The News & Observer
Raleigh, NC
Bluegrass Masters Together
May 11, 2007
By Jack Bernhardt

The first time Jerry Douglas and Tony Rice recorded an album together, Douglas knew he was hearing the future of bluegrass guitar. It was 1973.

"He asked me to play on his second album, 'California Autumn,' " says Douglas, who has performed with Alison Krauss and Union Station since 1998. "There were Doc Watson, Clarence White, a lot of other people who played lead acoustic guitar, but nothing like this guy," says Douglas, a 12-time Grammy-winning Dobroist.

"He had the speed and the creativity. Tony would rip a solo just like a fiddle player or mandolin player. And it was interesting, it was cohesive. It wasn't just a bunch of licks. He played the melody. That seems to be the hardest thing for anyone to do, especially at the breakneck pace that bluegrass music can reach. It was just mind-blowing to see this guy do something that no one else had tried. People didn't think that flat-picking guitar was meant for that kind of stuff."

In Saturday, Rice will share the stage at Koka Booth Amphitheatre in Cary with Krauss and Union Station. Krauss, who has won 20 Grammys, and her band will pay tribute to Rice by performing songs Rice has recorded and sung throughout his career. One of the most influential guitarists of the past 40 years, Rice was also an excellent vocalist until vocal cord problems forced him to quit singing in the 1990s. His picking and interpretations of songs by Gordon Lightfoot and others have influenced a generation of acoustic musicians, including Krauss.

"This is something that Alison has wanted to do forever," says Douglas. "Tony was and is such an influence on her -- his song choices and the way he played and sang. She used to ride around in cars and on her way to fiddle contests listening to that stuff. From what she's told me, she just lived with it.

"It is a tribute to Tony and I think it's great to put Tony in front of that many people. A lot of people don't know who he is because they came late [to bluegrass] and they don't know what a singer he was and how important he was to the whole bluegrass world. When his singing went away, it was a tragedy. But he's been playing so good -- I haven't heard him play this good in a long, long time. He's said he hasn't felt this good about music in 25 years."

Listening to Douglas talk about Rice is like hearing Picasso heap praise upon Van Gogh, or Beethoven compliment the musical vision of Bach.

Both musicians have expanded the boundaries of their respective instruments and changed the way acoustic music is conceived and performed.

In 1975, Douglas and Rice served as members of J.D. Crowe's New South, a trend-setting band that grafted folk, rock and country stylings onto solid bluegrass roots. Douglas' lyrical voicings on Dobro and Rice's blistering guitar solos contributed to making that version of the New South one of the legendary combos in bluegrass history.

After leaving the New South, Douglas co-founded Boone Creek, a youthful and progressive band that also featured mandolin phenom Ricky Skaggs. Rice moved to California and joined the David Grisman Quintet, adding jazz and swing structures to his already considerable repertoire.

Over the years, their musical wanderings brought them back together as they played on each other's albums and continued to stretch the limits of the music Bill Monroe created in 1945.

"We've always been great friends and loved studying different kinds of music," Douglas says. "I would go to his house and we would listen to [John] Coltrane or Miles Davis. He always had a great set of speakers and a great turntable, something that he could really go deep inside to whatever he was listening to. Tony does everything that way."

In his maestro-on-maestro musings, Douglas says it's impossible to underestimate the ways in which Rice has changed how guitar is played in bluegrass.

"Tony brought in this jazz element of structuring your solos -- of building solos and lengthening solos," he says. "It's his note choices and building solos with taste -- not just throwing a bunch of licks at something, but trying to paint a picture. First of all, he set a bar for everybody to try to reach. For most people, it's unreachable. The first time I met him I thought, 'I don't know if I'll ever meet another guitar player who plays like this.'

"And how he held a band together with rhythm, and what he did with drive. A rhythm guitar and mandolin and bass are the drum kit, the core of the band. Tony went through periods where he said he'd rather not even take a solo. He just wanted to play rhythm because he was interested in how that worked.

"He's a student of the guitar. He raised the bar so high that it was good for the music. It really made the guitar player work: he was no longer just pulling the plow, he was one of the racehorses, too."

While Douglas is thrilled that his friend's contributions are being recognized on the tour, he's also delighted to watch the interactions of two artists who have raised the bar for bluegrass and who hold each other in the highest esteem.

"I'm standing right beside Tony, stage right," Douglas says. "It's me, then Tony, then Alison. So I get to watch them work together and see the enormous admiration they have for each other. It's an amazing thing."  

Who: Tony Rice with Alison Krauss and Union Station featuring Jerry Douglas.
When: 7:30 p.m. Saturday.
Where: Koka Booth Amphitheatre, 8003 Regency Parkway, Cary.
Cost: $32.50-$48.50.
Details: 834-4000, www.ticketmaster.com.