Mandolin Man by Bob Black

Author:Bob Black
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: BIOGRAPHY & AUTOBIOGRAPHY / Music
Publisher: University of Illinois Press
Published: 2022-03-08T00:00:00+00:00

In 1983 a fourth Alan Munde Festival Favorites album was cut: Festival Favorites: Southwest Sessions.55 The band was called the Southwest Society of String Sizzlers. Once again Roland White was featured, along with Jim “Texas Shorty” Chancellor (fiddle), Robert Bowlin (fiddle), Bob French (banjo), Mark Land (guitar), and Bob Clark (mandolin). An original tune from Alan’s early career was included, “Molly Bloom.” It was fashioned from a musical “overlapping” scale particularly suited to melodic-style banjo playing. The tune springs into life after its elegant underlayment is established, and decorative variations are then added. It was originally recorded in 1969 by Poor Richard’s Almanac, which included Alan, Sam Bush, and Wayne Stewart.

In 1983 Roland did a little moonlighting of his own with a studio band called the Dreadful Snakes. The inspiration for the band name came from a Bill Monroe song titled “The Little Girl and the Dreadful Snake.” Besides Roland, the aggregation included Béla Fleck (banjo), Blaine Sprouse (fiddle), Mark Hembree (bass), Jerry Douglas (Dobro), and Pat Enright (guitar). I think the group should have been named “Pat Enright and the Dreadful Snakes,” because his singing was the powerful voice that tied the band together. On the group’s one and only album, The Dreadful Snakes: Snakes Alive,56 Pat’s rendition of “Blue Yodel #4” was among the very best recordings I have ever heard of the song. “Cash on the Barrelhead” brought his singing up yet another notch, and he hit the ball out of the park with “In Despair” (another Monroe song.) Pat has a way of singing a song that makes you think, This is the true version—the way it’s supposed to go. Other renditions just don’t cut it.

Roland did an equally fine job of singing on the Dreadful Snakes album. “Linda Lou,” another Monroe song, was a great example. Roland sang it with obvious admiration for the master, and Béla Fleck’s banjo backup was tasteful and unobtrusive. (I remember lots of people requesting “Linda Lou” in Japan when I was there as a Blue Grass Boy in 1974.) “Brown County Breakdown” was also included on the album. The Snakes crawled a little bit astray on that one, though, playing a calypso beat behind the first part. The original Monroe recording had “stops” on every measure. Roland sounded a little uncomfortable with that arrangement when he played his mandolin solo. I would love to have heard this band stay together long enough to develop a better blend of talent and dynamics. However, the singing by Pat Enright alone is worth the price of the album.

It was at about this time that the Nashville Bluegrass Music Association (NBMA) was started by Roland White and Charmaine Lanham.57 The two of them went to Bill Monroe and explained their idea for a membership-based organization to promote bluegrass, put on concerts, and publish a newsletter. They organized performances at the Tennessee Performing Arts Center; the Station Inn; Mother Maybelle Carter’s home in Madison, Tennessee; and other places, including the Bucksnort Trout Ranch. (About

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