Flatt & Scruggs Biography

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Flatt & Scruggs
Country Music | 3 CD Set
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After Bill Monroe, the most influential bluegrass pickers have to be Flatt & Scruggs, who began playing together in 1945 as members of, guess who - Bill Monroe’s Bluegrass Boys. After three years with Monroe, guitarist Lester Flatt (b. 1914) and banjoist Earl Scruggs (b. 1924) formed their own group, the Foggy Mountain Boys. They took with them two of Monroe’s players, fiddler Jim Shumate and bass fiddler Howard Watts, who was also known as Cedric Rainwater. Mac Wiseman joined them as a singer/guitarist. A strictly Southern band, it was signed to play on a Virginia radio station and then joined Mercury Records prior to taking off on a major tour of the South. In 1950, the Boys switched to Columbia Records after releasing on Mercury several folk songs played in the new bluegrass mode all the while gaining new fans with a stronger version of bluegrass music. In 1953, Flatt and Scruggs signed a sponsorship deal with Martha White Mills, gaining a regular show on Nashville radio WSM and on the Mill’s sponsored television shows. The sound changed subtly again with the addition of Josh Graves on the dobro guitar, which softened the sometimes frenetic bluegrass style while making the banjo less visible and their sound more modern. The Folk Sound program gave the band more national attention and in 1960 their appearance at the Newport Folk Festival reaped much benefit as college kids took to the music and other bluegrass and folk acts became popular. They were also regularly on the Grand Ole Opry television show. The Foggy Mountain Boys played the theme song of television’s big comedy, The Beverly Hillbillies, and their big instrumental, "Foggy Mountain Breakdown," was featured in the film, "Bonnie and Clyde." In 1968, Scruggs’ sons Randy and Gary joined but Earl’s slowly fading interest in pure bluegrass caused the band to break up the next year. Flatt formed the Nashville Grass, and Scruggs put his family to work in the Earl Scruggs Revue and also aided the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band reunion of old stars for its 1971 album, WILL THE CIRCLE BE UNBROKEN. Both Flatt and Scruggs, while now playing different styles of their music, continued to work into the ‘80s and early ‘90s.

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