Nice posts about your bluegrass “inductions” everyone. Here’s mine.

For me it all happened in the summer of 1977. Pretty much all I was listening to was jazz and blues: John Coltrane, Miles Davis, Billie Holliday, Cedar Walton, Oscar Peterson, Thelonious Monk, Charles Mingus, Stan Getz, etc. and all the blues greats (B.B. King and all them).

Then a friend asked me to go to a bluegrass festival. Not really knowing what that was, I said, “Sure.” It turned out to be the Berkshire Mountain Bluegrass Festival on the Rothvoss Farm. We parked up behind where the teepee has been for the last several years. No problem finding a spot. I got out of the car and heard this amazing music coming from the stage. I hurried in that direction until I could see what was going on. Ralph Stanley & the Clinch Mountain Boys were performing and the sound was pure magic. I didn’t know what bluegrass was, but I knew that I loved what I was hearing. It was instant addiction. An epiphany.

I walked around that weekend about three feet off the ground, knowing that my life was different, but not knowing exactly how. I couldn’t wait for the next year’s festival, so I wrote a note to Nancy Talbot and offered to help spread the word.

A few years later I was walking along the street in Herkimer, NY and went past a barber shop. The door was open and live music was wafting out the door. I did a quick double-take and went in, introduced myself and listened for a while. They told me about the every-other-Wednesday night jams at the barber shop and invited me to come listen. I was teaching Special Education at the time and for weeks, I’d sit in the corner on Wednesday nights, correct papers and tap my foot to the music. I loved it. You never knew who’d show up.

Sometimes it was great and sometimes it was wasn’t so great, but nobody really cared. They had fun and so did I.

Then one night the usual stand-up bass player didn’t show up and there was no one to play bass. They looked around and pointed to me and said, “Mary, come up here. We’ll show you what to do and we’ll play in G all night.” I wasn’t sure what that meant, and I knew nothing about the bass, but they coached me and at the end of the night, they stuffed the bass into my car and said, “Take this home.

Play along to Del McCoury and Bob Paisley records and come back in two weeks. Ya got Del and Bob at home? If not, we’ll loan you some.”

I was thrilled!

Needless to say, every night and all weekend long I’d play along and try to figure out the keys and chord progressions. I must have done something right cuz after the next session they sent me home with the bass again and said I was doing fine.

The rest is history. Now I play in a couple of bands, have played bass on several CDs, and along with a huge bunch of wonderful folks, am happy to help make Grey Fox & Rhythm&Roots happen. And I have an enormous family that goes way beyond my own blood relatives. When I think of what might have happened if I hadn’t gone to “a bluegrass festival” with my friend back in the summer of 1977, it simply boggles my mind.

Who knew???

My taste in bluegrass today is all over the place – everything from old time to newgrass, but my favorite bluegrass singer is still Ralph.

That’s what happened to me. My life sure is different than when I first went to the Rothvoss Farm!

– Mary

I can actually attribute a lot of my bluegrass history to Grey Fox.

As a kid I definitely loved seeing the Dillards on Andy Griffith and Flatt and Scruggs on the Bev Hillbillies but as a musician I started with folk – got my first guitar when I was about 12 and loved to play and sing Dylan, John Sebastian, Simon and Garfunkel, Beatles, etc., through my teenage years. I lived in Santa Cruz California for several years in the late 70’s and got heavy into jazz at a small college in Aptos, CA called Cabrillo. From there I moved to New Hampshire with my California girl and got involved in a few bands – mostly jazz, classic rock, and blues.

A small theater in Keene, NH had live music and one night my wife and I went to see Seldom Scene (I think this is what happened). We really enjoyed it and they mentioned they would be playing at a festival in New York called Winterhawk – I think a friend mentioned it a well.

1989 was our first festival. Kim and I fell in love with Winterhawk and the Rothvoss Farm that first year – my memory is a little flaky and I’m sure I’m combining a few early fests.. but I remember seeing Alison Krauss singing Midnight Rider and celebrating her 18th birthday, New Grass Revival, Hot Rize and Red Knuckles, Tony Rice with Norman Blake, Peter Rowan. Oh man I loved that hill!

