AJ Lee: Back to Bluegrass
“We started out right/Pickin’ in the pines/It’s a music that stays in your soul.”
Although AJ Lee is currently only twenty-four years old, she has been turning heads at California bluegrass events for nearly two decades. AJ attended her first festival when she was five years old and, as part of the Kids On Bluegrass program at California Bluegrass Association’s Father’s Day festival, she got up on stage and sang “Old Rattler.” Anyone who was within earshot knew that this young girl had a bright future in music.
By the time she was seven or eight years old, AJ had joined forces with the talented Tuttle family in their band The Tuttles with special guest AJ Lee. The Tuttles consisted of father, Jack (fiddle and bass), and his kids Michael (mandolin), Sullivan (guitar), and Molly (guitar and banjo). AJ rounded out the band on mandolin and vocals. Jack Tuttle (see Bluegrass Unlimited April 2021) is a prominent California bluegrass instructor who ran a “School of Bluegrass” for kids. With all of the talented kids that he knew as students, one may wonder why Jack selected AJ to be the only non-family member in his family band. Jack said, “It was clear to me that she would be a major talent. She was such a good singer so young. It was extraordinary. She was as good as any young kid that you’ve ever heard. At the time, Molly’s voice was coming into its own and I felt that they would be able to sing well together.” Jack added his voice as the third part on the band’s vocal trios.
AJ had not actually been one of Jack’s students since Jack taught in Palo Alto, California, and AJ lived in the town of Tracy, which was about an hour and a half away, without traffic. AJ had learned to play and sing from her mother, Betsy Riger. AJ said that her mother was a fan of country music and “a fabulous singer.” Her mother, a guitar player, learned enough about the mandolin to start teaching AJ how to play when she was four years old. AJ remembers, “She was very casual about it. Her teaching style was not intrusive. She wanted me to be interested on my own, so she didn’t push me.” When asked what kind of music she was learning how to play and sing at that age, AJ said, “It was mostly old country, but also an eclectic mix…some Bonnie Raitt…Patsy Cline…I even learned The Cascades ‘Rhythm of the Rain.’”
From a very young age, AJ was singing harmony with her mother. AJ said, “I’d be sitting in the back seat of the car while my mom was driving and we’d play a ‘find the note’ game. She would sing a note and I would match it. I think that helped me pick up singing harmony easier.” Kim Fox, who ran the Kids on Bluegrass program at the IBMA World of Bluegrass for many years remembers AJ coming into the program when she was seven years old (2005). Kim said, “AJ was very young and had a huge voice. She had this tone that was amazing for a kid her age.” By the way, the other kids in the program that year included Sierra Hull (13), Cory Walker (15), Jarrod Walker (13), Skip Cherryholmes (15), Molly Cherryholmes (13), Ruby Jane Smith (9), Paige Anderson (11), Aimee Anderson (10), Ryan Holladay (13), Christian Ward (13), Austin Ward (15), and Molly Tuttle (12). Each of these kids have gone on to make a name for themselves in the bluegrass, Americana, and/or country music worlds.
The Tuttles featuring AJ Lee
Regarding her joining forces with the Tuttles, AJ said, “I’d met the Tuttles at festivals. I was probably around six or seven and my parents were chatting with Jack and he invited me to sit in with them and I was eventually integrated into the band.” Jack remembers, “We kept a low profile. We probably only had five or six gigs a year. I didn’t want to be a stage parent.” At first, Jack was playing fiddle and the band would hire various bass players to sit in. Later, as the kids progressed, Jack moved over to bass and let the kids take all the solos.
The band eventually began to play more shows, but Jack said they kept it down to only playing shows eight to ten times a year. YouTube videos also brought the band attention. Jack said, “A booking agent back east saw a video and was interested in booking the band. He wanted to see us play live and suggested we attend the IBMA event. We didn’t go that year, but we did attend the next year. The booking agent was excited, but Molly was still in high school and AJ was in middle school. I did’t want to take the kids out of school to travel and play shows.”
Although AJ did not take personal lessons from Jack, she learned a lot being in the band and Jack did help arrange and write out her mandolin solos for her. She said, “Jack gave me pointers and I also had a lot of learning opportunities being around other players and jamming.” When asked about other mandolin players who have inspired her, AJ mentioned Sam Bush, Adam Steffey, Chris Thile, and Ricky Skaggs.
While AJ was with the Tuttles, in addition to touring on the west coast and occasional traveling to Nevada and Utah, they also traveled east on several occasions and performed in Canada. They recorded two albums, Introducing the Tuttles with AJ Lee and Endless Ocean.
In January of 2014 Molly Tuttle moved to Boston to attend college at the Berklee College of Music. As a result, the band slowed down. The gigs were scattered and then faded away completely. At that point AJ recorded a couple of EPs, one was simple titled AJ Lee (2017) and the other was called A Song For Noah (2014). AJ said, “I was not set on a solo career, I just recorded those projects for fun.”
