JIM AND JESSE:
* DEFINING BLUEGRASS, DEFYING CONVENTION
Steve Webb
* 02/12/99
Sarasota Herald-Tribune
(Copyright 1999)
Jim McReynolds, who with brother Jesse McReynolds formed one of
* the earliest groups to perfect the high lonesome sound of bluegrass
playing and singing, has a message about the style that, for years,
has been celebrated as mountain music's chamber music, an oasis of
consistency amid the ebb and flow of commercial country:
It was never that simple.
"We were inspired by Bill Monroe," McReynolds said of Jim and
Jesse and the Virginia Boys' earliest performances in 1947, "but we
were also very aware that we didn't want to sound just like Bill
Monroe. We looked for different things we could do, and if you fail
- well, you fail as yourself rather than have everyone listening and
going, `Well, they just tried to imitate Bill Monroe.' "
That meant that Jesse McReynolds would develop a cross-picking
mandolin style that owed more to Earl Scruggs' banjo technique than
to Monroe's mandolin style. It meant that other instruments would
join the mix in the recording studio. And it meant that Jim and
Jesse paid attention to having a contemporary repertoire, both for
studio and concert purposes.
"We were trying to go after something to make us stand out," Jim
* said. "Remember, this was before the festival circuit. Bluegrass
* musicians were part of country music and the goal was to impress the
promoters handling country shows. The first thing they'd hit you
with is, `What do you have on the charts?"'
So they included a tympani on "Thunder Road," steel guitar on
their version of "Truck Drivin' Man," and built a repertoire of truck
and train songs epitomized by "Diesel on My Tail."
Most notoriously, they were among the first country artists and
* definitely the first bluegrass artists to record songs by rock
pioneer Chuck Berry.
"From time to time, some of the critics would be pretty harsh on
what we were doing, but it worked for us," McReynolds said. "Those
Chuck Bery songs - everybody loved those things. We still get
requests for them. They worked for us."
As does the performance by harmonica player Mike Stevens with the
Virginia Boys. McReynolds said even that is not without its critics.
* "Some people think it isn't a bluegrass instrument," he noted. "A
lot of people don't remember Curly Bradshaw, who played harmonica on
the National Barn Dance in Chicago, toured with Monroe. They forget
DeFord Bailey, one of the original members of the `Grand Ole Opry.'
Roy (Acuff) took DeFord on the road."
It's like this: Guitar, banjo, mandolin, bass - they are all
picked and strummed. If a group is to have any sustained notes or
chords in its sound, the choices include fiddle, steel guitar or
possibly a dobro, or some kind of wind instrument such as a horn or
harmonica. The usual solution is to use a fiddle, but it isn't
always the solution Jim and Jesse have chosen.
"We toured with a steel guitar for a while," Jim recalled. "We've
had fiddle players. Sonny James played fiddle on our first record.
We had just hired a boy and he had a scheduling conflict for the
session - I don't know what the conflict could have been; there was
only one studio in Nashville in 1952. So Ken Nelson (Capitol
Record's country producer) brought in Sonny."
This was a year before James' recording debut as a singer and four
years before his huge hit, "Young Love."
"He had talent, but he was really more a showman than a player,"
McReynolds continued.
He tells the story, in part, to contrast then with now.
"It's a wonderful scene today. I can remember some years back
that if you'd lose a band member, you'd spend forever finding someone
talented to take his place," said McReynolds, who will celebrate his
72nd birthday on Saturday.
"The festival scene has meant that, today, there's all sorts of
talent out there."
