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BIG COUNTRY BLUEGRASS - THE BOYS IN HATS & TIES (REB-1838), 2010

Musicians
Tommy Sells: Mandolin
Teresa Sells: Guitar, Lead & Harmony Vocals
Jeff Michael: Fiddle, Lead Vocals
Johnny Williams: Guitar, Harmony Vocals
Lynwood Lunsford: Banjo, Harmony Vocals
Alan Mastin: Bass

Production Credits
Produced by Tommy Sells and Big Country Bluegrass
Recorded and mixed at Eastwood Studio, Cana, VA
Engineered by Wes Easteer
Mixed by Wes Easter and Tommy Sells
Mastered by John Eberle at Americana Mastering, Dickson, TN

Like many of today’s top bluegrass stars, the members of Big Country Bluegrass grew up in the musically rich countryside of southwest Virginia and the mountains and Piedmont area of North Carolina. Thanks to daily radio broadcasts, fiddlers’ contests that were held almost weekly and a steady stream of personal appearances by their favorite country and bluegrass bands, it is not surprising that the music became ingrained in many people’s DNA from a very young age. That is certainly the case with the members of Big Country Bluegrass, and the title song of their marvelous Rebel Records debut The Boys in Hats & Ties wonderfully captures the musical excitement that the new sounds of bluegrass generated in the rural South in the 1940s and 1950s.

Big Country Bluegrass has been a prominent regional band for over three decades now, founded by the husband and wife team of Tommy and Teresa Sells. They have featured a number of excellent musicians over the years, including the late Larry Pennington, a highly regarded banjo player in the region, as well as James King and Udell McPeak. The version of the group on this album features the superior fiddling and distinctive singing of Jeff Michael—a member of the band since 1995 and an underrated musician if there ever was one. Raised in a family that idolized the Chuck Wagon Gang, Michael took to bluegrass music at an early age and is proficient on all the instruments (he even plays some fine clawhammer banjo on occasion). Michael spent a year or so playing guitar and singing tenor for Charlie Louvin in the old Louvin Brothers style.

Other members of the band include Lynwood Lunsford, an impressive banjo picker who previously worked with Jimmy Martin and the Lost & Found. Guitarist and vocalist Johnny Williams is known for his songwriting and has been a member of several other bluegrass bands of the region. Leader of the group Tommy Sells plays mandolin and his wife Teresa plays rhythm guitar, sings lead on some songs and contributes to the wonderful high harmonies that have been a feature of the band on recordings like their powerful "High Alleghenies." And, sad to say, this album includes the last recordings done by the late Alan Mastin, who played bass with the band for 21 years.
By the late 1990s the group started to expand its base of operations, and in 1999 won a contest sponsored by Martha White Flour to see who could provide the best rendition of the famous Martha White theme as featured for so many years by Lester Flatt & Earl Scruggs—the ending of the title tune here will bring a smile to all of those who grew up listening to that band’s trade mark, as well as providing some free publicity for Martha White Flour! On the strength of that contest, the group earned a guest appearance on the Grand Ole Opry.

Big Country Bluegrass has always featured a good mixture of material old and new, drawing partially on songs by some local musicians such as Roy McMillan, Cullen Galyean and Dale Morris. But “The Boys in Hats & Ties,” composed by Tom T. and Dixie Hall along with Don Rigsby, is a “once in a blue moon” song that is absolutely perfect for Big Country Bluegrass, a true purveyor of hard-driving bluegrass music at its best!