - and pulled together a wonderful album called One Of These Days, with the Infamous Stringdusters as his band and Jerry Douglas as his producer. It landed Cris a debut on the Grand Ole Opry. How did he get here? We find out. Also in the hour, some of my recent catch-up with roots power couple Larry Campbell and Teresa Williams.

It's taken decades for the nature and impact of Jerry Garcia’s formative years as a musician and band leader to emerge and become semi-common knowledge, because for many, his devotion to old-time string band and bluegrass music between 1961 and 1964 doesn’t square with the quantum jams he’d be leading just a few years later. But because of the Dead, we have jamgrass, a popular branch of the family tree where instrumental interplay coexists with preservation of classic songs. And at last, this connection is made, and this story is told, in a new museum exhibit set for a two-year run, Jerry Garcia – A Bluegrass Journey, at the Bluegrass Music Hall Of Fame & Museum in Owensboro, KY. Episode 280 of The String takes you there with sound and voices from its grand opening weekend in late March.

After more than a decade helming her progressive acoustic band The New Hip, bass player Missy Raines has reconfigured and turned back to the music she was raised on and the genre for which she’s been named Bass Player of the Year by the International Bluegrass Music Association ten times, most recently in 2021. Her new band is called Allegheny, and her new album Highlander finds her singing about the lonesome wind, fast-moving trains, and more weighty and contemporary subjects in the old school style.

History was on Béla Fleck’s mind as he released Rhapsody In Blue on Feb. 16, the 100th anniversary of its 1924 premiere. It's a multi-faceted, album-length celebration of the great work of American music - and its adaptability. The centerpiece is a 19-minute classical version by the Virginia Symphony Orchestra with Fleck playing Gershwin’s tricky piano part on banjo. But there are blues and bluegrass versions of the piece too. Because even at age 65, when he could be coasting on all he’s done, Fleck still looks for apparently the hardest thing he could possibly try at any given time.

Bluegrass fans who love to stay home in the winter aren’t left out in the cold, because of a bumper crop of excellent new albums. Mostly by women and younger artists, they tell a gratifying story about where today’s music is going, and we’ve been reveling in these neo-traditional sounds over on The Old Fashioned (Saturdays 9 am / Tuesdays 8 pm).

From the golden era Grand Ole Opry to epic concerts of my Nashville years - Levon Helm’s Ramble and Down From The Mountain come to mind - the Ryman Auditorium is the place for multi-artist country music extravaganzas. We can add to those historic events Saturday night’s celebration of Earl Scruggs on the occasion of his 100th birthday. On the very stage where the banjo legend helped usher the bluegrass sound into existence, this three-hour tribute showcased foundational music played by many of the greatest living practitioners of the genre, including a whole bunch of banjo players.

When Ben Wright, then 28 years old, saw a banjo for sale in the window at Chicago’s Old Town School of Folk Music, he had no idea how far it would take him. Not just to gigs at the country’s best bluegrass festivals but to an improbable life of sharing American music with audiences young and old in more than 25 countries. Not only does Ben’s band, the Henhouse Prowlers, have a new record deal and a fine new album, the quartet has a track record of sharing bluegrass and good vibes with more non-Americans than probably any other band. And they’ve created a non-profit called Bluegrass Ambassadors to extend that mission into the future.

David Grisman was inducted into the Bluegrass Hall of Fame this Fall for his “distinctive and influential” mandolin playing and his large output of original instrumental tunes, comprising an offshoot of bluegrass called Dawg Music. He’ll be featured next year in the Hall’s exhibit about the bluegrass life of Jerry Garcia. But Dawg’s legacy also includes a lifelong passion for recording acoustic music. Taking cues from folklorist Ralph Rinzler, Grisman captured live shows, friendly jams, and studio sessions across six decades, and much of that has been released on his own record label, Acoustic Disc. Craig Havighurst got to visit with Grisman at his home in Port Townsend, WA this summer, making possible this special report.

When guitarist, songwriter, and Nashville MVP Mike Henderson died in late September, it was an especially hard blow to the original members of the SteelDrivers, the hard-edged bluegrass band that Henderson co-founded in 2005. Its members had been making music with the dynamic Henderson as long ago as the early 1970s. In a special report, Craig Havighurst examines Henderson’s legacy as a player and songwriter and how it’s bound up with one of the most successful roots bands of recent years, just as they’ve released their first gospel bluegrass album.