Bluegrass History Could be Made in Owensboro!

Bluegrass' Cream of crop to pick at Monroe celebration! 

OWENSBORO, Ky. — Bluegrass history is likely to be made in Owensboro this fall when dozens of hall of famers take the stage for what would have been Bill Monroe's 100th birthday.

Gabrielle Gray, Executive Director
of the International Bluegrass Music Museum 

“We're going to have one enormous headliner after another,” said Gabrielle Gray, executive director of the International Bluegrass Music Museum in Owensboro.

Virtually every active member of the International Bluegrass Music Association's Hall of Fame is scheduled to perform in the Sept. 12-14 Bill Monroe Centennial Celebration.

Monroe, known as the “father of bluegrass music,” was born on a farm in the town of Rosine near Owensboro on Sept. 13, 1911, and died Sept. 9, 1996.

He is buried in Rosine Cemetery.

Gray says the birthday bash will mark the first time so many bluegrass legends have performed at one event.

“I checked with Lance LeRoy (a Hall of Fame agent and manager),” she said. “He said there has never been a festival with a lineup like this.”
Earl Scruggs, whose banjo work in Monroe's band in 1945 helped create the bluegrass sound, is scheduled to perform — along with Ralph Stanley, Doc Watson, Jesse McReynolds, Mac Wiseman, J.D. Crowe, Bobby Osborne, Eddie Adcock, Tom Gray, Kenny Baker, Curly Seckler, Everett Lilly, The Lewis Family, Bill Clifton, Rodney Dillard, Melvin Goins and Paul Williams.
Other bluegrass pioneers and former Blue Grass Boys will also be performing at the three-day event, Gray said.

Tickets for all three days range from $100 to $175.
The festival will also see the premiere of a new Bill Monroe musical.
Most of the performance times by Hall of Fame members are still being scheduled, Gray said, “but Ralph Stanley will perform on Sept. 12 just before the evening performance of the musical.”
A documentary about Monroe's band, the Blue Grass Boys, is also scheduled to premiere during the festival.
The museum is producing the documentary and interviewing as many former members of the band as it can locate.
“We're seeing the canonization of Bill Monroe,” Gray said. “He's not just a saint. He's the king of the saints.”
The interviews with former band members, she said, show that “they are canonizing him too. He was hard on his musicians until he got wanted he wanted and then they were good enough to go out on their own. They love him for it.”
Monroe, Gray added, “produced several generations of fabulous musicians.”
The Monroe Centennial will be the museum's second festival of 2011.
The museum's River of Music Party, June 23-25 at Yellow Creek Park will shift away from traditional bluegrass and explore the roots and branches of the genre, she said.
So far, that lineup includes: Steve Martin & The Steep Canyon Rangers, Carolina Chocolate Drops, Punch Brothers featuring Chris Thile, Infamous Stringdusters, Tony Rice, Mountain Heart, Josh Williams Band, Valerie Smith & Liberty Pike, Kenny & Amanda Smith, Pete & Joan Wernick, Audie Blaylock & Redline, Trampled By Turtles, 23 String Band and the Kentucky BlueGrass AllStars.
Three-day tickets for this event are $70 for the general public, $60 for senior citizens and the military, $55 for students and $50 for museum members.
Tickets for both festivals are on sale at the museum in Owensboro or by calling (207) 926-7891.