B I O G R A P H Y
Blue Highway
Creating compelling, relevant modern bluegrass is a delicate balancing act. An artist must retain enough of the music’s time-honored elements to remain recognizable as bluegrass, while imparting enough of their own personality to leave arrive at a sound that is unique and personal. It is a challenge that Blue Highway accepts with an acrobat’s sense of grace and skill. The five men who make up Blue Highway are committed to expanding the expressive boundaries of bluegrass through their own powerful individual songwriting voices, formidable instrumental abilities, dynamic arrangements, and an unrivaled ensemble sound born of over fourteen years of performing together. Released in February of 2008, Through the Window of a Train is Blue Highway’s eighth album and a powerful consolidation of the band’s strengths and their definitive statement to date as songwriters, performers, vocalists, and – harder to define sonically, but so rare and crucial – collaborators,
bandmates, and friends.
Composed of Jason Burleson (banjo, guitar, mandolin),
Rob Ickes (Dobro and
Weissenborn-style slide guitars), Shawn Lane (vocals, mandolin, fiddle, guitar),
Tim Stafford (vocals, guitar), and
Wayne Taylor (vocals, bass), Blue Highway has developed a streamlined, flexible take on the bluegrass tradition that makes them among the most influential bands in the genre today. Each member is among the most distinguished performers on his instrument of choice, and the band, individually and collectively, has collected a number of awards from the International Bluegrass Music Association, including Album of the Year (for 1996’s It’s a Long, Long Road), two awards for Gospel Performance of the Year, 1996’s Emerging Artist of the Year honor, and nine Dobro Player of the Year awards for
Ickes. The paradigm established by Blue Highway has made them widely admired by subsequent generations of bluegrass musicians. “They’re kinda like our big brother band,” says Jeremy Garrett of the Infamous
Stringdusters, whose acclaimed debut album, which tied for IBMA’s Album of the Year award in 2007, was produced by Stafford. “We have always looked up to Blue Highway...”
First convened in 1994, Blue Highway quickly set themselves apart from the bluegrass pack with a trio of heralded albums for Rebel Records that offered ample evidence of the band’s ability create striking original music that still resounded with timeless bluegrass soul. After 1999’s self-titled album on Ceili Music (which featured Tom Adams in the place of Burleson, who returned to the fold shortly thereafter), Blue Highway joined forces with Rounder Records. Their first Rounder release, 2001’s Still Climbing Mountains, was their first album of entirely original material. It was followed in 2003 by the gospel project Wondrous Love, winner of IBMA’s Gospel Performance of the Year in 2004, and by 2005’s thrilling
Marbletown, which featured original songs mixed with riveting interpretations of songs by such writers as Mark Knopfler (the title cut) and Gary Scruggs (“Lazarus”). Both Wondrous Love and Marbletown were nominated for Grammy® awards in the Best Bluegrass Album category.
While previous albums have enlisted the aid of a series of illustrious producers – most recently Scott Rouse
(Marbletown), Alan O’Bryant (Wondrous Love), and Jerry Douglas (Still Climbing Mountains) – Through the Window of a Train finds the band returning to self-production, cutting the album in the out-of-the-way environs of Maggard Sound studio in Big Stone Gap, Virginia. “This area is home to me,” says Wayne Taylor, and Stafford is quick to point out that four of the five members of Blue Highway are from the region, a musical hotbed in the shadow of the storied Clinch Mountain ridge. Through the Window of a Train features only one outside instrumentalist, and is the band’s second album to be composed exclusively of original material, still a rare feat in bluegrass, which as a genre relies greatly on vintage repertoire and traditional songs.
“This is the easiest record we've ever done,” observes Rob Ickes. The process behind Through the Window of a Train was organic and spontaneous. “People always ask us how we go about arranging material,” Ickes continues. “I tell people we don't work out anything – we just start playing. We just catch it as it happens, and that's when you get the more memorable stuff. So that's been the plan for this record – or lack of plan!”
“I like the idea of not having a preconceived notion,” adds Burleson. “It adds energy…”
The consistent quality of songwriting is key to Blue Highway’s music, and forms the bedrock of their sound, informing almost every musical decision. “The way the song is written will dictate the arrangement,” explains Shawn Lane. “Nine times out of ten, it will tell you what it wants to do, if you listen close enough.” Lane’s exhilarating “Life of a
Travelin’ Man” opens the set, with Burleson’s banjo kicking off a dazzling, sophisticated arrangement marked by call-and-response instrumental breaks, spot-on harmonies (Lane and Taylor), and a surprising half-length verse yielding to an instrumental bridge featuring a series of solos over a new set of chord changes.
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