Earl Eugene Scruggs
(born January 6, 1924) is a musician noted for perfecting and popularizing a 3-finger style (now called Scruggs style) on the 5-string banjo that is a defining characteristic of bluegrass music. Although other musicians had played in 3-finger style before him, Scruggs shot to prominence when he was hired by Bill Monroe to fill the banjo slot in the "Blue Grass Boys". Scruggs built on earlier styles to develop a truly new and readily identifiable style, involving: unprecedented smoothness, syncopation, and uninterrupted flow; a large vocabulary of unique and original licks; blues and jazz phrases, evident in backup and in solos such as "Foggy Mountain Special;" and an overall coherency and polish that other stylists lacked, which inspired imitation by newer generations of banjo pickers.
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EARL SCRUGGS TICKETS
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Biography
Scruggs was born in
Shelby, North Carolina to Georgia Lula Ruppe and George Elam Scruggs.
[1] Scruggs joined
Bill Monroe's Blue Grass Boys in late 1945 and his syncopated, three-finger picking style quickly became a sensation. In 1948 Scruggs and guitarist
Lester Flatt left Monroe's band and formed
Flatt and Scruggs. In 1969, Flatt and Scruggs broke up and Scruggs started a new band, the Earl Scruggs Revue, featuring several of his sons.
On September 24 1962 singer
Jerry Scoggins, Flatt, and Scruggs recorded
The Ballad of Jed Clampett for the TV show
The Beverly Hillbillies which was released October 12 1962. The theme song became an immediate
country music hit and was played at the beginning and end of each episode. Flatt and Scruggs appeared in several episodes as family friends of the Clampetts in the following years. In their first appearance, season 1 episode 20, they portray themselves in the show and perform both the theme song and
Pearl Pearl Pearl.
Flatt and Scruggs won a
Grammy Award in
1969 for Scruggs' instrumental "
Foggy Mountain Breakdown". They were inducted together into the
Country Music Hall of Fame in 1985. In 1989, he was awarded a
National Heritage Fellowship. Scruggs was an inaugural inductee into the
International Bluegrass Music Hall of Honor in 1991.
In 2002 Scruggs won a second
Grammy award for the 2001 recording of "Foggy Mountain Breakdown", which featured artists such as
Steve Martin on 2nd
banjo solo (Martin played the banjo tune on his 1970s stand-up comic acts),
Vince Gill and
Albert Lee on electric guitar solos,
Paul Shaffer on piano,
Leon Russell on organ, and
Marty Stuart on mandolin. The album,
Earl Scruggs and Friends
, also featured artists such as
John Fogerty,
Elton John,
Sting,
Johnny Cash,
Don Henley,
Travis Tritt, and
Billy Bob Thornton.
Earl Scruggs and Friends
(MCA Nashville, 2001).
On
February 13,
2003, Scruggs received a star on the
Hollywood Walk of Fame. That same year, he and Flatt were ranked #24 on
CMT's 40 Greatest Men of Country Music
.
Scruggs' wife and manager Louise Scruggs died on
February 2,
2006 at the age of 78 at
Nashville, Tennessee's Baptist Hospital following a lengthy illness.
[2]
On September 13, 2006, Scruggs was honored at
Turner Field in
Atlanta as part of the pre-game show for an
Atlanta Braves home game. Organizers (Banjo.com) set a world record for the most banjo players (239) playing one tune together (Scruggs' ''Foggy Mountain Breakdown).
On February 10, 2008, Scruggs was awarded the Lifetime Achievement Award at the 50th Annual
Grammy Awards.
Discography
Albums
| Year
| Single
| Chart Positions
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| US Country
| US
| US Heat
| US Bluegrass
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| 1967
| Strictly Instrumental
(with Lester Flatt and Doc Watson)
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| 1969
| Changin' Times
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| 1970
| Nashville Airplane
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| 1972
| I Saw the Light with Some Help from My Friends
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| Earl Scruggs: His Family and Friends
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| Live at Kansas State
| 20
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| 1973
| Rockin' 'Cross the Country
| 46
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| Dueling Banjos
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| The Earl Scruggs Revue
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| 169
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| 1975
| Anniversary Special
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| 104
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| 1976
| The Earl Scruggs Revue 2
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| 161
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| Family Portrait
| 49
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| 1977
| Live from Austin City Limits
| 49
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| Strike Anywhere
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| 1978
| Bold & New
| 50
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| 1979
| Today & Forever
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| 1982
| Storyteller and the Banjo Man
(with Tom T. Hall)
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| Flatt & Scruggs
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| 1983
| Top of the World
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| 1984
| Superjammin
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| 1998
| Artist's Choice: The Best Tracks (1970-1980)
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| 2001
| Earl Scruggs and Friends
| 39
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| 33
| 14
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| 2002
| Classic Bluegrass Live: 1959-1966
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| 2003
| Three Pickers
(with Doc Watson and Ricky Skaggs)
| 24
| 179
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| 2
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| 2004
| The Essential Earl Scruggs
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| 2005
| Live with Donnie Allen and Friends
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Singles
| Year
| Single
| Chart Positions
| Album
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| US Country
| CAN Country
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| 1970
| "Nashville Skyline Rag"
| 74
| —
| Earl Scruggs: His Family and Friends
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| 1979
| "I Sure Could Use the Feeling"
| 30
| 41
| Single only
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| "Play Me No Sad Songs"
| 82
| 66
| Today & Forever
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| 1980
| "Blue Moon of Kentucky"
| 46
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| 1982
| "There Ain't No Country Music on This Jukebox"
(with Tom T. Hall)
| 77
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| Storyteller and the Banjo Man
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| "Song of the South" (with Tom T. Hall)
| 72
| —
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DVDs
- Earl Scruggs - His Family and Friends (2005)
- :(Recorded 1969. Bob Dylan, The Byrds, Bill Monroe, Joan Baez et al.)
- Private Sessions (2005)
- The Bluegrass Legend (2006)
Earl Scruggs, Doc Watson and
Ricky Skaggs
Flatt and Scruggs
- The Best of Flatt and Scruggs TV Show Vol 1 (2007)
- The Best of Flatt and Scruggs TV Show Vol 2 (2007)
Footnotes
- Ancestry of Earl Scruggs
- Music Industry Pioneer Louise Scruggs Dies
References
- Ancestry of Earl Scruggs
- Music Industry Pioneer Louise Scruggs Dies