-[Narrator 1 VO] This program is brought to you in part by Santa Cruz Guitar Company and Santa Cruz Parabolic Tension Strings.

-[Narrator 2 VO] Also brought to you by Page Capos .

And by Paluso Microphone Lab.

Additional support provided by these sponsors .

Hello and welcome to The Life of a Musician.

Tonight's episode is recorded live from Merlefest at Wilkes Community College in Wilkesboro, North Carolina.

Let's step inside and listen.

♪ Step right up ♪ ♪ You just got to see ♪ ♪ The magnificent magical Mysterious menagerie ♪ ♪ It'll amaze, It'll amuse ♪ ♪ It'll arouse, It'll astound ♪ ♪ Go down to most bodacious Show in this here town ♪ ♪ Pack up your sorries, Kiss away your cares ♪ ♪ You won't have To worry no more ♪ ♪ If your time runs down ♪ ♪ Life ain't worth Living no more ♪ ♪ You can't hardly drag yourself Out of bed like before ♪ ♪ You got no health, No vitality ♪ ♪ No vigor, no zest ♪ ♪ The Chief's Indian Remedy Elixir's the best ♪ ♪ Don't hesitate ♪ ♪ You don't want to be late ♪ ♪ If you're damned Before it's all gone ♪ ♪ Yeah, I said, Step right up ♪ ♪ You just got to see ♪ ♪ The magnificent magical Mysterious menagerie ♪ ♪ Like I said it'll amaze, Amuse, arouse and astound ♪ ♪ No doubt the most bodacious Show in this here town ♪ ♪ You better Pack up your sorries ♪ ♪ Kiss away your cares ♪ ♪ That's right ♪ ♪ You got to drink it neat ♪ ♪ That's right, It ain't too sweet ♪ ♪ Before long you'll Be back wanting more ♪ ♪ The chief will Make you believe ♪ ♪ The doc ain't There to deceive ♪ ♪ And the story that He weaves will relieve you ♪ ♪ Of some of your pain ♪ ♪ And all of you change ♪ ♪ But you'll be glad That you came to the show ♪ ♪ They got a peg-legged Dancer and an Indian chief ♪ ♪ They got a blues-singing lady ♪ ♪ She's got diamonds In her teeth ♪ ♪ They got a two-headed Turtle man ♪ ♪ You just got to see it ♪ ♪ You know they got a chicken That can count to ten ♪ ♪ No lie ♪ ♪ Follow them down To the free show tonight ♪ ♪ You don't want To miss it begin ♪ ♪ I said step right up ♪ ♪ You just got to see ♪ ♪ The magnificent magical Mysterious menagerie ♪ -[laughs] That's good man.

That's a tongue twister.

-Yeah, it's a lot of words for me to remember.

I got a few songs.

A lot of my songs I noticed in shows lately are shorter than they were when I first heard them.

-[laughs] -I forget the words.

-I'd do that.

-Yeah.

You just got to keep rocking on.

-What I was loving about what you're doing there, I'm--I'm watching...

I'm watching you play and it's kind of mesmerizing.

It's almost kind of like watching a banjo player almost.

With where you're moving your positions and you're hitting those notes.

You know, all that-- so what's...

I mean I get it, I know practice, practice, -practice.

-No practice.

-[Brandon] No practice?

-No.

Once you're a touring musician you got it down.

I mean people tell me how do you know when it's time to start looking for gigs?

I said somebody besides your mother and your friends will tell you.

All of a sudden people are coming out to see you.

If you live in Norfolk, Virginia then you go to the next town and you stretch it out.

And then you got to have something.

I recorded one song in 1967 for Blue Goose Records.

The guy was a record collector of 78 RPM blues records.

There's a whole bunch of those interesting people.

And he used to have parties at his house.

A bunch of... blues nerds that were so into it.

There's a book out, we call it the Bible.

It was written by Goodrich and Dixon English.

And on the cover it says "a complete documentation "of every... "every blues record pre-war, pre-1942."

And by then electric guitars were in.

This is all acoustic stuff.

You look up Pink Anderson and there's his two songs.

And it tells you the matrix number on the 78.

