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Location: Lafayette, Louisiana | Hello everyone. I know that Bluegrass musicians are pretty much the old Martin kinda group. In saying that, has Ovation caught on with any Bluegrass players? I have always admired many Bluegrass guitarist, but I don' think I have ever seen one playing an Ovation. I imagine these guys are traditionalist, and I wonder if Ovation was ever accepted in the Blugrass community. Thanks...Paul Hebert |
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Location: Las Cruces, NM | Paul
I've played bluegrass for 50 years and haven't seen an Ovation. But, that doesn't matter as bluegrass is a very closed society and in danger of dying of incest, each year the popular bands win the awards and the genre sinks a little more into hide bound rigidity forgetting the Country Gentlemen, and even Bill Monroe who was a non traditionalist, if I see one more Bluegrass band emulate "Brother Where Art Though" I'm going to puke. I just did as the Del McCoury band appeared on Grand Ol' Opry and did a a cappella song.
Blugrass is gone.
Bailey |
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Location: Scotland | Bill Harrell played an acoustic-only Adamas as his main guitar in the 1980's. Tony Rice was an Ovation endorsee at one point. |
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Location: Amarillo, Texas, USA | I'm glad to see this post because I'm in the market for an accoustic with electronics I'm considering an Ovation, and it would be set up high for hard country/bluegrass flatpicking.
My current accoustics are a Larrivee D-05, a Gibson J-45 and a Gibson LGO, all superb for what I play.
The one thing I do know for a fact is the shallow bowls are most definitely out. Any recommendations on the Ovation for me?
Thanks. :) |
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Location: atlanta | Kaki King's live shows sometime include an original tune she calls "Bluegrass". Probably inspired by Swannanoa, it is pure greased lightning, with clawhammer banjo, travis picking and an overall stylistic approach all her own.
All on the big Adamas, fingerstyle....
She'll be at this Year's New Orleans JazzFest, btw. Not that far from Lafayette, Paul.
Dave King |
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Location: Houston, TX | Popcritic, what's the connection to Swannanoa? I went to college there in the late 80's (Warren Wilson College). |
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Location: atlanta | Scott, she has been attending the Swannanoa Gathering Guitar Week at Warren Wilson College since she graduated from high school in 1998. It is impossible to overstate the importance of the Swannanoa experiences in her artistic development. Before she went there, her most immediate influences were Alex DeGrassi and Michael Hedges.
In 1998, she took classes from Preston Reed, Al Petteway and El McMeen and became friends with all of them. When you hear her CD, you will hear their influence as well.
By private e-mail, I'll send you some pictures of her at Swannanoa in the summer of 2001. She learned dobro there, and that's Sally Van Meter's dobro she's playing in the jam session.
Her aunt and uncle (my brother) live in Houston, btw.
Best regards--
Dave King |
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Posts: 43
| From here in southwest Virginia in the Blue Ridge Mountains and Appalacian Mountains. Home of the Stanleys and the Galax Bluegrass and Old Time Music festival, Ovations do not make much of a mark in the Bluegras and Old Time scene. Contrary to popular belief, as quoted in some other replys, Bluegrass and Old Time are not dead, or even close to it. Galax draws tens of thousands of Bluegrass and Old Time fans every year. Ralph Stanley is true Bluegrass and Old Time musician, and Allison Krause is bringing the sound to the mainstream. But the music is more about the life then it is about anything else. I see it every day, I hear it every day, and I love it. They don't play Ovations, but that is more tradition than anything. But the funny thing is, when I go to a gathering and play Bluegrass and Old Time with other, people usually give me funny looks when I break out my Ovations. But after they hear the sounds they make, they oddity wears away with the sweet sounds of mountain music.....Aaaahhhhhh....
Photogazer |
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Location: Houston, TX | Photogazer, considering where you live I'm assuming you've probably been to Merlefest as well. |
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Location: Las Cruces, NM | Photogazer
I'm just being cynical, I love blugrass and the players. I spent 3 years in Virginia in the early 50's, and went to the Old Dominion Barn Dance in Richmond to see Mac Wiseman whan he was popular with "Love Letters in the Sand" and "I Wonder How the Old Folks are at Home", My younger brother was a National Fiddle contest winner in Canada in the early 60's and played on the Cincinatti Barn Dance or whatever it was and made a cassette tape with mandolin picker, Jesse McReynolds in the 80's hoping to get some recognition as a bluegrass fiddle player. I didn't play with him much 'cause I was in California, but he came to visit me one time and we went to Bakersfield, looking for the Haggard, Buck Owens experience. We entered a contest at a place called the Blackboard and won a trophy 3 feet tall before we realized we had found it. That was old bluegrass fun. (My brother died of cancer a few years ago)
Bailey |
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Location: NJ | The types of music you play does not have to be connected to the reputation of the instrument. Can you play jazz on a martin? sure Can you play blues on a D'Angelico? sure Can you play bluegrass on something other than a Gibson? sure |
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Location: Las Cruces, NM | Adamsguy
You can play bluegrass on any good instrument. Bluegrass is not an instrument thing. The early bluegrass players were people who streched the known boundaries. They looked for the loudest and the fastest. There were no Scruggs twisters before Scruggs, the Kay bass was not as well known, The LLoyd Loar mandolin didn't have a purpose before Bluegrass and the deep throated Martins were made fun of in refined circles as too country for refined people. Put them all together and Bluegrass emerged, but not with any respect, but with a big audience suddenly when it became obvious that this was a fun music.
Bailey |
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Posts: 146
Location: Ct./ USA | I saw these two dudes at Ovation play some blue grass when the power went out one day, whooo. I think it was Darren and Dave in the old Mandolin cell. Those cats SURE know their stuff.
Doug |
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Location: Scotland | Bailey, I disagree with your statement that Loar's instruments had no purpose prior to Bluegrass. Throughout the early 1900's in America mandolins outsold every other stringed instrument. Mandolin orchestras were all over the country, & Lloyd Loar's designs were the instruments everyone aspired to if you could afford them. Other instruments, including banjo, ukes & guitars eventually became more popular & by the 30's the mandolin was all but forgotten. It took Bill Monroe to give it a new purpose, but the popularity of the Mandolin had kept American instrument manufacturers in business for decades and throughout some very difficult times |
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Location: Las Cruces, NM | Paul T.
Yes I'll agree with you, but very few people would know about the mandolin orchestras etc. as they made few if any recordings and had pretty much faded away by the 1940's when bluegrass emerged. However, they were a part of an era when people got together to play music for the enjoyment of it and not the money, that might be a good thing today in place of TV. The brother acts, Louvin's, Monroe's, etc. recorded in the '30s and '40s and featured the mandolin (Ira Louvin played many types of mandolin including resophonics, and Chet Atkins played on and produced their hit records). The country/bluegrass era created the market for the Gibson type mandolin and it opened the way for today's mandolin players in many types of music. The LLoyd Loar was thought to be the best, but many would argue that people like Monteolone etc. had built better ones. To me the sound of any good mandolin adds quality to any type music.
Bailey |
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Bluegrass and Ovation