The Lonesome River Band. Photo By Dan Tackett.

Ronnie Bowman & the Committee with Robbie McCoury Sitting in on banjo. Photo by Dan Tackett.

Eddie Adcock on stage during a performance with wife Martha. Photo by Dan Tackett.

Earl Scruggs and Lizzie Long onstage at the 2008 Bean Blossom Bluegrass Festival. Photo by Thomas Stout.

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Adcock, Gaudreau, Waller & Gray - The Country Gentlemen Reunion Band (RadioTherapy Records)

It’s nothing short of amazing that the landmark bluegrass band, The Country Gentlemen, has been around for half a century. It’s equally difficult to fathom the huge impact the group has had on bluegrass as we know it today.

From the outset, the Gents didn’t mirror the Deep South roots of Bill Monroe, the Stanley Brothers or Flatt and Scruggs. They were cut from a different mold.

A bit of insight into the famous band’s past and an exclamation point on the group’s indelible stamp on an American form of music are both offered on a new CD, “Adcock, Gaudreau, Waller and Gray: The Country Gentlemen Reunion Band.”

The group includes two original members — banjo picker and guitarist Eddie Adcock and bass player Tom Gray. Joining them are Jimmy Gaudreau on mandolin and Randy Waller on guitar. Gaudreau was the Gentlemen’s second mandolin player who replaced John Duffey and Waller is the son of the late Charlie Waller, perhaps the Gentlemen’s perfect Gent.

Eddie Adcock and his wife/musical partner Martha are listed as both producers and executive producers. The CD is on the RadioTherapy Records label.

This CD will offer great memories and pleasure to longtime fans of the Gentlemen, and I’d bet it will be embraced by the new crop of bluegrassers. It has an incredibly strong song lineup and some pretty darn good picking to boot.

Adock, ever the crochity old warrior, shows age has treated him like fine wine with his prowess on banjo. He comes across smooth and strong throughout the tracks, but never more so than on the old classic, “Sweet Georgia Brown.” Yep, Eddie can still cook. Gaudreau takes his turn in the spotlight with an original instrumental, “El Doggo,” which also includes fine supporting licks from Adcock and Waller.

I wouldn’t dare to be the judge to determine “bluegrass” or “non-bluegrass.” All I care to say is this: My ears are pleased and I smile a lot when listening to this CD.

I caught The Gentlemen at a festival only months before Charlie Waller died. It was my first live exposure to this group, and I’ll have to say, as frail as Charlie Waller seemed on stage that day, it was easy to see that entertaining the crowd in front of him was priority No. 1. Failing health had to take a back seat for the two, 45-minute sets he did. A year later, after Charlie Waller’s passing, I caught Randy Waller’s reincarnation of the group. Perhaps that first impression I got a year earlier left a strong mark on my memory, but I wasn’t impressed.

Fast foward a few years to this new CD, and I offer an olive branch to Randy Waller, whose vocals are to be commended on the reunion project. They, indeed, are Gentlemen-like.

The CD’s 13 songs obviously were carefully chosen to reflect the true flavor of the Gentlemen. There’s the off-the-wall stuff, like “El Doggo;” a bit of country, including Merle Haggard’s “White Line Fever;” and just a bunch of tunes that simply sound like old friends.

Martha Adcock sums the entire aura around the Gentlemen of yesterday and this newest version on the CD in her very eloquent liner notes:

“‘It’s good, but it ain’t bluegrass’ is what they said 50 years ago …but folks who know bluegrass music know that the ‘Classic’ Country Gentlemen are a big reason why bluegrass sounds the way it does today.”

I wouldn’t dare to be the judge to determine “bluegrass” or “non-bluegrass.” All I care to say is this: My ears are pleased and I smile a lot when listening to this CD.

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Eddie & Martha Adcock pictured onstage at Ichibankan, will kick off the month of May with a string of dates on the west coast. Photo by Hiromi Chida

Eddie and Martha Adcock will spend May Day in sunny California. In fact, the duo will spend quite a few May days on the West Coast.

Their schedule for next month includes:

May 1 & 2: Granada Hills, Calif.– Blue Ridge Pickin Parlor, 17828 Chatsworth St., www.pickinparlor.com, 8 p.m.

