Wikipedia

When I was a child, I remember sitting in my grandparent’s living room looking through their set of encyclopedia. I was fascinated that I could find information on so many subjects that interested me. (I did this when I wasn’t listening to Grandaddy’s bluegrass albums!) We didn’t have encyclopedia in our own home until several years later. “What does this have to do with Hard 2 Git?”, you might ask. Well, after having a great time this past Sunday playing gospel bluegrass with the rest of the band at First Baptist Church in Detroit, I was thinking about “bluegrass” on my way to work this morning. I couldn’t remember exactly why this form of music I love so much was called “bluegrass”. So, I thought…when I get to work, I’ll look it up on Wikipedia! Sure enough…the answer was there…along with a lot more interesting reading.

If you’ve never used Wikipedia, The Free (online) Encyclopedia, visit http://en.wikipedia.org/ and look up something! (Find the search box in the left-hand column and start typing in something. It may quickly auto-complete the word you’re typing and suggest what you’re possibly looking for. If so, just click on the subject you want. If not, just type something and click the SEARCH button.) You can probably even look up some of your favorite bluegrass musicians and read about them. You may even want to read about Wikipedia itself! You’ll find out that it’s content is continuously being updated and added to by people just like us. (That’s a scary thought!)

Here’s a link that will take you directly to the article I’m reading-> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bluegrass_music . When you see words or phrases that are highlighted in the articles, click on them and you will be transported directly to the wiki article for that subject. After reading about THAT subject, click you browser's "back" arrow or button to return to your original article. You can literally get lost and spend hours learning with Wikipedia.

If you’ve never used Wikipedia, I hope you’ll find a greater fascination with it than I did with that set of old encyclopedia my grandparents had!

Boyd

Bluegrass in Hugo

When I first started playing banjo in…1970…I think..., my only experience with bluegrass music was listening to it on 33 RPM records, 8-track, and cassette tapes. I don’t think there was very much bluegrass on the radio then. Oh, you might hear Foggy Mountain Breakdown or Dueling Banjos (1972) on the Ft. Worth station, WBAP. I’ll bet there was some bluegrass played on local radio stations in Paris and Bonham, but I don’t remember listening to that much radio in my high school days.

My first exposure to real, live bluegrass music probably came somewhere around 1975. I had previously bounced around north Texas with J.T. Bryan, Joe Julian and Ross Whit, attending Texas Fiddle contests in different cities. I enrolled at Paris Junior College after I graduated from high school in 1975. There, I met Bennie Tschoerner, who taught several of my electronics classes. I think Bennie was the one who first took me to Salt Creek Park in Hugo Oklahoma. Bennie had heard “Little” Jimmy Hendley play banjo at Bill Grant’s festival in Hugo and thought, “If that little kid can play banjo, surely I can too.” So, Bennie bought an Alvarez banjo…that eventually became mine…after Bennie gave up on banjo pickin’!

The Hugo Bluegrass Festival at Salt Creek Park, as I always heard, was “the biggest festival west of the Mississippi”. I have never attended any other festival in the states surrounding Texas that was as big as Bill Grant’s. Bill’s festival always started on the first Wednesday in August and went through Sunday. Many attendees would set up camp in Salt Creek Park as much as a week before the festival officially started. And Bill had some of the biggest bluegrass bands in the country. I seem to remember the likes of Lester Flat, Bill Monroe, Rick Skaggs, Mac Wiseman and many more being there over the years.

Bennie and I usually hung out at a camp not too far from the “foot of the hill”, that was set up every year by the same group of guys. I’m not sure I can remember everyone’s name that was usually there. I know that Stuart Anderson and Steve Annis was there…a fellow they called “Five String”, and some others. We mostly sat around the camp jamming and sharing new licks we had learned, but we would often go walking through the woods, stopping to jam with other groups of musicians. Of course, we kept a close eye on the official schedule and would go back up the hill to see our favorite performers.

I remember spending a lot of time visiting the vendors that were always there. It was better than any music stores in Fannin and Lamar counties. You could find all kinds of bluegrass instruments, records and tapes. There was also plenty of places to buy food and drink.

I always looked forward to going to this festival each year, but it was awful hot in August. I remember strapping my banjo to the sissy bar of my 1979 Yamaha motorcycle and driving from Greenville to Hugo in the later years. When the festival was over and I returned home, I could still hear music ringing in my ears for at least a day or two…literally!!! I don’t remember the last year I attended the festival before it shut down. Debbie and I married in 1984 and we both attended at least one or two festivals after that. I was pretty much wrapped up in the Country Music scene during the 80’s and didn’t go to Salt Creek anymore.

Steve Annis has been converting some old photos to digital format recently. Here is one he sent yesterday. See more of the pictures on my website, http://www.banjoboyd.com/ , in the PHOTO GALLERY. Maybe some of my fellow Hard 2 Git band members will blog more about the great times at Salt Creek Park. Ah, the memories!

Boyd

Mr. Bill Grant's Bluegrass Festival - Hugo, OK

The bluegrass festival in the first week of Aug. in Hugo Ok. had it's on personality among festivals, a capsule of good people brought together by the love of old time music. It must have been around the year 1980 when my dad Hub and I started out on an early Saturday morning toward Hugo not knowing exactly where Grant's Bluegrass Festival was or how the bluegrass style of music would change our lives. We found not only the festival grounds but a large group of people that came to be some of our best life long friends. People that care more about the people on the old rustic stage at Hugo than the people on the big stages around the world. We sat there and saw people like Joe Stuart sing the Eastern Gate. Emmitt Suliivan, Josh Graves and many bluegrass entertainers let the sounds of those acoustic instruments ring up the hill through the trees in Salt Creek Park with vocal harmonies like I had never heard. As I sat there overwhelmed by the music and the friendly people I decided that if I had a dream it would be to be to play that music and it would be special if I could do it right there on that very stage. The following morning I called my brother and dad and had them meet me at the local music store and we all bought bluegrass instruments. From there the festival at Hugo became our home on the first week of August for many years to come. We would take our camper on or around July 4th and each weekend we would be there to jam with the people as they brought their campers in up until the festival started. My wife Anna and I have memories of so many good people that we could hardly wait to see each year. As I think about it, all of the members of The Hard 2 Git Bluegrass Band have the Hugo festival as a common link. Sam and Reva were there camping with us through the whole thing. We met Stuart there and became good friends as we jammed together each year. When we needed a banjo player for Hard 2 Git, I called Stuart just from that past friendship. He has been with the band from day one. Boyd won the banjo contest in the late seventies, which was a great accomplishment.

People came from all over the world to compete in the instrument and band contests at Hugo. Can you believe that our dobro player is one of the best banjo players in the world. What does that say about our banjo player? As time and experience went by, we formed our own bluegrass band Simply Gospel, which was made up of my brother Danny Martin, James Roberts, Van Barton, Joe Worley and myself. James Roberts wife, Linda, joined the band in the later years. Mr. Bill Grant booked us on the Hugo festival in 1988, 1989, 1990, and 1991. The Hard 2 Git Bluegrass Band played the festival in its last year around 2005. Salt Creek Park holds a special place in the memories of all of us who were able to be a part of those times, where friends were made for a lifetime through the love of bluegrass music. James Martin