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MICKEY GALYEAN & CULLEN'S BRIDGE - MY DADDY'S GRASS (REB-1856), 2016

Musicians
Mickey Galyean: Guitar, Lead Vocals
Rick Pardue: Banjo, Tenor Vocals, Lead Vocal on track 12
Brad Hiatt: Bass, Baritone Vocals
Billy Hawks: Fiddle
Special Guests:
James King: Co-lead Vocal on track 5
Brady Bryant: Bass Vocal on track 8

Production Credits
Produced by Mickey Galyean & Cullen's Bridge
Recorded, mixed & mastered by Wes Easter at Eastwood Studio, Cana, VA

My Daddy's Grass is the band's first album with Rebel Records. It blends rare and powerful lead vocals and strong, close harmonies with traditional bluegrass rhythm guitar and sparkling lead instrumentation. The repertoire consists of superb older songs and some great original material, including five Rick Pardue penned numbers.

Mickey Galyean’s music is rooted in tradition. He hails from Lowgap, North Carolina, a hotspot for mountain music that was also home to banjo great Larry Richardson as well as old-time legend Fred Cockerham. Mickey is the son of Cullen Galyean, a masterful musician and songwriter who performed with a number of highly regarded regional bands from the Galax, Virginia/Mt. Airy, North Carolina area, including The Foot Hill Boys and The Border Mountain Boys. After Cullen’s passing in 2010, Mickey felt a strong desire to keep the music which had shaped his childhood alive. In 2011, he formed Cullen’s Bridge to record new and classic material in the traditional style of his father and other area musicians.

Cullen’s Bridge features Mickey on rhythm guitar and handling the lead vocals with his rich, powerful voice. He is joined by Brad Hiatt on acoustic bass and baritone vocals and Rick Pardue on banjo and tenor vocals. Pardue is also a talented songwriter who contributes a majority of the original material to the band. He wrote the 2012 IBMA Song of the Year, “A Far Cry from Lester & Earl” and won the prestigious Chris Austin Songwriting Contest at MerleFest. Billy Hawks, formerly of Doyle Lawson & Quicksilver, Big Country Bluegrass and Junior Sisk & Ramblers Choice, rounds out the group.

My Daddy’s Grass features the memorable title track written by Pardue which tells the poignant story of a man going through his father’s attic upon his passing. Unexpectedly, he finds a box full of old bluegrass records and upon listening to them comes to love the music himself. Also included in the recording are four other Pardue originals which showcase his range as a songwriter, from the hard-driving gospel number “Brother Paul” to the witty wordplay of the not-so-heartbroken ballad “I’d Have a Dime”; “Charming Betsy” and a blistering rendition of the Stanley Brothers classic “Sweethearts in Heaven,” featuring a duet with the late James King (one of his very last recordings), are two of the six older songs featured in the mix. The sole instrumental, “Trail Blazer,” is a great fiddle tune written by Billy Hawks.