THE BLUE GRASS SESSIONS featuring BELA FLECK, SAM BUSH, JERRY DOUGLAS, MARK SCHATZ, BRYAN SUTTON and GABE WITCHER; Kingsbury Hall, Tuesday evening, Sept. 7; one performance only.
"We've enjoyed ourselves, and it's all your fault," mandolinist Sam Bush told the appreciative audience that filled Kingsbury Hall last night.No, Mr. Bush. You're mistaken. The audience had a wonderful time at your expense.
Bush, banjo picker extraordinaire Bela Fleck, dobro master Jerry Douglas, fiddler Gabe Witcher, bassist Mark Schatz and guitarist Bryan Sutton (who replaced Tony Rice after Rice suffered a hand cartilage injury) played a two-hour session of new-grass acoustic music that left the adoring audience cheering for more.
The group, touring on Fleck's new album, "The Bluegrass Sessions: Tales from the Acoustic Planet Volume 2," cranked it out.
Each group member had his time in the spotlight. Douglas -- nicknamed "Flux" -- highlighted and soloed with gritty accuracy as he flashed his good-natured smile toward the audience and fellow bluegrassers.
The resin dust on Witcher's bow wafted into the air and looked like smoke as he sawed on his fiddle, and Fleck's five-string finger-picking dazzled the audience. Sutton did some fretboard finger-flying as well.
Schatz kept time but also enticed the audience with a segment of clogging and hamboning during a Witcher and Fleck duet.
And then there was Bush. He was the main emcee and company jester. He sang, danced, marched about and joked with the audience. And his mandolin strumming and picking was nothing short of lightning speed and pinpoint precision.
The group performed such titles as "Polka on the Banjo" and "Valley of the Rogue" from the "Bluegrass Sessions . . . Vol. 2" and "We Hide & Seek" from Douglas' album "Slide Rule."
Bush and Douglas also did a duet and jammed out "Sailin' Shoes," which segued into Eric Clapton's "Crossroads" and back again.
Another welcome surprise was the vocal melodies on Bush's "Same Old River" and a shy Fleck giving in to the audience and singing two-part harmonies with Bush on "I Know You're Married."
Not to be left hanging, Schatz recruited Fleck in another duet, the moody "Katmandu," during which Fleck used his tuning keys to make the banjo's notes.
Fleck and the boys' music was fully acoustic and organic, without effects. And you could count on the fact that some musicians in the audience went home and played their acoustic instruments until the wee hours.