It's some kind of thing that identifies when it was made and stuff.

The year it was recorded, where it was recorded.

And like Blind Lemon Jefferson there's like 75 or 100 songs that he recorded.

And every song is documented.

It's absolutely amazing.

And we'd go to these parties, you know, we'd get high doing whatever.

And we'd pick out a song.

And Nick Pearls who started, it was the first blues reissue company.

He called it Belzona Records but then somebody said he can't use that.

He went to Yazoo Records.

And these parties were insane.

A little thing about those parties comes up in a Steve Buscemi movie called Ghost World .

Which is the guys that were record people.

It's about two teenage girls who just graduated high school.

And in the movie Steve Buscemi and his buddy try to pick up the girls that just graduated high school at the laundromat.

And it's not working out but they invite them to this party and the two girls say, "Yeah, we'll go to the party."

So they get to the party and they walk in there and it's a scratchy Skip James record playing from 1931 or '29 or whenever.

And these guys are all sitting around grooving on it.

And the two girls are looking at each other like, "What did we get into here?

These guys are nuts."

And you had to be nuts to listen to those.

They're scratchy old things.

And every once in a while they're clean copy but those '78s.

So he started a company called Blue Goose Records for live people.

Because there was an Afro-American young guy who was from Georgia.

He got out of the Navy and lived up in Harlem where Sonny Terry and Brownie McGee lived.

And a lot of people from this area, the Carolinas and Tennessee, ended up there that played blues guitar.

Some of them made records, some of them didn't.

But Larry fell into the hands of Reverend Gary Davis who was a guitar genius singing on the streets in the '50s.

And he started [clapping] Blue Goose Records to record Larry Johnson, this guy.

And Larry Johnson's record got written up and he took all that old stuff and came up with a unique style he called the stride guitar.

And he got rave reviews in Rolling Stone Magazine.

We were on tour together in England.

And he knew how to accompany me and make me sound better than I am.

And we decided when I made my first record, I recorded one song for the Blue Goose label.

And then I came back from England with a press kit of reviews.

People were going nuts.

They said not since Ramblin' Jack Elliott came over here in '57 or whenever he went over there with a cowboy hat and a guitar, have we been so entertained by a New York guy.

-[laughs] -So that was pretty good.

I got incredible reviews over there and the rest is history.

But I forgot what your question was.

-That's okay.

-[Roy laughs] -We're here for you.

I guess for me, I'm looking at this stage and what I've done musically.

So when you look at just all the miles and all the words and all of that, you know, you've done more than so many people.

What's the thing that kind of keeps you going?

-It's an addiction.

-[Brandon] Okay.

-I need the love of the audience.

I don't work a lot because it's not a popular music.

It never was.

When I played my first open mic in Providence, Rhode Island going to college on the GI Bill, I got out of the Navy in '65.

Me and my buddy played three songs.

They were kind of Dave Van Ronk covers of old blues songs, including Dave Van Ronk's Gary Davis' "Candyman," [soft guitar strumming] which he heard in like '06.

It was the first time he heard somebody play with their fingers.

He said the guy's name was Irving Porter.

But, uh... he got nothing to do with it.

But uh...

But we did our three songs, you know trembling, smoking cigarettes, before and after.

We did our three songs and we walked out outside to have a smoke.

Oooh.

And I said to my buddy, He said, "What do you think?"

I said, "I don't know about you."

This was in 1966.

I said, "I don't know about you, but I'm going to do this for the rest of my life."

-[Brandon] I hear you, man.

-And here I am.

And I never changed my desire.

Like I tell the young guys, I said, "The best you can hope for, you've got to have the dream.

If you have the dream, it might be possible."

Most people don't have a dream.

They go to work somewhere for their whole life.

If you have the dream and you stick by your guns, the dream is to make a living playing the music you love.

You don't want anybody to tell you what to record, how to record it.

I mean, 90 percent of people that are musicians are making their living working for somebody else playing music.

Maybe at a Vegas show band or whatever.

Very few people, if you can make a living without compromising what you do... it's a miracle.