During her years with the Tuttles, AJ also performed on occasion with a group of young musicians calling themselves OMGG (Obviously Minor Guys and a Girl), which included AJ with Nate and Max Schwartz and Marty Varner. When I talked with Kim Fox about IBMA’s Kids On Bluegrass, she said, “You have to go to YouTube and listen to OMGG play and sing ‘California Cottonfields’ at the 2009 IBMA World of Bluegrass Festival.” If you search “OMGG Bluegrass” on YouTube, you can find that video, and others, featuring AJ with OMGG.
AJ Lee and Blue Summit
In 2015 AJ started to put together a new band with her Tuttles bandmate Sullivan Tuttle (now twenty-six). Jack Tuttle recalls, “At first AJ put together a loose band, but it got more serious and solid as time passed and now they are a very high level and professional band. Everything is going their way.”
There have been a few personnel changes in the band over the past seven years with the current band consisting of AJ Lee (mandolin), Sullivan Tuttle (guitar), Scott Gates (guitar), Chad Bowen (bass), and Jan Purat (fiddle). AJ and Sullivan are original members, with Chad joining about four and a half years ago and Jan three and a half years ago. Scott Gates (formerly with the Los Angeles-based band the Get Down Boys) is the newest band member, having joined the band in December of 2021. Although Gates is the newest member of the band, he and AJ have a long history together. There are several videos on YouTube of Scott and AJ performing together, one when AJ is eight years old (search on “8 year old AJ Lee – Bury Me Beneath the Willow” – Gates is standing next to AJ, playing mandolin). AJ said, “I’ve known Scott since I was five years old. We would frequently be at the same festivals.”
AJ Lee and Blue Summit have recorded two albums to date. The first, Like I Used To (2019) strayed a bit outside the bluegrass genre as it included electric guitars, drums, and clarinet. AJ said, “We are young and we all have been influenced by different genres and we thought ‘we don’t have to do bluegrass,’ so we were experimenting to see if we were interested in anything else and the answer turned out to be ‘not really.’ So, we went back to bluegrass.” The band’s newest release I’ll Come Back (2021), did see the band coming back to their acoustic instruments and more bluegrass-oriented music.
I’ll Come Back (reviewed in Bluegrass Unlimited, Nov 2021) featured all original material. With the exception of the title song, which was co-written by AJ Lee and Jesse Fichman, and the instrumental “Rodney Dangerfield,” written by fiddler Jan Purat, all of the other eleven cuts on the album were written by AJ. When asked about her songwriting, AJ said, “I started writing when I was about twelve. My mom was writing songs and she is talented. I wanted to write so that I could make something of my own.” AJ said that although the inspiration to write comes and goes, she has kept fairly consistent at it through the years and admits that when she is getting ready to record it helps her focus on her writing.
Since 2019 the band has been collecting some prestigious awards. In 2019 the band won the Freshgrass Band Contest and Sullivan Tuttle placed second in the 2019 National Flatpicking Contest. As fate would have it, those two contests were on the same weekend. So, while the band was competing in Massachusetts, Sullivan was in Winfield, Kansas. In 2019, AJ was the winner of the International Bluegrass Music Association’s Momentum award for “Vocalist of the Year.” AJ has also won the Northern California Bluegrass Society award for “Best Female Vocalist” nine times. In 2020, the band received awards from that organization for “Best Bluegrass Band,” “Best Mandolin Player,” “Best Female Vocalist,” and “Best Guitar Player.”
The Future
AJ Lee and Blue Summit are currently maintaining a very busy tour schedule. AJ said, “Our tour schedule is packed right now, so it feels like things are getting back to normal.” She added, “No pandemic is going to stop us!” In addition to dates at various venues throughout California, Oregon, Washington, Colorado, Utah, and New Mexico, in 2022, the band is scheduled to play at the Charm City Bluegrass festival in Baltimore; the Strawberry Music Festival, the Kate Wolf Music Festival, the High Sierra Music Festival and the CBA Father’s Day Bluegrass Festival in California; and the Durango Meltdown and Telluride Bluegrass Festival in Colorado.
In addition to maintaining their heavy touring schedule, the band is also working in the studio when they are not on the road. They have recently recorded several cover tunes, like Gillian Welch’s “Tear My Stillhouse Down” and the jazz standard “Body and Soul.” Since the band’s last album Scott Gates has joined on guitar. Regarding Gates addition to the band, AJ said, “One of my favorite things is improvising my mandolin solos. Every one of my solos is improvised, which helps keep it fresh and interesting. It is more fun and more genuine. Having Scott in the band gives us new energy in our improvisations. He takes a lot of interesting solos and that inspires me to play things that I would not have thought of playing…something outside of my wheelhouse.”
At the twenty-four, AJ Lee has had as much, or more, experience on stage as some players who are twice her age. However, she maintains her youthful, creative energy and enthusiasm and with her talented Blue Summit bandmates by her side, the sky is the limit. Although the band has been together for seven years, more than two of those years included the pandemic roadblock. Back on the road in 2022, this band is hitting its full stride and I predict that they will be a big part of the bluegrass world in the future as they continue to gain momentum.
