Noppet Hill Bluegrass Preview
by Seth Rogovoy
(LANESBORO, Mass., July 20, 1999) -- The back of her new CD, "Laurie Lewis
and Her Bluegrass Pals" (Rounder), trumpets Laurie Lewis's new recording as
a "homecoming" and as "a return to the music that claimed her heart as a
teenager."
But in a recent phone interview from her home base in Berkeley, Calif.,
Lewis said she doesn't feel like she has had any kind of homecoming, because
to her she's never left home in the first place.
"I never really left," said Lewis, who headlines this weekend's Noppet Hill
Bluegrass Festival in Lanesboro (see below for details). "The traditionalist
bluegrass people would say that I certainly left, and my record company
thinks I certainly left. But even when I was putting out albums with mostly
my original stuff on it, they still categorized it as bluegrass. So I wanted
to do an album that I thought would fall really comfortably where everyone
keeps trying to put me anyway."
The bluegrass camp is a place where Lewis is happy to be, as bluegrass is
the music that first got her excited about playing and with which she is
most comfortable. So it wasn't any great stretch for her to assemble her
ideal ensemble of players, including her longtime musical partner Tom Rozum
on mandolin, guitarist Mary Gibbons, banjoist Craig Smith and bassist Todd
Phillips - her bluegrass pals, in other words -- to record an album of
classic and contemporary tunes in a straight-ahead, high-lonesome lineup.
Not that Lewis's bluegrass credentials were ever seriously in doubt. Twice
voted "Female Vocalist of the Year" by the International Bluegrass Music
Association, Lewis toured as a fiddle player on the Masters of the Five
String Banjo tour, in which she found herself singing nightly harmony with
none other than her early idol, Ralph Stanley.
Lewis will be bringing her bluegrass pals with her to Noppet Hill, where
they will draw heavily on the repertoire from the new album and probably dig
into some other selections from Lewis's two-decade long career as a
bandleader, singer, songwriter, fiddler, guitarist, bass player and
producer, rooted in bluegrass but straddling the amorphous territory that
also includes country and folk.
Lewis says that the same elements that attract her to bluegrass are the
very ones that allow her to stretch the form to embrace other kinds of
music.
"It's a wonderful combination of instruments that fall together really
well," she said. "They're acoustic and they don't trample each other.
There's no overlap in what the musicians do or the sounds of the particular
instruments.
"Traditionally - and this is something that a lot of bluegrass musicians
ignore - traditionally the music was an attempt by Bill Monroe and Carter
Stanley to take these various forms of music around them to make them their
own, and to write new music, personal music, within that form.
"So it's really a tradition of innovation. Traditionalist bluegrass
musicians don't really see it that way. They say you have to play the
repertoire, and play it the way Bill did. But what Bill was doing was
revolutionary and very personal to him, and I love that about it and I love
that with this instrumentation it's so easy to pull in my other influences,
like say Tex-Mex music, or the country influences from California, like Buck
Owens and Merle Haggard."
Lewis credits Berkeley and the Bay Area for its supportive atmosphere for
bluegrass and all kinds of music. "If the U.S. is the melting pot, then
Berkeley is the melting pot of the melting pot," she said. "Anything you
could possibly want to get deeply into you can find a community of people
here already into it."
The Berkeley bluegrass scene -- where Lewis first came to maturity in
groups including Phantoms of the Opry, Arkansas Sheiks, Good Ol' Persons and
the Grant Street String Band - also provided a stress-free incubator for
women to pursue their muse in a field not always eager to open doors to
them.
"The scene in the Bay Area was extremely welcoming and that's where I
started playing," she said. "I didn't even know it was a men's club, and
that says a lot about the wonderful men in the Bay Area bluegrass scene.
They certainly didn't act like it was a men's club.
"It wasn't until I'd been in that scene for years and then started
traveling and saw that in fact it was a men's club in most places….But by
that point I had my own band and was doing my own thing, so it didn't
matter. If I wasn't invited into the club, that was OK - I had my own club.
"In a lot of areas there is still a sort of bluegrass gunslinger mentality,
that the only right way is the original way, which of course was all men.
There is a lot of that. But I'm not out to prove anything. I'm out to play
music I love and hear in my head. If some men don't like it because it's a
women playing it, then they don't have to listen."
What you need to know about NOPPET HILL BLUEGRASS FESTIVAL
For the fourth year running, the Noppet Hill Bluegrass Festival takes place
this weekend at the Steele's Family Farm on Bailey Road in Lanesboro (five
miles north of Pittsfield off Route 7 - watch for signs). Perched at the
bottom of a gentle slope in a natural amphitheater in a 35-acre hay field
offering some of the most picturesque vistas in the Berkshires, Noppet Hill
has quickly become an annual highlight of the summer festival season,
drawing hardcore bluegrass fans as well as families just looking for a fun
way to spend a summer afternoon.