To have a goofy kid like me who was sitting in Alan Frese's rock and roll shows clapping to Chuck Berry's rhythms and stuff ended up being this.

I mean I'm in the Blues Who's Who the big book of blues.

I've toured the world.

I've played in Australia and Austria and Germany and Norway.

Sometimes I wake up and I just can't believe that I did it or why it happened.

And it's like... it's a calling.

-I hear you.

Well, definitely.

And the proof's in the pudding, you know, because the proof that you were supposed to do it is the fact that you're still doing it.

-I'm still playing little clubs all the time, getting me to my bigger gigs.

Even though I've toured the world.

But moving into, when I left Greenwich Village the last time in '76 bicentennial , I rented a motor home.

Me and Fats Kaplin played a gig at some... We were already working together, long story.

But... had my bus parked, B.B.

King's bus and Merle Travis's bus.

It was an everything festival.

And I ended up buying the rental unit and moving out of Greenwich Village.

Dave Van Ronk said, who was the godfather of the Anglo-Saxon blues players in New York, very influential.

Bob Dylan got to New York looking for Woody Guthrie and ended up on Dave Van Ronk's couch for a year.

Dave Van Ronk's manager just wrote a book about those days.

It's called... Dave, Bob and the Village Scene .

Bob was sleeping on his couch and trying to play acoustic blues.

[soft guitar strumming] -[Brandon] That's crazy.

He was influenced by Dave in some ways.

But his first album he did "House of the Rising Sun" and that was Dave's arrangement of that old time thing.

A simple arrangement, four chords or something.

The story goes that Bob came back to the house and said to Dave, "Would you mind if I recorded 'House of the Rising Sun'?"

And he said, "Actually I got a deal with Mercury Records and I'm going to record it."

He said, "Uh, I just recorded it for Columbia."

-Oh, man.

[chuckles] -And he went up to Columbia to play harmonica on some girl folk singer's album and John Hammond Sr. signed him.

-Wow.

-I mean Dylan apparently had a way about him that you just wanted to not let anybody else get it.

-[Brandon] Yeah.

-And John Hammond Sr., of course, also discovered and signed Bessie Smith and Bruce Springsteen, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera throughout the years.

But Dylan's first two albums didn't sell great.

But John Hammond Sr. knew there was something there.

-Well, in that era they believed in developing talent.

You had a little bit more leash to make the bread.

-Well when Dylan made the first record, I've read, he sent it to the publisher guy, John Hammond, and he said, "How many songs do you have?"

He said, "Well, I got one down" --and that was a song to Woody-- "But I'm working on two others."

But they signed him anyway.

-[Brandon] He just had it.

-And it was the third album where he did "Don't Think Twice" and all those great songs.

-Crazy.

That was one of my favorites.

[soft guitar strumming] I want to say just thank you so much.

I'm almost tripping over my words because it's like I'm sitting next to a living icon, a living fountain of knowledge and experience.

But thank you so much for coming on here.

-Well any recognition I get, I'm thankful just to have again.

-[Brandon] Man, this is so cool.

-You come from a bluegrass background.

I mean the bluegrass guys have been good to me.

But it's not my world.

-It's nothing but respect.

You can hear the root of a lot of what we love in what you do.

I think that's the draw.

-Well bluegrass came from Kentucky, Bill Monroe and all that.

Well there was the first fingerpicking blues record made on a 78 in 1923 and his name was Sylvester Weaver.

And on one side of the '78 it said, they called it "Guitar Blues" and on the other side they called it "Guitar Rag."

They were two instrumentals.

"Guitar Rag" ended up becoming a huge country hit as...as... what's the big one that all the western swing bands played, something rag?

-[Brandon] Uh... -They might call it "Guitar Rag."

-[Brandon] Yeah, "Guitar Rag," yeah.

-"Steel Guitar Rag" or something.

-[Brandon] Yeah.

-It came from Sylvester Weaver.

And Sylvester Weaver from Eastern Kentucky... did that.

And Arnold Schultz, who they say played fiddle -in Uncle Penn's band.

-Uncle Penn's band, yeah.

-[Roy] He played with a thumb and one finger as did, he influenced Merle Travis and Mose Rager and all those guys, the thumb picking crowd.

