Andy Hall

Hooked on Bluegrass

Andy Hall

For me it was gifts of music. My family is all originally from Nashville, and has been into country and bluegrass for a long time. I grew up in up-state New York because my dad moved up there for a job.

When I was about eighteen years old, I got a gift of a Bill Monroe four CD box set. I had already been playing guitar, and totally hooked on music, but had not discovered bluegrass. It was shocking to me how much I so instantaneously loved this Monroe box set because I had been into completely different styles of music.

Around the same time, a friend played a cassette for me of “Skip, Hop, and Wobble”. Jerry Douglas, Edgar Meyer, and Russ Berenberg. I had been playing a blues slide, but when I heard Jerry Douglas on the dobro, I was just blown away! Between the Bill Monroe box set, and Jerry Douglas, I was hooked!

(posted 7/7/2010)