Kentucky Traveler (43 page)

These are the young men who planted the seed of bluegrass in the fertile ground of country music, and it's still bearing fruit all these years later. They blazed the trail and laid the foundation everyone has built on. They created a revolutionary sound that had the essence of old-time string-band music, but with a raw energy and fire. It was a whole new vocabulary of original songs, musical licks, jazzy hot solos, bluesy rhythms, backup fills, and vocal arrangements. It was truly a sound never heard before. These guys were coloring outside the lines! All these years later, I'm still learning from their music, studying outtakes and alternate versions and hearing new surprises: the way Lester Flatt puts a twist on a word, or Chubby Wise's touch on a fiddle break. That's honey to me.

You already know how important Bill was to me, but the members of his band are my heroes, too. They all had a hand in designing the blueprint, and I've been blessed to have known these architects. I had a personal relationship with each of the Fab Five, except for the bass player, Howard Watts, whom I sadly never got the chance to meet. They've been mentors and musical fathers, not only to me but to generations of bluegrass musicians.

Chubby Wise had a background in old-time and country-style fiddling, and he put his stamp on everything he played. Chubby seldom used his little finger on his left hand, and as a result he made a lot of long slides during his solos, giving the music a bluesy feel that was perfect for Bill's style. I've wished a thousand times I could have talked to Chubby more about the old days.

Hard to believe, but it was more than fifty years ago that I met Lester and Earl as a wide-eyed seven-year-old. I saw Lester quite a few times on the festival circuit while I was with Ralph in the early '70s. He was the same ol' Lester off the stage as he was on stage, and his down-home personality made him the best emcee that bluegrass ever had. We talked about the time I did a guest appearance on the Flatt & Scruggs TV show, and I was amazed he remembered me. I know for sure that bluegrass fans will always remember the man who wrote so many classic songs, like “Cabin in the Hills” and “God Loves His Children,” and who gave the world the “Lester Flatt G-run,” which every bluegrass guitarist can play in his sleep! You've probably heard it, that run on the guitar that fills the space before a solo or a vocal. Charlie Monroe kinda started it, really, back in the '40s, but Lester was the one who popularized it, and it's become the signature Martin guitar lick for bluegrass.

There's a story about Lester's bedside conversion that shows how it's never too late when it comes to salvation. A friend told me that when Lester was close to death, he asked to be taken to his hometown of Sparta, Tennessee, to get baptized. When Lester came out of the water, he started to cry and said, “Why did I wait so long?” and he kept crying and saying those words over and over.

Lester was right. If you've never been born again, don't put it off until it's too late. There is no promise of tomorrow (Acts 4:12 and 2 Corinthians 6:2). It's the most important decision you'll ever make, because it is for all eternity.

Next to Bill, the Blue Grass Boy I was closest with was Earl. He was my mentor and friend both. When I first moved to Nashville in 1980, I got to know Earl and his wife, Louise, as well as their boys, Gary, Randy, and Steve. I admired how Earl raised up his sons, getting involved in their music and pouring it into them like my Dad did with me.

Earl and I worked on several recordings and TV shows together, but the project I was most proud to be a part of was
The Three Pickers
, with him and Doc Watson. It would have been great if Mr. Monroe had been the “third picker” instead of me, but he had already passed away. It was quite an honor to record that album with two of my heroes.

Earl was one of the most humble musicians I ever met. He had such a quiet dignity and was so laid-back you'd never know he was one of a handful of musicians who ever truly changed the way an instrument was played. His impact on American music is immeasurable, and there's hardly a banjo player alive whose style of playing can't be traced back to Earl. When he recorded “Foggy Mountain Breakdown” back in 1949, it sounded superhuman. It's absolutely flawless.

God made just one Earl Scruggs, and I'm grateful we had him and his playing for so many years. He passed away at eighty-eight years old loving the music and playing his banjo. He was always listening, not to himself but to the next generation, and that kept him forever young while he was with us. That was the Fab Five I knew and loved—Bill, Chubby, Lester, Earl, and Howard. These five men were only together a little more than two years, but they exploded onto country music like a supernova or an earthquake, whatever they call an “act of God,” which it truly was!

