KENNY BAKER - ROAD TO COLUMBUS

ROAD TO COLUMBUS

KENNY BAKER.

SONGWRITER: BILL MONROE

COUNTRY: U. S. A.

ALBUM: KENNY BAKER PLAYS BILL MONROE

LABEL: COUNTY RECORDS

GENRE: COUNTRY/INSTRUMENTAL

YEAR: 1976

 

        Kenneth Clayton Baker (June 26, 1926 – July 8, 2011) was an American fiddle player best known for his 25-year tenure with Bill Monroe and his group The Blue Grass Boys.

         Baker served more years in Monroe's band than any other musician and was selected by Monroe to record the fiddle tunes passed down from Uncle Pen Vandiver. After leaving the Blue Grass Boys in 1984, Baker played with a group of friends, Bob Black, Alan Murphy, and Aleta Murphy. Bob Black and Alan Murphy recorded an album with Baker in 1973, Dry & Dusty. After the one summer with Black and the Murphy's, Baker teamed with Josh Graves, who had played resonator guitar for Lester Flatt & Earl Scruggs as a Foggy Mountain Boy. Baker teamed with Graves until Graves' death in 2006.

         William Smith Monroe (/mənˈroʊ/; September 13, 1911 – September 9, 1996) was an American mandolinist, singer, and songwriter, who created the bluegrass music genre. Because of this, he is often called the "Father of Bluegrass".

         The genre takes its name from his band, the Blue Grass Boys, who named their group for the bluegrass of Monroe's home state of Kentucky. Monroe's performing career spanned 69 years as a singer, instrumentalist, composer and bandleader.

           In a long and distinguished career, Kenny Baker made 12 consistently good albums for the County label: this gem is as good as any of them. Baker showed up at a Nashville studio with a group of top Bluegrass musicians (Joe Stuart, Randy Davis, and banjo pickers Bob Black and Vic Jordan), plus a couple of new tunes from the master, Bill Monroe, who encouraged Baker to record them. Though Kenny had asked Monroe to join them for the session, Bill was non-commital and even Baker felt that there was a less than 50/50 chance that Monroe would stop by to offer some advice and give his approval. Bill not only showed up, but brought his mandolin and picked enthusiastically on every tune, taking breaks on most of them. His energy inspired everyone present, and Baker ended up with one of his finest albums. The album marked the first recording of Monroe's now classic ROAD TO COLUMBUS, along with two other new pieces, MISSISSIPPI WALTZ and FIDDLER'S PASTIME, plus a dynamite version of JERUSALEM RIDGE, a piece that Monroe played often but that was not issued on any Monroe album at the time. A wonderful fiddle album that should be in the collection of every Bluegrass fiddle fan and every fan of Bill Monroe & his music