All posts tagged: Norman Blake

Five albums for a desert island: The Circle Album

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I still remember coming home sometime in 1972 — I was a junior or senior in high school — and putting Will the Circle be Unbroken on my stereo. I had started focusing on acoustic music (such as James Taylor) a year or two before, but I was soon exploring more of the roots of folk, which led me to the record bin on that fateful day when I found this record with the funny looking cover by the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band — a country-rock ensemble I had recently seen in concert. There was a little patter to start the record, which was unusual in and of itself in that era of over-produced rock albums, with Jimmy Martin commenting on John McEuen’s banjo kick-off by saying, “Earl never did do that….”  But then Martin, the Dirt Band, and their musical guests were off with a rollicking version of The Grand Ole Opry Song. Decades before O Brother Where Art Thou?, there was Will the Circle Be Unbroken when some long-haired hippies and rockers took country, bluegrass, and mountain …

Watching the Grammy’s Part II

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After closing out last night’s More to Come… post on the Grammy’s, I caught the final award for album of the year, which went to Robert Plant and Alison Krauss for Rising Sand.  There is some justice when a rock icon who never won a Grammy with Led Zeppelin suddenly wins five when he teams up with – as the Washington Post’s J. Freedom du Lac termed her – “bluegrass goddess” Krauss. I loved it when Plant – that Led Zeppelin screamer – thanked old time musicians Mike Seeger and Norman Blake, along with bluegrass fiddler extraordinaire Stuart Duncan and the wonderful independent roots record company Rounder Records in his acceptance speech.  We haven’t heard names like that from the Grammy stage since O Brother swept the awards show.  Woo hoo! More to come… DJB

Live at McCabe’s

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I am in Santa Monica, California, for a set of meetings.  For most people, when they think of Santa Monica they think of the beautiful beach and the restored Santa Monica Pier, with its historic carousel and the great Ferris wheel that lights up the night sky.  Those things are all pretty wonderful, but when flatpickers come to Santa Monica they think of Live at McCabe’s. Back in the 1970s, Norman Blake was making his first west coast appearance and he recorded an album at McCabe’s Guitar Shop, which is located on Pico Boulevard here in Santa Monica.  It is a wonderful album for several reasons, but most of all because it showcases Blake’s incredible guitar flatpicking skills.  For those who’ve only heard Blake on O Brother Where Art Thou or on his later albums, there’s always a wonder – as others have noted – at how Blake came to be mentioned among the first guitar greats in the same breath with Doc Watson, Dan Crary, and Clarence White.  When you listen to Live at …

Playing Music

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Playing music with friends over Thanksgiving has pushed me to reorder my schedule to find even more time to play.  And – no surprise here – I’ve loved it.  I’m reacquainting myself with some of the playing of Norman Blake (check out the Nashville Blues video below of Norman and the Rising Fawn String Ensemble) and other musicians I admire. In the delightful book Practicing, author and musician Glenn Kurtz says, For me, sitting down to play has very little to do with discipline.  “It isn’t just education and discipline that makes one so devoted to work…it is simple joy.  It is one’s natural sense of well-being, to which nothing else can compare.”  Love of music brings me to the practice room. I am finding that joy in playing again and it is a wonderful feeling. So I’m off to play a bit now, and then tomorrow evening I’ll be at the Celtic Christmas concert of the Institute of Musical Traditions for some great acoustic guitar by Al Petteway and Robin Bullock.  If you’re in the Washington, …