Tribute to the Great Earl Scruggs

Eerie photo of Bill Monroe & his Bluegrass Boys. Earl is front and center. Bill is behind him to our right. Where is Lester? Maybe he took the picture.

          I’m a little shocked at how often I am compelled to write an obituary for some great musician I admire. I always wish I’d written something about them when they were alive!

          Of course, I’m referring to the fact that pioneering banjo virtuoso Earl Scruggs died March 28^th of natural causes at age 88.

          Earl revolutionized the art of banjo playing when he joined Bill Monroe’s Bluegrass Boys in 1945. Scruggs was the first banjo player to ever play for a national audience in the elaborate three finger picking style – a style as fiery as Monroe’s jet propelled mandolin playing. After 19 year old Scruggs auditioned for Bill Monroe, the legendarily understated Monroe leaned over to singer / guitarist Lester Flatt and asked, “Is he any good?” Flatt’s response was, “I don’t care what you pay him, he’s worth twice as much.”

         Scruggs may not have invented the three finger picking style – other banjo players, Ralph Stanley and Don Reno mastered the style around the same time. However, Scruggs always claimed he could still remember the day he was practicing and the three finger style miraculously fell into place, apparently from out of the blue and inspired by no one else.

          Bill Monroe is credited as the creator of bluegrass – the only style of music known to be invented by an individual. However, it never really sounded like bluegrass until Earl contributed his three finger banjo picking – a signature element of the bluegrass style.

          Membership in Monroe’s band brought with it regular performances on The Grand Ol’ Opry, recording dates and nationwide touring. Scruggs was a sensation in a sensational band. Unfortunately for Monroe, this, his dream line-up ( Monroe – vocals & mandolin, Flatt – guitar & vocals, Scruggs – banjo, Chubby Wise – fiddle & Cedric Rainwater – bass) only lasted from the time Scruggs joined in late 1945 until 1948 when Flatt & Scruggs left the band to form their own Foggy Mountain Boys. (The soft spoken and eminently sensible Scruggs felt threatened by Monroe’s freewheelin’, womanizing lifestyle. Apparently, Monroe was carrying on an affair with the wife of a highway patrol trooper, and was often speeding on the highway with this particular girlfriend and his band members in the vehicle. Scruggs feared what would happen if that particular ARMED police officer would pull them over and then learn that someone in the band was having an affair with his wife.)

          Flatt & Scruggs maintained a successful partnership for 21 years. They recorded for Mercury Records, and most successfully for Columbia. During the 60’s Flatt and Scruggs were the second most popular country act to record for Columbia, their success exceeded only by that of Johnny Cash. Even though the hillbilly sound and pious, old fashioned lyrics of bluegrass seemed anachronistic to the psychedelic hippy era, bluegrass thrived during the 60’s. Their popularity was helped no doubt, by their frequent appearances on the top rated “The Beverly Hillbillies”. Their extremely stiff “acting” had an awkward charm of its own, and of course their music was always great. Their “Beverly Hillbillies Theme” was heard weekly on the show, although it’s lead vocal was sung by Jerry Scoggins. They scored a surprise late 60’s hit when their 1940’s recording “Foggy Mountain Breakdown” was featured in the ground breaking film “Bonnie & Clyde” (Despite the fact that bluegrass music did not yet exist in the time of Bonnie & Clyde.) Also, bluegrass in general was helped by the fact that the hippy generation were quite appreciative of “folk” artistry as a reflection of the views of The People.

          Admittedly, their Columbia Records are a bit odd. The team was regularly given current hits to re-record. Their takes on Ian & Sylvia’s “Four Strong Winds”, Bobbi Gentry’s mysterious “Ode to Billie Jo” and especially Bob Dylan’s “Down in the Flood” were excellent. Material like “The Universal Soldier”, “Like A Rolling Stone” and “Everybody Must Get Stoned” (What the hell were they thinking !?!?!?) were ridiculous. Clearly it was profitable for Columbia Records to have Flatt & Scruggs record songs written by other artists signed to their label, even if they weren’t remotely appropriate for Lester and Earl’s personalities. Flatt asked the rhetorical question, “Why do they have us record all of Dylan’s songs when they already have them by Bob Dylan?”

          Their individual reactions to having to record contemporary material are the exact opposite of what I would have expected. Earl was all for it – despite the fact that there was virtually no room for banjo picking in these songs. Flatt was against it, despite the fact that I would think these modern songwriters were providing intriguing lyrics for a vocalist to sing.

          They broke up (apparently pretty amicably) in 1969. Columbia made them such a lucrative offer, that they recorded their final album six months after their break-up.

          Earl went on to form the more progressive Earl Scruggs Revue with his sons, and Lester went back to his beloved old bluegrass style. Although Earl’s legendary status was already established, neither he, nor Lester would duplicate the popularity they had enjoyed as a team.

Per Wikipedia, ”Flatt and Scruggs won a Grammy Award in 1969 for Scruggs' instrumental "Foggy Mountain Breakdown". They were inducted together into the Country Music Hall of Fame in 1985. In 1989, Scruggs was awarded a National Heritage Fellowship. He was an inaugural inductee into the International Bluegrass Music Hall of Honor in 1991. In 1992, he was awarded the National Medal of Arts. In 1994, Scruggs teamed up with Randy Scruggs and Doc Watson to contribute the song "Keep on the Sunny Side" to the AIDS benefit album Red Hot + Country produced by the Red Hot Organization.
In 2002 Scruggs won a second Grammy award for the 2001 recording of "Foggy Mountain Breakdown", which featured artists such as Steve Martin on 2nd banjo solo (Martin played the banjo tune on his 1970s stand-up comic acts), Vince Gill and Albert Lee on electric guitar solos, Paul Shaffer on piano, Leon Russell on organ, and Marty Stuart on mandolin. The album, Earl Scruggs and Friends, also featured artists such as John Fogerty, Elton John, Sting, Johnny Cash, Don Henley, Travis Tritt, and Billy Bob Thornton.^[9]
On February 13, 2003, Scruggs received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. That same year, he and Flatt were ranked No. 24 on CMT's 40 Greatest Men of Country Music.
On September 13, 2006, Scruggs was honored at Turner Field in Atlanta as part of the pre-game show for an Atlanta Braves home game. Organizers set a world record for the most banjo players (239) playing one tune together (Scruggs' "Foggy Mountain Breakdown"). On February 10, 2008, Scruggs was awarded the Lifetime Achievement Award at the 50th Annual Grammy Awards.”

Lester Flatt died in 1979 – he was only 64.