Jul 18
Don’t write Scruggs off any time soon
Earl Scruggs on stage at Bean Blossom in June of 2008. Photo by Thomas Stout.Earl Scruggs set the audience on fire last month with his brief, surprise performance at the Bill Monroe Memorial Bluegrass Festival in Bean Blossom, Ind. With no advance announcement, Scruggs appeared on stage with Lizzy Long & Friends, joining in some harmony singing, offering a few background licks on a vocal number and wowing the crowd with his banjo anthem, “Foggy Mountain Breakdown.”
It’s obvious that Scruggs, at age 84, hasn’t eased into the rocking chair.
An exclamation point to Scruggs’ non-retired status came earlier this week when the pioneering bluegrasser dazzled his audience on the final night of the Seattle, Wash., Symphony Orchestra’s SummerFest series. Scruggs’ appearance on the series playbill comes as no surprise once you realize who organized the concerts — Seattle native and ace fiddler/violinist Mark O’Connor.
Scruggs’ Seattle’s appearance, it should be noted, proves that milestones can happen, no matter a person’s age. Scruggs and his band had a more-than-adequate warm-up act, the Sparrow Quartet, one of virtuoso banjo player Bela Fleck’s many side projects. It marked the first time Scruggs and Fleck had shared the stage — and share it they did, with an encore performance that also included O’Connor.
Writing for the Seattle Times, freelance critic Tom Keogh, described the banjo guru’s performance: “… Scruggs was the center of a bluegrass onslaught. He played some of his most famous material (’Sally Goodwin,’ ‘Foggy Mountain Breakdown’) and a number of covers, including the 19th-century folk song ‘In the Pines,’ the even older ‘Soldier’s Joy’ (’I wrote it,”‘Scruggs quipped) and the Beatles’ ‘Lady Madonna.’
“Scruggs’ flowing, three-finger syncopation gave every tune a ringing quality that was both open and epic. Yet he could sound lazy and swaying (on Bob Dylan’s ‘You Ain’t Going Nowhere’), slightly martial (’Soldier’s Joy’) or witty (’Doin’ My Time’). “Surrounded by the likes of 75-year-old, Grammy Award-winning fiddler Bobby Hicks and renowned multi-instrumentalist John Jorgenson, Scruggs took a couple of necessary rests and let his terrific band rip through a few favorites.”
Also appearing as band members were sons Gary and Randy Scruggs.
Scruggs, meanwhile, has other summer dates to perform. He’ll appear Aug. 17 at the Havelock County Jamboree in Havelock, Ontario, and Aug. 31 at the Four Corners Folk Festival in Pagosa Springs, Colo.
A complete list of his tour dates and lots of information you may not know about Earl Scruggs can be found at www.earlscruggs.com.
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