How I learned to Play in a Bluegrass Band

8/13/26

“How I learned to Play in a Bluegrass Band”

I got my first mandolin at the age of eight, but I really didn’t get around to pickin’ with other musicians until I was able to drive. And drive I did. If I heard about a jam, a festival, just about anyplace I could play, I was there with my tater bug mandolin.

As you may have gathered from a previous post, I am a ham radio hobbyist. I joined a radio club as a teenager, where I met fifteen-year-old John Brunschwyler, who was interested in learning banjo. I encouraged John to get a banjo so we could start a band. He got it, picked up the rudiments quickly, and soon we were jamming with other musicians in the DC area. After two or three months, John began to get really good (at least I thought so) and I thought we were about to set the music world on fire.

One day, John called me and said that he had met Harry Packard, who was in a band with some other old guys (most of them in their forties, ha ha) and they were missing two instruments in their band. And guess which instruments – right! - mandolin and banjo. And John said they had been playing together since the 1950s. Holy crap! – my dreams of being a pro were coming true. Harry had arranged for a rehearsal the next weekend and I counted the days, practicing form the second I got home from work until midnight. I was gonna be ready.

The night of the rehearsal finally came, and I met Harry, the guitarist, along with Dee Dee Wilkinson on dobro, Carl Baker on bass, Lenord Stottlemeyer on second guitar, and fiddler Clarence Fawley, who was about eighty-five years old then. I didn’t know Mr. Fawley’s first name until years later. He was just Mr. Fawley. When I played my first show with them, I found out that Harry Packard was about the best emcee I had ever heard, and I had heard all the bluegrass greats. He had the audience in the palm of his hand every time he spoke. There weren’t any virtuosos in that band, especially not me and John, but we were all pretty good on our instruments and the audience usually liked us.

Anyway – I had better get into the funny stories before I lose you, so here goes.

Leonard was the musical director of the band. He had a pleasant, on-key singing voice and he knew it. I wanted to sing, of course, and I asked if I could do a song or two. Leonard said that he had hired a mandolin player, not a singer. Shucks! A different word came to mind at the time. After two or three weeks when he had heard Harry and me singing in the parking lot, Leonard asked me, “Do you know ‘Blue Eyes Cryin’ in the Rain?’” Of course I did and I was ready to belt it out. Then he asked me to do a tenor part on the line, ‘Only Memories Remain.’ “That’s it?” I asked “Yeah, we’ll try you out on that line and see how you do.” Big deal, one line. So, I sang that one line for about a month. John said the line in that song about the land that knows no parting was about a place where everybody is bald-headed. That comment didn’t please Leonard. Eventually, I was allowed to sing a few songs with the band, but it was a long time coming. I don’t want you to get the idea that Leonard was unkind. He was just used to doing things his way. All of those fellows were father figures to me, but I still hate “Blue Eyes Cryin’ in the Rain.”

Mr. Fawley, our octogenarian fiddler, had a wooden leg, liked to drink whiskey, and chewed tobacco. Those three attributes came together to cause him some embarrassment and the rest of us to remember a certain show forever. We had a gig playing at the Montgomery County, Maryland, fair. It was a big deal. Hank Williams, Jr. had played there the previous night, and it was up to us to entertain a large crowd. The first set went fine. I got a solo song, along with my line in ‘Blue Eyes,’ and everyone was feeling good about it. Mr. Fawley snuck off during the break and had a few sips from his flask – just enough to take the edge off but not enough to sour his fiddlin’. What he didn’t count on was that the “little taste,” as he called it, made him a little unsteady. Just before the second set, he tripped while going into the men’s room, fell off his wooden leg, and soiled himself. What a mess! We got him back on the stage and sat him down behind us with a fiddle mic, so no one would see, so it wasn’t too bad. Now Mr. Fawley had dozens of fiddle tunes and one song, “Buffalo Gals,” in his repertoire. He wanted to sing it right then and there. Leonard told him he had better just sit in the back and fiddle, but he insisted. Well, he started bellerin’ out “Buffalo Gals,” but he had forgotten the chaw of tobacco in his mouth, and it came out all down his white shirt. So, Mr. Fawley was soiled from top to bottom that day.

Another time, Mr. Fawley booked us at a wedding reception, much to Harry’s chagrin, as he believed his usual schpiel wouldn’t be received well and he would have to do the wedding emcee routine. But we took the gig. The reception was at the Moose club and there was an open bar for the guests. About an hour into the gig, when most everyone in the room was trashed, the father of the bride came to the stage and asked, “Hey there fellers, do you know ‘Too Old to Cut the Mustard?’” Harry allowed as how he did know a verse and a course of it, so the fellow asked that the song be dedicated to the father of the groom. About thirty seconds into the song, the father of the groom came up and shouted “Stop the music! Who asked for that song?” Harry pointed to the man and the groom’s father went and punched the bride’s father in the face. Before long, the two families were duking it out and Mr. Fawley was hollering, “Save the instruments boys!” Yeah, we got ‘em in the cases, but we couldn’t leave our sound system there, so we stood around on the stage until the brawlers tired themselves out and somebody said “Hey, what happened to the music?” We finished the gig, got paid, packed up, and left.

Tom Mindte
August 2026

1982 Clagettsville Charity Band - Leonard Stottlemeyer, Dee Dee Wilkinson, Harry Packard, Tom, Carl Baker, John Brunschwyler

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