My apologies again, Joe, for not noticing, before making the previous post, that my Norton clean-up had swallowed my cookie. --Stewie. BBS, I am not the rude guest above, but I draw your attention to the actual references on pp49-50 of 'Stars of Country Music': Re bluegrass & Monroe: In the late 1940s, he traveled with Bill Monroe and seemed relatively unimpressed with the fact that Monroe was busy creating a revolutionary style in music, bluegrass. When the audience was good, Macon would tell Monroe, 'The old man can still draw 'em in'. If it was small, he would say, 'You can't pull 'em in like you used to, Mr Bill'.
Re Earl Scruggs: Another story told of Uncle Dave describes him in the late 1940s watching Earl Scruggs stun a Grand Ole Opry with his then-revolutionary three-finger banjo-picking technique; Uncle Dave watched silently from the wings of the Ryman for a time, then finally turned away and said, 'He ain't one damned bit funny'.
From those, it is fair enough for the Wikipedia writer to draw the conclusion that Uncle Dave was unimpressed with bluegrass - he was probably implying that Bill did much better when he was strutting his stuff with brother Charlie. However, the second quote could be interpreted as the old man being impressed and jealous of Scruggs' picking and his impact on the audience - a case of sour grapes. The author of the Macon chapter in 'Stars of Country Music', Charles Wolfe, cites no specific sources for these anecdotes. He does indicate, however, that the information for his essay was drawn, inter alia, from interviews with Sam and Kirk McGee, Sid Harkreader and Macon's sons, Dorris and Archie. --Stewie.
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