And Mose Rager never made a commercial record.

But, uh... it's that fingerpicking thing.

And many of the great bands like Charlie Pool and all those guys, the guitar player could play this Black influenced guitar style and they did.

I always say the difference between blues and "hillbilly music" in guitar playing is... the color of the guy holding the guitar because the styles were very similar and it was a great interchange -in Kentucky.

-[Brandon] Yeah.

And then into the Carolinas and all that.

-[Brandon] Absolutely.

-I mean Jimmy Rogers, -[Brandon] Oh, yeah.

-one of his biggest influences, nobody knows about Emmett Miller.

-The Brooklyn.

-You know about Emmett Miller?

-I do not.

-Emmett Miller is the unsung hero of Americana music.

He was a minstrel man, worked in blackface.

And he did a session in '28 in New York City.

If you find the 78, it says "Emmett Miller and his Georgia crackers."

They weren't from Georgia.

That was New York session guys.

That was Eddie Lang on guitar who was on every record that Bing Crosby made.

And Adrian Rollini on the baritone sax and Joe Venuti on the violin.

It was the New York hotshots that worked in Goldkette's dance band.

And on the side they played swing jazz.

And they bagged Emmett Miller and his first hit, the greatest review I have ever read anywhere, somewhere on the internet on microfilm.

"Emmett Miller debuted his new single, "'The Lovesick Blues' "at the Palace Theater in Atlanta -and the crowd went berserk."

-[Brandon laughs] He was called back to do it seven more times.

They wouldn't let him off the stage.

And some of the posters, the little clips that you see if you search far enough, it says "Emmett Miller and his trick voice."

He yodeled like a clarinet player.

-[Brandon] Oh, I hear you.

-And a dear friend of mine who passed away, Leon Redbone, his two biggest influences, three biggest influences in my mind were Emmett Miller, Ukulele Ike and Blind Blake.

-[Brandon] Okay.

-But minstrel shows were the biggest form of entertainment from the middle 1800s until the '20s when it went out of fashion.

And Emmett Miller, when Hank Williams recorded "The Lovesick Blues" in '52 or whenever it was, it's possible that Emmett Miller was playing a joint on, what's the street downtown with the joints?

The main drag for the... [snapping fingers] -Broadway?

-Yeah.

He might have been playing some dive there.

Because he went out of style.

He didn't make any money.

And he's buried in Georgia.

And a lot of people go visit his site.

It's like Pink Anderson's buried in Spartanburg.

I came up from there and swept it off and cleaned it off with moonshine.

-[Brandon laughing] He made a lot of money moonshining and gambling.

And he was a rounder.

Now he's got a plaque downtown, a bronze plaque, because they named that Pink Floyd after him.

-They'd say some folks would say he was a sporting man.

-Yeah, he was a rounder.

-[chuckles] Like I said, thanks again.

I mean, we're going to have to get together like, oh, I'm going to call you and I'm going to have you tell you, tell me, just tell me.

Just talk to me, tell me all of this stuff.

It's amazing.

And now we've got some of it for posterity.

-I'm writing my memoirs, I have a hard time focusing on doing anything constructive.

When I left kindergarten, it was a tricky thing for me.

I was five, I guess.

And I had two teachers and the big one told me on the last day of kindergarten, she looked down at me and she said, "Roy [clicks tongue] you're not going to have it so easy in first grade."

-[Brandon laughing] And I always had trouble learning anything.

But this here is just a dedication.

I never tried to learn anything.

I got interviewed for the Doc Watson film that they were doing last year.

And I was sitting probably in this room.

And the lady said to me, "The first question I ask everybody is how did Doc Watson's music influence yours?"

And I said to her, "You got the wrong guy."

I said, "Not at all, but I have a story to tell."

I said, "B.

Towns and Doc Watson, "they wanted the blues and I want to be remembered "not necessarily for what I do, but that I brought the blues to the mountains."

-[Brandon] That's amazing.

Well, would you care to send us off with one?

-Yeah.

This is another tune I wrote.

-[Brandon] Okay.

I call it "The Good Book" because I'm Roy Bookbinder.

