Homegrown Music : Discovering Bluegrass

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Summary: An open-minded and objective assessment of bluegrass music
Review: All of us were bluegrass music neophytes at some time in our past. Perhaps a few of us were born into bluegrass, but most of us crossed paths with the genre somewhere along life's road. For journalist and photographer Stephanie Ledgin, it was July, 1975 when the young college graduate went to work as assistant editor of Pickin' magazine. She probably didn't know the difference between the Clinch Mountain Boys and the Clinch Mountain Clan. Or the Blue Grass Boys and Blue Sky Boys. But Ledgin did know that the music grabbed and moved her, and she then spent a couple years in Nashville. Besides Pickin', her work has also appeared in such publications as Bluegrass Unlimited, Acoustic Guitar, Sing Out!, and Bluegrass Now. Now, with nearly three decades of journalism experience under her belt, she has the background, facts and insight to educate today's bluegrass "newbie." Her timing is good as the late-2000 release of the film "O Brother, Where Art Thou?" has created a resurgence of interest in the genre. She mentions the movie frequently throughout the book.

Ledgin gives us an open-minded and objective assessment of bluegrass music, a fabric of our lives which is embedded in popular culture more than we consciously realize. At the same time, she concedes that it's still a "nonmainstream music." Her approach is shared in an enthusiastic personal manner. She wants us to know where to listen to bluegrass, what some recommended albums are, and how to learn to play the music. After defining bluegrass and delving into its origins, the author describes how it has evolved over the years. She explains that the family tree of bluegrass is more like a "forest of tangled roots and branches." Her paragraph descriptions of many bands and artists are good information, but, to a certain extent, they aren't presented chronologically which makes the logical historical threads a bit hard to follow. Ledgin then explores the various instruments of bluegrass.

The repertoire of bluegrass is given a cursory discussion of its themes related to love, death, faith and family. Then, some background info about a few key songwriters is presented. Throughout the book, she also includes short interviews with various individuals associated with bluegrass (Ralph Stanley, Janette Carter, Earl Scruggs, Jim Lauderdale, Sierra Hull, John McEuen, Jeff Hanna, Pete Goble and others). The international bluegrass scene, concerts, festivals, jam sessions, workshops and bluegrass in the schools are discussed. Her "completely subjective" list of 25 recordings to jump-start your collection (along with a few videos) barely scratches the surface of the bluegrass cannon, but it offers solid selections. She also includes concise contact info (including Internet website addresses) for magazines, syndicated radio shows, record labels, instruction material, and key organizations. I wish she would've noted the on-line listservs Bgrass-l and the Nwbluegrass Yahoogroup. The 25 photos were all taken by Ledgin, and all but one have not been published previously. They span a period from 1982-2003.

In an interview transcribed in the book, Ralph Stanley states about the importance of bluegrass in America music, "It's more down-to-earth. It tells a story; a lot of the songs do. It just fits all classes of people...Well, this type of music has not only reached the old people and the mountain people, it's gone out now and proved itself to the world." That, in the words of one of bluegrass music's patriarchs, may simply be the best reason for the newcomer and established fan (whether a musician or not) to pick up a copy of this book and discover bluegrass. (Joe Ross, staff writer, Bluegrass Now)