This year's festival takes place Friday, July 23, through Sunday, July 25.
Individual day passes are available at the gate (Friday, $10; Saturday or
Sunday, $20), as are three-day passes ($50) entitling holders to camp on the
site (free firewood is provided to campers). Children 12 and under admitted
free. Music runs Friday, 5 p.m.-10 p.m.; Saturday 11 a.m.-10 p.m.; Sunday 11
a.m.-5 p.m. Field pickin' - a highlight of any bluegrass festival worth its
salt - typically occurs around the clock. Gates open Thursday, July 22, at
noon.
Festivalgoers are encouraged to bring blankets and lawn chairs. There is a
large spectator tent near the stage to provide relief from the sun or bad
weather. Food vendors will be in ample supply, but coolers are permitted.
According to the festival's informative (and witty) website,
http://www.campfest.com (which includes links to home pages for most of the
performers), there are only two rules at Noppet Hill: 1. You have to pay to
get in. 2. You can't act like a jerk. Seems eminently reasonable.
THE PERFORMERS:
In addition to Laurie Lewis and Her Bluegrass Pals, who will perform at
Noppet Hill on Saturday, here is a rundown of the other groups scheduled to
appear over the course of the three-day weekend.
James King Band: Hailing from ground zero of bluegrass territory in Carroll
County, Va., James King grew up surrounded by bluegrass and old-time music.
Apparently it sunk in, as last year King's energetic, soulful style garnered
him the Traditional Male Vocalist of the Year award from the Society for the
Preservation of Bluegrass Music in America. (Sunday)
The Gibson Brothers: In the liner notes to their recording "Long Forgotten
Dream," Lanesboro's own Robert Fraker - himself a mandolinist and bluegrass
songwriter of no inconsiderable talent - hails upstate New York's Gibson
Brothers as "naturals…living proof of all that is said about the particular
power of brother duets" and "impressive writers of songs that fit seamlessly
into the tradition, keeping the repertoire at once fresh and timeless."
'Nuff said. (Saturday)
Larry Sparks: Singer-guitarist Larry Sparks joined Ralph Stanley's Clinch
Mountain Boys after the death of Ralph's brother, Carter Stanley, in 1967.
In 1969, Sparks went out on his own, and since that time has made his mark
as a living legend of bluegrass, noted for his expressive guitar playing and
soulful vocals. (Sunday)
The Goins Brothers: Brother Ray has retired, but brother Melvin Goins is
still going strong on 50 years in the business. This veteran of the Lonesome
Pine Fiddlers and the Stanley Brothers has a new band of youngsters backing
him, insuring that old-time bluegrass will survive well into the new
century. (Saturday)
Breakaway: One of the more "progressive" bands in this weekend's lineup,
this Burlington, Vt.-based outfit has been a perennial favorite at
Winterhawk and plays a lot of original material. (Friday and Saturday)
Karl Shiflett and Big Country Show: Founded in 1993, this quintet proudly
bills itself as "an all acoustic, traditional country music show, dedicated
to the preservation and performance of the original American musical art
form known as `Bluegrass Music.'" The group employs the traditional
one-microphone technique - apparently a hot topic among aficionados these
days - and dresses in vintage outfits that unabashedly declare "nostalgia."
(Saturday)
Adam Dewey and Crazy Creek: This eastern Mass.-based, straight-ahead quintet
plays traditional bluegrass from the repertoires of Bill Monroe, Joe Val and
the Stanley Brothers in addition to original tunes. (Saturday)
The Bag Boys: This Boston-based brother group includes members who in other
lives play avant-jazz and classical music. They come together with the
brothers Bag to play a blend of old-time and new songs, or "Sensible Music
for Troubled Times," as their CD is titled. (Friday and Saturday)
The Bogus Family: There's something mighty suspicious about this group
pretending to be an old-fashioned family ensemble. Perhaps it's the first
names, which include Eubie, Truly, Billy Bob, Hokus, Izzy and Knott? Bogus
or not, it's undoubtedly all in good fun, as leader Cecil Abels (his real
name?) brings the New Hampshire-based outfit to Lanesboro for the first
time.
Also, look for Bob Paisley and the Southern Grass (Sunday), Trevor Hollow
(Saturday), Mike Boulay and Friends (Friday) and Cow Tippers (Friday).
[This article originally appeared in the Berkshire Eagle on July 22, 1999.
Copyright Seth Rogovoy 1999. All rights reserved.]