Bluegrass remained a once a year thing for several years. One festival, probably around 1999 I happened to catch the guys from Buddy Merriam’s band jamming near our camp. They really knew their stuff – picking and vocal harmony – it was that year I decided to seriously learn to play bluegrass and participate in the field picking.

I figured that since I knew jazz, bluegrass would be easy to nail – I was mistaken. I have been consumed by bluegrass ever since. I’ve been in a couple of bluegrass bands and go to a bunch of festivals every year. Grey Fox is definitely the highlight of my family’s summer – actually our year. My kids were weaned on it and wouldn’t think of missing it.

We start a list each year at the festival and plan the whole year for the next one.

Only 51 days till the liner party and then the festival. Can’t wait!!

– Scott

www.newfoundgrass.com
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Back in the early 60’s, in Pensacola, Florida (southern Alabama) my mother would turn the t.v. on and make me watch the so and so country hour. I think it was around 6:00 p.m.. I was forced to watch Jim and Jesse, Bill Monroe, Grandpa Jones and so much cornpone it made me sick! At ten years of age I thought I was some “modern” individual and, frankly, this music, and my being forced to watch it, embarrassed me. I wanted the Beatles and the ‘Mersey Beat’. As our family disintegrated I moved about with relatives but was becoming consumed with rock music. In 1965, at age twelve, I discovered the Byrds. This was “it” for me. To this day I love that Rickenbacker electric twelve string. Then I was a teenager and I discovered Cream and the Electric Prunes and Moby Grape. Thought I was really cool.

Joined the Navy in ‘71 and for sure I thought I would be a casualty.

Didn’t happen. I did meet a few fellows who had guitars and would play old time bluegrass on the ship while out at sea. I didn’t care for it much at first but a seed was planted. After the Navy I travelled to Northwest Connecticut to attend community college. I remember a sort of psychedelic existence (though those days were gone by) and got to hear the New Holy Modal Rounders (Easy Rider Soundtrack), the Dead (whom I hated), Brewer and Shipley and the Flying Burrito Brothers. I had already experienced the Byrds’, “Sweetheart of the Rodeo“, with its huge Gram Parsons influence. One day I heard “Old and in the Way.” Geez, Jerry could play this (later learning he started out with a bluegrass band)? Now I’ve worn out 3 LPs of “Old and in the Way” and I’ve become a sort of Gram Parsons expert (his influence on the Rolling Stones and Keith Richards, a friend, led to Honky Tonk Women, Dead Flowers and their ‘country era’).

If you have ever listened to the Flying Burrito Brothers’, Double Live Album you will have heard their nod to Bluegrass. Later Gram would team up with Emilylou Harris for some very famous sessions that included several new bluegrass standards. Emmylou’s first album had several Parson’s songs included. Later with the Nash Ramblers she continued the thread.

In my second attempt at university life I attended Southern Connecticut State University. I had become a John Prine fan. The dj on the Wednesday night bluegrass show at WPKN, Bridgeport played in a bluegrass band in a bar where I met him. As president of the Veteran’s Association I hired him for a gig at the college. I got the last beer keg license in Connecticut University history for this show in 1984. His name was Chris Teskey and he was the emcee at Winterhawk for the first several years (he emceed around the clock).

Well, he got my bluegrass jones going. He invited me to Winterhawk in 1984 and gave me a free pass. I went and it was love at first site and sound. Incidentally that steep hill to the right of the stage had NO ONE on it. It wasn’t very crowded but I had tons of fun. Haven’t missed one since.

Now, with my limited abilities, I get to sing with Caroline (R and R Volunteer Coordinator) and we usually sing Gram Parson’s “Sin City.” I’m hoping to learn more Parson’s songs and hopefully sing with Caroline. She’s such a great singer and with luck she’ll put up with me.

What got me out of rock music? Hearing “Hotel California” 100 times in the same week! Too bad. The Eagles’ concept album, “Duelin’ Daltons” was one of the best recordings ever made in my book. That was in part because of the participation of Bernie Leadon’s banjo work. Nowadays I look back on the Byrds’ experiments, Gram Parsons, John Prine (Paradise), Jerry, and the early work of Hot Rize and Seldom Scene (rest in peace, John Duffy) as the people who have most influenced my life and personal love of Bluegrass music. Hope I wasn’t too maudlin. Would be interested in others’ views and histories of same.

- Jack Mazur