Of course, no discussion of my heroes would be complete without mentioning the Stanley Brothers, who built on the foundation the Blue Grass Boys laid all those years ago. I've got a blown-up photo of Carter and Ralph from their Columbia years, 1949 to 1951, when they forged that classic Stanley Brothers sound. The songs they sang are the heart and soul of bluegrass. The music they left behind gives us a taste of the sounds of heaven, and hardly a day goes by that I'm not singing or hearing one of their songs. Carter died on December 1, 1966. He was only forty-one, way too young. I wish he could have lived to see how the bluegrass community loves and honors him today.

'Course, Ralph is as big a hero to me as Carter or even Bill. It took the Coen Brothers' film
O Brother, Where Art Thou?
to bring Ralph a whole new audience that discovered what the bluegrass community had known for years—that he is a national treasure. Ralph's popularity is an affirmation of mountain music and culture, and it proved to the uptown bunch that we're pretty smart after all. We'd been behind Ralph for years; we had a vested interest in one of our own, an elder we held in high esteem. And now Ralph gets the respect he deserves, wherever and whenever he plays.

Not long ago, I got to visit with Ralph during the Memorial Festival at his old home place in Smith Ridge. He's slowed down some, but says he's gonna keep singing for the people as long as he's able. That day, we went up to the cemetery where Carter is buried. It was getting dark, it had been raining, and well, it was a little spooky.

Thank God I took my camera with me, though. I took some amazing pictures of Ralph there, with the light dying behind the mountains. He showed me the big ol' mausoleum with his name and his wife Jimmi's name on it, and he said he was ready whenever the Lord called him. Well, Ralph, guess the Lord has more work for you to do! I'm sure glad you're still around to inspire a new millennium of bluegrass pickers and singers, and that you took a chance on me when I was nothing but a kid.

I think of so many musicians whom I hold near and dear, bluegrass royalty like the Osborne Brothers and Jimmy Martin and so many others who earned a place in the pantheon. There's just not enough space on the walls in my studio to do justice to the men and women who've kept bluegrass music going. I especially want to mention the sidemen, who never got the accolades that the stars did. They're the unsung heroes who could raise the hair on the back of your neck with an incredible mandolin solo or fiddle run or high, lonesome vocal lick.

Some you've heard me talk about, like Pee Wee Lambert, George Shuffler, Curly Ray Cline, Benny Martin, Ralph Mayo, Curly Lambert, and Curly Seckler. But there are so many others: Paul Warren, Chubby Anthony, Red Taylor, Art Stamper, Lester Woodie, Tex Logan, Charlie Cline, Rudy Lyle, Cousin Jake Tullock, Benny Sims, Art Wooten, Jim Shumate, and hundreds more. These were the men traveling six deep in a station wagon with no AC just to get to hundred-dollar gigs, eating sardines or Vienna sausages from a can and washing up at gas-station restrooms. There was hunger in the music these men played, 'cause there sure wasn't much money to be made in those early days. Music was a calling to these men. We could never repay those early fathers who paid such a huge price for birthing this music and raising it up. They have given so much to my generation, which has it so easy compared to what they had to go through.

There are heroines on the studio wall, too. Minnie Pearl, in an old Hatch Show Print poster from 1944 in which she's young and radiant and beaming her famous Minnie smile. And there's a poster of my favorite female trio: Barbara Fairchild, Connie Smith, and my wife, Sharon White. These talented ladies are very special to me. They all three have gorgeous voices that are as unique as their personalities. They did an album that I produced,
Love Never Fails
. It was so cool to hear each of them taking turns singing solo on the verses, and then singing harmony together on the choruses.

There's another picture that's really precious to me. It's a photograph of Johnny Cash on stage paying tribute to John Lennon after he was killed in 1980. Cash is dressed in white, wearing dark sunglasses, and holding a bouquet of flowers. Marty Stuart was on the road with Cash at the time, and he took the picture. He gave me a print of that moment for my gallery. When you think about it, Cash was a preacher, a prophet, and a picker, all three—and so much more, too. He was one of country music's great defenders of the faith, like a modern-day troubadour.

