August 2006 –

Scruggs-3
   (Continued from previous page)

From the stage of Boulder's Chautauqua Auditorium, a performer once said, "Now I know how my pick feels when it falls inside my guitar." Meaning the place is big and cavernous and dark inside, and made mostly of wood. Maybe that's how Earl feels about his place in modern music. Tumbling around in a confusing environment, albeit one filled with echoes of the friendly and familiar.

Chautauqua was the site of a July 31 taping of E-Town, a Boulder-based radio show distributed nationally on public stations. It is hosted by Nick Forster, an original member of Hot Rize, the pioneering, grammy-nominated modern-era bluegrass band born in the early 1980s. The sold out Monday night show, a day after Rocky Grass, was billed as a Bluegrass Bash, featuring the Scruggs band and Hot Rize. It will air on future dates beyond September of this year.

The E-Town show was not a "concert," Forster warned, before the taping began. Its main objective is to recognize good works, often with environmental benefits, by ordinary citizens. The easy-to-digest format mixes that high purpose with a dose of entertainment, usually of the musical variety. This show included an interview onstage with a Nepalese man, transplanted to Colorado, who has organized medical missions of mercy to his home country.

I lost count, after a dozen or so, of the references to Scruggs as a legend, or legendary, when he and his band finally took the stage. Their song list was an abbreviated version of the previous day's performance: "Foggy Mountain Breakdown," "Sittin' On Top of the World," "Doin' My Time." "Earl's Breakdown" sounded a bit fuller, with the auditorium's better acoustics, than at the festival. Still, anyone not schooled in bluegrass might have wondered, what's the big, legendary deal? My neighbor's kid can play that song about as well.

I feared that again Earl might again not utter a word. He did say it was great to be in Colorado, which drew a cheer. His son Gary led the crowd in wishing Dad a happy 82nd birthday, belatedly, which seemed odd. His birthday was January 6.

Earl then sat with Nick Forster for a 20-minute interview. Soft-spoken, he told the stories he's told before, about stumbling onto the three-finger style as a boy in North Carolina; about his brief interaction and friendship with King Curtis, a jazz sax player he met at the Newport Folk Festival, in 1960. He recalled hatching the idea for "Will the Circle Be Unbroken" with John and Bill McKuen, in Boulder in 1971. It was gratifying to hear the great man's voice. And to know he's all there, mentally, even after the death this year of his wife; and to hope he understands what he did for music, and that we love him for it.

Hot Rize, in deference to the world's greatest banjo player, served as this night's opening act. This "band" is by no means a road-weary touring contingent, omnipresent at festivals, as it once was. It re-unites on special occasions for maybe a dozen appearances per year. Based near Boulder are Forster, the E-Town host; and banjo picker Pete Wernick, who produces instructional material and conducts jam camps for pickers. Mandolinist Tim O'Brien has moved on to success and acclaim as a recording artist in Nashville. Bryan Sutton, a fiery flatpicker roughly half the age of the others, stepped in on guitar after Charles Sawtelle died in 1999. Of Sutton's thriving career, Hot Rize and the Scruggs band are two small parts.

In 25 years as a top band, Hot Rize made more than a few contributions to the bluegrass lexicon. "Just Like You," penned by Wernick, and "Hard Pressed We Can Find a Way," by O'Brien, were done to perfection. The forgiving format of a radio taping allows for out-takes and do-overs. On one hot instrumental, twice, Wernick halted the banjo intro after a few measures to go at it again. That sort of peek behind the scenes not only amuses the folks. It demonstrates that with the air-tight standards of bluegrass, there is a right way and a wrong way.

That aside, the Hot Rize sound was tight and powerful. With just four instruments and two or three voices, it blew away the sound of the Scruggs band with its drums and electric guitar. Not in volume, necessarily. But in the instrumental interplay of a classic bluegrass band, nothing is wasted. There is no "throwaway" sound, nor any rivalry between instruments. Everything complements everything else. Drop the bass or cut the rhythm guitar, and you'll notice the void immediately. Kill the banjo back-up behind the mando, and you'll hear a hole. Add a drummer, and perhaps you've added a distraction.

Which is what Scruggs and his contemporaries taught the world, ironically, two generations ago. Playing without amplification in schoolhouses and theatres, they created a raw, pure sound that is enduring and, in some ways, impossible to improve. Not that we shouldn't try, and thankfully, even Earl himself is still trying.

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