Merlefest Day 1B

Jesse & Leonard rockin' at the Walker Center
Originally uploaded by John Falstaff.

So after I watched the Avetts and Laura Love, I trucked it up the hill to the Walker Center for an afternoon's worth of boogie, starting with Darrell and Wayne Scott.

I'm a huge Darrell Scott fan, I think he's one of the finest songwriters in America today, so I wasn't going to let a Merlefest pass without seeing him at least once, and I just bought his dad's album off iTunes, so I was interested to see what they would cook up together.

Wayne Scott is better than 70 years old and has just released his first album, a true old-school style country music record with a unique voice that I really enjoy. He starts off with "The whiskey eases the pain," and closes with a rendition of "Folsom Prison Blues" that is honestly channelling Cash at his finest.

So the set started off with Darrell doing a version of "River Take Me" solo, then bringing his dad out to join him. They also had Matt Mandano on bass, Casey Driessen and Luke Bulla on fiddle, and a guy on drums that I didn't know (sorry). A solid set overall, not terribly exciting, but good solid musicianship and some excellent songwriting. Honestly, at 71, I didn't expect stage dives, so I thoroughly enjoyed myself. I was able to get a seat in the front row, which is always nice.

When they were done, most of the front row emptied out and I was able to move over to dead center in the front row for the Platypus Jam, featuring The Duhks and The Mammals. I fell in love with The Duhks last year, and had really high hopes for this jam.

Needless to say, I wasn't disappointed. It took a while to sound check everything and get the monitors right, but that's what happens when you get around a dozen musicians onstage all at the same time. They kicked into a smokin' bluegrass tune for their first number, and then said "that was pretty good for a sound check." Which is also the fact of festival sound - the first song or two are the sound check, and it's never until the second song that the sound is really dialed in, and sometimes the third. SE Systems out of Greensboro does all the audio for Merlefest, and they have done a great job for years. This year was no exception, so big shout out to Cliff and the boys for their excellent work.

To start the second song, Tao, one of the leads in The Mammals, steps up to the mic and says "let's go ahead and get this outta the way. Grandpa, you wanna come out and sing one with us?"

So out totters this old guy carrying what looks like the world's first banjo, and the room absolutely erupts. See, Tao's full name is Rodriguez-Seeger, and this was Grandpa Pete Seeger coming out to play a song with the Platypus Jam. These things happen all the time at Merlefest, but they're always magical.

So I'm sitting front row center and one of the living legends of folk music is picking banjo 15 feet away. It's gonna be a good day. Pete does a song or two, then The Duhks do a couple of songs on their own. Then The Mammals do a couple of songs on their own, then the two bands reconvene to figure out the rest of the set list.

This was a jam session in the truest sense, with no predefined set list, folks picking up a break whenever someone throws it to them, and generally blowing the roof off the Walker Center. Special kudos to Luke Bulla, who The Duhks brought out for a couple of songs and he just stuck around, jamming on everything he could find and smoking the solos for the rest of the set.

It didn't get much better than Tao (or maybe Leonard) looking out at the crowd and asking "you guys aren't in a hurry, are ya?" They played until the stage manager wouldn't let them play anymore, then they did a couple more songs! You cannot finish a set with any more energy than they had, from Mike from the Mammals doing a rock-star monitor jump with his banjo to Tao picking banjo on his knees to Leonard down in front of the monitors jamming on the forestage. I would not have been surprised to see Jesse stage dive before the set was over.

Then to close it out, they brought Pete back out. He came down and said "at 87, I don't have much voice anymore, but I can give you the words and you can sing this one." Then he led us in an 1100-person chorus of "Turn, Turn, Turn." I teared up a little, I'll admit it.

I've been going to Merlefest off and on for 10 years, and that set may be the best single set I've ever seen there. Simply amazing, a magical moment that I'm glad I could witness. I didn't think my night could get any better, then I found out that Sam Bush has a new album coming out and most of his set would be off that album. It was gonna be a gooooood night.