You know, every generation has its heroes. These are some of mine. I hope they are some of yours, too.

N
ow I want to talk to you about a preacher, one of my all-time heroes and a true spiritual father, the Reverend Billy Graham. In a very special place I have a rare photograph that I treasure. It was taken in 1949, during a Youth for Christ crusade in Los Angeles, where Dr. Graham was preaching to huge crowds in a circus tent. Thousands came to know Christ as savior in those eight weeks.

In this photo you can feel Dr. Graham just wearing it out. He's tall and lanky and full of Holy Ghost fire. He's preaching the Gospel with his arm outstretched, like he's pointing to where we need to go. A visionary, a champion, and a man of God.

The work Billy Graham has done is phenomenal. Nobody in our lifetime has evangelized more lost souls, from the man on the street to the high and the mighty. He has stood before kings and queens, he has counseled ten presidents, starting with Harry Truman. I see Dr. Graham in this Scripture: “A man's gift makes room for him, and brings him before great men” (Proverbs 18:16). He's a household name, synonymous with what an evangelist should be: steadfast and forthright, with integrity to spare. No scandals have touched him. When Billy Graham speaks, you know he's going to tell you the truth.

Through the years, Dr. Graham's message has never wavered. It's always been about preaching the message of the Cross in a way so that people want to fall in love with Christ, hearing something in the message that points them not to Billy Graham, but to Jesus. His sermons celebrate the goodness of God, and for good reason, because Scripture says in Romans 2:4 that it's the goodness of God that leads men to repentance.

But Dr. Graham knows it's not easy in this life to do the right thing, so he's taught us a battle strategy. If you don't wake up and make a plan to stop Satan from having control, he'll do everything he can to have his way in your life. Paul says, “We wrestle not against flesh and blood but against powers and principalities” (Ephesians 6:12). Of course, evil and sin are buffers put between us and God. They are learning tools. If it hadn't been for the law given in the Old Testament, we'd never have known what was sinful. If there's no struggle and wrestling with sin, we'd never know forgiveness and mercy and grace. We'd never know the real love of God if there wasn't the suffering and the strife.

I first met Dr. Graham back in the '80s. I was a musical guest for a Billy Graham crusade in Columbus, Ohio, but I was just a hired hand, really, and he was such a towering figure to me. It wasn't till about a dozen years ago that I started getting to know his heart and not just his public persona. He was getting up in years, and he'd cut back on his schedule. I was at the RCA Dome in Indianapolis, and I walked into his dressing room. He was sitting alone, and he looked up and said hello. Well, all I could do was start weeping. I felt so broken there in front of him. He just smiled and said, “Bless your heart.”

It's hard to explain, but I was overwhelmed by his spirit of humility. He wasn't sad or lonely or in bad health or any of that. He was joyful, actually, but he'd emptied himself of his self, and you could feel the love of Jesus all over him. Here was the greatest preacher of our time, and he was as humble and gentle as a lamb. He'd gotten to a place in his walk with Christ where there was this total dependency on Him, and that was manifest.

Over the years, I've become a lot closer to the Graham family, mostly through my missionary work under Franklin, Billy's son. Sharon and I traveled to Bosnia and Croatia for Operation Christmas Child, taking gifts and providing aid for orphans there. I've learned about Billy Graham just following Franklin around. He's a good son and a great friend. Sometimes we even hunt and fish together.

Not long ago, Franklin invited me to his father's house in the mountains outside Montreat, North Carolina. In recent years, Dr. Graham hasn't been able to travel on his crusades. He's had a few health scares, especially after he lost his wife Ruth in 2007, and he doesn't see many visitors anymore. This was an incredible honor. He was sitting alone in a yellow sweater, looking a little frail. I casually asked him how he was feeling. “I've come to find out one thing for certain in my life,” he told me, “and that is Jesus Christ is the only one that I totally trust. He's the greatest friend I've ever had.”

Then he sort of paused, and he said, “I'm asking God for one thing.” I said, “What's that, Dr. Graham?” I thought maybe he was asking God to heal him and give him more years. Or maybe he was asking God for peace in Jerusalem.