May 3: Granada Hills, Calif. — Eddie Adcock Banjo Workshop at Blue Ridge Pickin Parlor, 818-282-9001, $50 fee, 1-4 p.m.

May 7: San Diego, Calif. — Old Time Music, 2852 University Ave., www.sdoldtimemusic.com ,7:30 p.m.

May 9: Santa Clara, Calif.– Mission City Coffee Company, 2221 The Alameda, www.fiddlingcricket.com, 8 p.m.

May 11: Montrose, Calif. — House Concert & potluck spread, 818-249-2969, noon.

May 31 Suwanee, Ga. — Everett’s Barn, 4055 Stonecyper Road, http://www.everettbrothers.com, 770-945-5628 or 770-945-9098 or 770-945-0176, 8 p.m.

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Eddie & Martha Adcock onstage at Ichibankan, a converted ancient sake manufacturer in Fukuoka. Photo by Hiromi ChidaEddie & Martha Adcock, Tom Gray and Japanese country radio personality Hiromi Chida backstage at IchibankanTom Gray onstage at Ichibankan in Fukuoka. Photo by Hiromi Chida.Eddie & Martha Adcock with Hiroshi Asada (The Tourmaster) onstage at Fukuoka during the last stop on the Adcocks’ sold-out seven-city tour of Japan. Photo by Hiromi Chida.

Eddie and Martha Adcock closed out 2007 with their very first tour of Japan — and discovered that their high standing in the bluegrass realm, along with their songs, vinyl albums, tapes and CDs, had preceded them long ago to the Orient.

“Absolutely, our reception in that country couldn’t have been more warm and enthusiastic,” Martha says in a lengthy discourse of the trip that’s part of the Adcocks’ latest e-mail newsletter. “Japan has been a hotbed of bluegrass music activity for decades, and one of the main catalysts was the recordings of the ‘classic’ Country Gentlemen (Eddie Adcock, John Duffey, Charlie Waller and Tom Gray), who are still revered and whose music and personalities have quite a large number of fans. Among many bluegrass musicians, there remains a love for — and adherence to — the sound and repertoire of the classic-period Gents.”

Martha said the Japanese tour, which included several sold-out concerts spanning many corners of the country, was a long-awaited dream for Eddie.

“… this trip was the realization of a dream held over the years, ever since he, John Duffey and Charlie Waller with Ed Ferris had been invited to play Japan in the mid-late 1960s,” Martha said. “But they never went. The twist to that story is that Eddie, reaching far back under the front seat of the Gents’ tour vehicle one day, found an expired contract to play Japan. According to Eddie, ‘In those days, Duffey was so afraid of flying that he
simply hid the contract. I was really disappointed to miss that opportunity. Of course, later with the Scene, Duffey decided he loved to fly! Well, for years after the contract incident I still wanted very much to go to Japan, and although opportunities arose many times, for different reasons it never worked out…until this trip. I had such a fabulous time there that I guess it was worth the wait.’”

Martha was astounded at the many avid fans who knew not only the Country Gentlemen’s material, but also the songs she and Eddie have recorded as a duo over the years. “We all autographed large numbers of career-spanning CD’s and collectors’ albums as well as pictures, magazines, instruments, t-shirts, et cetera. Would you believe that we even had a few squealing, sobbing young groupies? It’s hard not to enjoy being treated like bluegrass demigods,” beamed Martha. The trip, which took place in December, was the climax of the Country Gentlemen’s 50-year anniversary. Eddie and Martha were accompanied by bass player Tom Gray and his wife Sally. According to Martha, they “toured the length and breadth of that lovely country for nearly two weeks, playing to sold-out houses each night.”

Gray and the Adcocks were joined on stages throughout the country by several Japanese musicians who they have met over the years, including longtime friend Akira Otsuka who played mandolin on several shows. The Adcocks and Gray also played several concerts with “The Gentlemen” a Japanese band that performs Country Gentlemen classics.

One show in Kobe featured a reunion of the legendary Bluegrass 45, which includes Akira Otsuka. Bluegrass 45 was the first Japanese bluegrass band to tour America.

“It was surely a high point of our musical careers,” Martha says as she reflects on the trip. “And, as an appropriate cap on the 50th-anniversary year of the Country Gentlemen, it would be hard to beat.”

Eddie & Martha will be playing a March 15th show at the Rivervalley Community Center in Moscow, OH.

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