Coming up Hard in Kentucky
By DAVE SHIFLETT
In the world of bluegrass there is no greater figure
than Bill Monroe, which is a great tribute to his music
if not the man, at least as he is portrayed in Richard D.
Smith's workmanlike biography, "Can't You Hear
Me Callin'" (Little Brown, 384 pages, $25.95).
Monroe could carry grudges for decades, steal
songwriting credits, heist another man's wife, petition
to keep competitors out of the Grand Ole Opry and
strongly criticize players who exceeded his somewhat
narrow standards.
Then again, Mr. Smith argues, Monroe
came up hard, and it wasn't easy making
your living playing "hillbilly music."
Born near Rosine, Ky., on Sept. 13,
1911 (a Friday, Mr. Smith points out),
Monroe lost his mother at 10, dropped
out of school after the fifth grade, had
an eye that pulled toward his nose
(corrected in his teens) and all told was
a lonely child, as he explained later in
his life: "For many years, I had nobody to play with or
nobody to work under. You just had to kindly grow
up. Just like a little dog outside, tryin' to make his
own way, trying to make out the best way he can."
Monroe, who died in 1996, did have two things going
his way: a high, powerful voice and a talent for
playing the mandolin. He also had a decided interest in
not becoming a millworker, which he estimated
would have been his fate had he not prevailed in the
music biz. Even those without much interest in
bluegrass, which has been described as folk music in
overdrive, will admire Monroe's remarkable tenacity.
Full Schedule, Empty Seats
His touring schedule was brutal, sometimes requiring
him to play four shows a day after all-night drives.
Performances sometimes featured full-throated
hecklers -- some of whom Monroe ushered to the
door himself. Audiences could be quite small: During
a lull in his career, Monroe once played a full and
apparently enthusiastic show for two patrons.
Yet he also achieved greater glories. He was a
long-time member of the Grand Ole Opry and hosted
daily radio shows during prime time, which in his
business meant at noon, when fans came in from
working in the fields to eat their midday meal.
Because of his prominence,
heightened by popular songs
such as "Blue Moon of
Kentucky" and the hard-driving
instrumental "Rawhide," he
attracted legendary sidemen
and guests such as Don Reno,
Flatt and Scruggs, Kenny
Baker, Del McCoury, Ry
Cooder and Sam Bush. At one
point, Mr. Smith writes, a
young nine-fingered banjo player named Jerry Garcia
drove east from California to Bean Blossom, Ind., to
audition for Monroe's band, but chickened out in the
end. Garcia later started the Grateful Dead, a band
that would eventually make upwards of $30 million a
year. Monroe didn't do nearly as well: Financial
figures late in his life showed him to have real-estate
holdings of several hundred thousand dollars but less
than $12,000 in available cash. That's not a lot of
lucre for a legend.
As Mr. Smith points out, there are those who dispute
Monroe's paternity as the true "father of bluegrass,"
though there's no question where the author stands.
Early on, he insists that Monroe is not only "the most
broadly talented and broadly influential figure in the
history of American popular music" but is "the only
person to create -- not just dominate but wholly create
-- a distinctive music genre."
He returns to Earth later, explaining that Monroe "was
very much like the director of a major motion picture"
who "brings everything together in accordance with
his/her own vision of the final film." Meanwhile, fans
of Earl Scruggs say it was his syncopated banjo style
that provided the lightning that brought the beast to
life. (Mr. Scruggs's departure from Monroe's band
with guitarist Lester Flatt resulted in decades of
illwill on the part of Monroe, who charged that they
"stole" his music.) Whichever side one takes, there is
no disputing that Monroe's percussive mandolin chop
and "high lonesome" voice are central to bluegrass,
which in turn influenced performers with much
broader popularity, including Elvis Presley and Bob
Dylan.
According to Mr. Smith, Monroe wasn't always
lonesome -- and he apparently was never high. His
dedication to teetotaling was matched by a long career
chasing skirts, which broke up several marriages,
including his final one at age 73 to Della Streeter,
who was 41 at the altar. The author does assure us
that Monroe, who composed and sang profound
gospel numbers, was not an unscrupulous philanderer;
he refused to pursue the girlfriends of his sidemen or
married women in general.
Birth of a 'Love Child'
Save for one. Bessie Lee Maudlin bounced between
Monroe and her State Trooper husband several times
before finally settling on Monroe (who was legally
enjoined from marrying her). According to Mr. Smith,
she bore him a female "love child" whom Monroe
never legally acknowledged, though her existence may
explain an unendearing provision in Monroe's will: "If
it shall be proved in any Court of law with appropriate
jurisdiction that I have any children other than my son
James William Monroe, then I direct that any such
child shall inherit a sum of one dollar as that child's
share of my estate."
Mr. Smith includes these prominent warts, but
elsewhere his tone is almost worshipful. "The
immense Monroe persona attracted people like a
mammoth star whose gravity holds planets and
comets in orbit, and even shapes the fabric of
surrounding space and time," he observes in one
gaudy riff. In the same spirit he begins chapters with
quotes from such hillbilly sages as Voltaire, Ovid,
Shakespeare, Queen Victoria and Johann Wolfgang
von Goethe. He also engages in a bit too much
sensitivity chatter for some tastes (ahem), as when
charging one of Monroe's brothers with inflicting
trauma-inducing "physical abuse" by occasionally
taking drunk and whacking young Bill.
At the time of his death, Monroe was admired by
friends and old foes alike, including players of the
highly improvisational "newgrass," which he initially
said he hated. One imagines he would have had warm
feelings toward an upcoming tribute CD ("Big Mon,"
Scaggs Family Records), which not only reflects his
influence on rockers Bruce Hornsby and John Fogerty
but includes performances by Dolly Parton and the
Dixie Chicks, whose various talents would no doubt
fill his heart with song.
Mr. Shiflett is a writer based in Midlothian, Va. |