-Let's hear it, brother.

[gentle acoustic guitar] -And of course, Reverend Davis.

I didn't talk much about Reverend Davis, but I got these chords like that.

-Okay, so you're grabbing the bottom end.

Yeah.

And then you're grabbing that bass up with the thumb?

-Yeah, Reverend Davis played it.

He played with one thumb and a finger.

-Okay.

I use two fingers and a thumb.

And I got to play with bare fingers.

You can't pluck strings with picks on.

[guitar strumming] This here is a song like Reverend Davis said, the song was revealed to him.

And Tex Whitson, Haggard's guy, he said, "You should do an album."

He's always been trying to get me to do something, but I don't pay attention.

But he said, "You should do an album "of all Christian songs and call it The Good Book .

I mean, your name's Bookbinder."

I said, "There's too many people that can play Gary" the way I can't really play Gary.

I do some of Gary's songs.

I made it my own because I didn't... How did you make it your own?

And the deal is when you try to sound like your heroes, John Hartford told me this, people asked him.

You're trying to sound like your heroes and you can't do it.

And when you realize when you reach the limit of your talent you've got your own damn style.

-[laughs] I believe it.

-Because you're never going to make a living playing somebody else, just somebody else, anyway.

-[Brandon] Play with us, brother.

[soft guitar strumming] [soft guitar strumming] ♪ My mama told me ♪ ♪ My papa told me too ♪ I'm going to do that over.

-[Brandon] Yeah, absolutely.

♪ My mama told me ♪ ♪ Papa told me too ♪ ♪ The good book's Got the answers ♪ ♪ Yes, it will Tell you what to do ♪ ♪ The good book's Got the answers ♪ ♪ You just wait and see ♪ ♪ The good book's Got the answers ♪ ♪ They're just for you and me ♪ ♪ Learn to sing and dance ♪ ♪ You better work And play real hard ♪ ♪ Watch your step Along the way ♪ ♪ On your journey To the stars ♪ ♪ Don't you be a cheater ♪ ♪ Don't be telling lies ♪ ♪ Straight and narrow Path you're on ♪ ♪ Will lead you to the prize ♪ ♪ My mama told me ♪ ♪ Papa told me too ♪ ♪ The good book's Got the answers ♪ ♪ That's right ♪ ♪ It's going to tell you What to do ♪ ♪ The good book's Got the answers ♪ ♪ You just wait and see ♪ ♪ The good book's Got the answers ♪ ♪ They're just for you And me ♪ ♪ Be good to the children ♪ ♪ The old and feeble too ♪ ♪ Don't be doing to others ♪ ♪ What you don't want Done to you ♪ ♪ Mind your own business ♪ ♪ Keep singing This happy song ♪ ♪ A soldier in God's army ♪ ♪ Always knows What's right from wrong ♪ ♪ Don't be wantin' What's not yours ♪ ♪ Give thanks you got a lot ♪ ♪ You ain't never going to Miss what you don't have ♪ ♪ Or get from them that's got ♪ ♪ Fussin' and a-fightin' ♪ ♪ You know it's not The righteous way ♪ ♪ You just best be quiet ♪ ♪ If you've got Nothing good to say ♪ [♪ ♪ ♪] -Thank you so much, Roy.

-[Roy] Thank you.

Thank you for being here and thanks for watching back home, folks.

And please tune in to every episode of the season of The Life of a Musician .

And, Roy, let's do this again, man.

Let's hang out.

-[Narrator 2 VO] Thank you for being a part of our show .

We look forward to seeing you on the next episode of The Life of a Musician.

-[Roy] ♪ You just wait and see ♪ ♪ The good book's Got the answers ♪ ♪ They're just for you and me ♪ ♪ Learn to sing and dance ♪ ♪ You better work And play real hard ♪ ♪ What's you stand And blown away... ♪ -[Narrator 1 VO] This program is brought to you in part by Santa Cruz Guitar Company and Santa Cruz Parabolic Tension Strings.

-[Narrator 2 VO] Also brought to you by Page Capos.

And by Paluso Microphone Lab.

Additional support provided by these sponsors.