- Nashville Bluegrass Band
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The Nashville Bluegrass Band is an American bluegrass music ensemble founded in 1984.
The group's members first played together in 1984 as a backing band for Vernon Oxford and Minnie Pearl; each of the members were established musicians from the Nashville bluegrass community.[1] They signed to Rounder Records and recorded their Béla Fleck-produced debut, My Native Home, in 1985. Incorporating elements of black gospel and spirituals, then a rarity in bluegrass, they became critical and popular successes both in America and abroad. The group toured in some 20 countries and were the first bluegrass band to ever play in China.[2]
The group continued to record for Rounder and Sugar Hill into the 1990s; two of the albums, 1993's Waitin' for the Hard Times to Go and 1995's Unleashed, won Grammy Awards for Best Bluegrass Album.[3] Other albums were nominated for Grammys in the same category in 1988, 1990, 1991, 1998 and 2004.[2] After the departure of bassist Gene Libbea and mandolinist Roland White in 1998, the group went on a brief hiatus, but after vocalist Pat Enright sang as one of the Soggy Bottom Boys from O Brother, Where Art Thou?, the group's career saw a revival. They played as the backing group for many performers on the Down from the Mountain tour and album, and toured again on their own in the 2000s.
Contents
Members
- Original members
- Alan O'Bryant - banjo
- Pat Enright - guitar, vocals
- Mike Compton - mandolin
- Mark Hembree - bass
- Later members
- Gene Libbea - bass
- Roland White - mandolin
- Stuart Duncan - fiddle
- Dennis Crouch - bass
- Andy Todd - bass
Discography
Released Title Label Number Notes 1985 My Native Home Rounder 0212 LP 1986 Idle Time Rounder 0232 LP 1987 To Be His Child Rounder 0242 gospel LP, reissued on CD 1988 New Moon Rising Sugar Hill CD 3762 Grammy nominee, with Peter Rowan 1990 The Boys Are Back in Town Sugar Hill CD 3778 Grammy nominee 1991 The Nashville Bluegrass Band Rounder CD 0232 CD compiled from My Native Home and Idle Time LPs 1991 Home of the Blues Sugar Hill CD 3793 Grammy nominee 1993 Waitin' for the Hard Times to Go Sugar Hill CD 3809 Grammy winner 1995 Unleashed Sugar Hill CD 3843 Grammy winner. Some sources list the pre-release title as Still Unplugged 1998 American Beauty Sugar Hill CD 3882 Grammy nominee 2004 Twenty Year Blues Sugar Hill CD 3959 Grammy nominee 2007 Best of the Sugar Hill Years Sugar Hill CD 4036 compilation, 1990–2004 References
- ^ "Nashville Bluegrass Band Biography". Keith Case & Associates. http://www.keithcase.com/profiles/Nash/index.htm. Retrieved August 21, 2010.
- ^ a b Nashville Bluegrass Band at Allmusic
- ^ Grammy Awards, Allmusic.com
External links
Categories:- Musical groups from Nashville, Tennessee
- American bluegrass music groups
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