Articles

Photo by Daniel Coston For nearly half a century, fiddling ace Mike Hartgrove of the Lonesome River Band has been traveling highways across America playing bluegrass and country music.  “Mike is a road pro,” says Lonesome River Band leader Sammy Shelor. “The guy has been on the road since he was 17 years old, about…

Photo by Eleanor Wilkie Matt Flinner was touring nationally in a bluegrass band as a pre-teen.  Around 1980, Ted Shupe of Ogden, Utah formed a band of 10-year-olds around his fiddle-playing son, Ryan (now with Ryan Shupe and the Rubberband) and they called themselves the Pee Wee Pickers.   The band’s talent earned them spots…

Reprinted from Bluegrass Unlimited MagazineJanuary 1971, Volume 5, Number 7 “I’ve always wanted to do what we are doing now,” says Lester Flatt about his new approach to his music. The band currently features Buck “Uncle Josh” Graves, Jack Tullock and Paul Warren, plus two former Blue Grass Boys in the person of Roland White…

Reprinted From Bluegrass Unlimited MagazineApril 1983—Volume 17, Number 10 The Larry Sparks story begins September 25, 1947, in Lebanon, Ohio, just across the Kentucky line. Larry is the youngest of nine children of Eva and Charlie Sparks; all the children played guitar at least a little, and his grandfather Lewison Dose Russell was an old-time…

Reprinted from Bluegrass Unlimited MagazineNovember 1976, Volume 11, Number 5 Not since the introduction “Lester Flatt, Earl Scruggs, and All The Foggy Mountain Boys” last rolled off the tongue of announcer T. Tommy Cutrer has the name of a bluegrass band been longer or more talked about than “The Boys From Indiana with Paul Mullins…

Reprinted from Bluegrass Unlimited MagazineJanuary 1969, Volume 3, Number 7 This article came about largely as a result of my efforts to clarify some points raised by L. Mayne Smith in his article “An Introduction to Bluegrass” (reprinted in BU Volume 1, Numbers 3-6; JEMF Reprint Series number 6). BU readers will find many of…