that had people on a stage, scratching on strings— we tried to go.
How was living in Vermont and, more expansively, in the northeast, impactful on your music development? All of my early training was in that area. Where I live now in Nashville, there ' s music everywhere, and when I moved to Ferrum, Virginia, it was a hotbed of country music. There was not a lot of it where I was growing up, but I had access to a record when I was 12 years old that made me want to play the banjo, and I just couldn ' t get it out of my head. I got a banjo for my thirteenth birthday, and I went to bed with it. I woke up with it. It never left my hands. If there was any live music that was in that area, that ' s where I went to watch and glean anything that I could from musicians who played in the Northeast, like the Berkshire Mountain Bluegrass Festival. My early training ground was all local live music from that part of the country.
How long did you live in Vermont? I lived my whole life there until I moved away when I was 19.
Any locations you can recall where you used to hang out and listen to live music? There was no one spot. I spent a lot of time back and forth to Schuylerville, New York, to see a lot of Smokey Greene’ s performances. Smokey was really great to me as a young kid growing up. He would invite me to play with him anywhere that he was. I would get on stage and play a song or two, or sometimes be a part of the band. I got a lot of exposure through Smokey and his concerts and his bluegrass festival that he ran in upstate New York.
When did you first appear on stage? I was six years old. The first time I got on stage was at a club, also in upstate New York. Smokey was playing at a club called“ The You and I.” At some point, I had asked my mother if she would ask the band if I could go up and sing a song. I think to stifle me, she said,“ If you want to go sing a song, you can go up and ask him.” I don ' t know what got in my jeans that night, but I walked up the center aisle to Smokey, who was singing. I tugged on his pant leg, and he looked down and said,“ Well, why, young man?” I said,“ Can I sing a song with you?” And that was my first time on stage. I remember my knees physically knocking.
I was so nervous. It was very out of character for me to have asked to do something like that. But I apparently wanted it pretty bad even then. I sang a John Denver song,“ Please Daddy Don ' t Get Drunk This Christmas.” I heard the applause. I was just overtaken with it. And then a dude came up and gave me $ 5, and I remember thinking, how is this even possible? That was an enormously big deal for me, and that feeling still stays with me, and I still have that same nervous energy every time I get on a stage.
In my interview with Kevin and Michael Bacon( page 8), Michael also talked about that nervous feeling before going onstage. It ' s every show, but only for the first few minutes. I have to make sure that the first song allows me to have a little room to just let it out and loosen up. I ' m very conscious that I want people to connect to the music that they ' re hearing. I want to feel like I ' m not doing a scripted show. I don ' t make a setlist when I go on stage. I usually know the first two or three songs, but that ' s all I ever make a decision on. It’ s according to the audience that I ' m playing to.
That would scare the heck out of me if I didn ' t have a set list. Not having a set list isn ' t necessarily what scares me. That allows me the freedom to feel like I can steer any way I want. I think it would scare me more if I made a set list and then two songs in, I felt like I hadn ' t considered the songs that I really needed to play. Without a setlist, I can respond to whatever I feel like the emotion is.
What drew you to the banjo? I heard a record from J. D. Crow & The New South that they made back in 1975. The bluegrass community knows it as“ 0044.” It’ s one of the most famous bluegrass records that had a profound influence on almost everyone that plays this type of music. It was a landmark record. So, I heard Tony Rice, Ricky Skaggs, J. D. Crow, Jerry Douglas, and Bobby Sloan on this recording as a 12 year old, and it just stayed with me. I had to figure it out. It was the one record— and still is the one record— that I hold as a benchmark to everything I do. To this day, it ' s one of the most beautiful records ever produced or made, and it still holds the same weight for me.
What’ s your favorite type of venue to play in? I tend to look for the good in any venue. When people show up and they ' re ready to hear music and party, that ' s when it ' s great for me. If that ' s outside, fantastic. If it ' s inside, fantastic. It ' s nice to have theater shows where you have control over your environment, and you know the temperature is good, and you know the sound is good. I feel like you have the people captive right there sitting in front of you. So I feel like I can connect to audiences better. I tend to talk a lot more when I do theater shows.
That sounds like the Mahaiwe. What can people expect when you perform there? They can expect my interpretation of bluegrass music. What I find people saying a lot leaving shows is that they didn ' t expect was that they spend more time laughing than they thought they would. I like to have fun with people, and I like to talk to people in the crowd while I ' m on stage. It ' s not a stiff show. I want to feel like someone ' s invited us into their living room, and we ' re actually connecting.
I imagine you might be talking almost as much as you’ re singing. More than I ever thought I would. For the career that I ' ve had, I ' ve always been a sideman, behind someone, a part of a band, but never the person who is in charge of all the banter that takes place on stage. I ' m finding that might be more my comfort zone than even playing music. I really love communicating with people. I really love to tell the stories of how the songs came about. I think people appreciate feeling like they get a little window inside of what ' s going on.
That’ s interesting, because with Alison Krauss, that dynamic must have been quite different. It’ s a hugely different dynamic in the shows that we do. When I played with Alison— and I loved every second that I played with that band— it was a very predictable show. If you ' ve ever seen an Alison Krauss show at one point in the year, and you went to another months later, you ' re going to see the same show, the same songs, the same order, the same everything. She varies it up a little bit, but it’ s kind of the same banter in-between songs. I feel like I have an opportunity to step outside of that box, and it’ s offered me a level of freedom that I ' ve never had the ability to share before. So, it’ s fun territory for me to be in.
Holiday Fall 2023 2025 BERKSHIRE MAGAZINE // 29