The Harmonic Heartbeat of Bluegrass: Tammy Rogers King and The SteelDrivers' Musical Journey
May 05, 2024
Randy
Discover the soul-stirring history and future of bluegrass music as we sit down with the remarkable Tammy Rogers King of The SteelDrivers. You're in for an auditory feast that intertwines the traditional melodies of Bill Monroe with the genre's modern-day mosaics, all through the lens of Tammy's rich musical narrative. She recounts her vibrant history of touring with country music luminaries, revealing how the high notes and harmonies of life on the road have woven into her artistic fabric. We also navigate the balance of family and touring, an intimate behind-the-scenes look at the life of a musician that's as intricate as the music itself.
Then, get ready to step behind the curtain of Nashville's music scene with anecdotes that are as warm as a Tennessee sunset, including the time Larry Gatlin left a lasting impression on my mom. We swap tales from the road with Reba McEntire and unpack the down-to-earth charm of Dean Miller amid the bright lights of Music City. The SteelDrivers are revving up for a monumental year, so we'll share a sneak peek at their headlining Ryman Auditorium show and the buzz around their 20th-anniversary tour. With festival stages and theater shows on the horizon, plus a cherished stop at the Bristol Rhythm and Roots—complete with family visits and homemade goodies—this episode encapsulates the heartfelt celebration of bluegrass, storytelling, and the anticipation of melodies yet to come.
Discover the soul-stirring history and future of bluegrass music as we sit down with the remarkable Tammy Rogers King of The SteelDrivers. You're in for an auditory feast that intertwines the traditional melodies of Bill Monroe with the genre's modern-day mosaics, all through the lens of Tammy's rich musical narrative. She recounts her vibrant history of touring with country music luminaries, revealing how the high notes and harmonies of life on the road have woven into her artistic fabric. We also navigate the balance of family and touring, an intimate behind-the-scenes look at the life of a musician that's as intricate as the music itself.
Then, get ready to step behind the curtain of Nashville's music scene with anecdotes that are as warm as a Tennessee sunset, including the time Larry Gatlin left a lasting impression on my mom. We swap tales from the road with Reba McEntire and unpack the down-to-earth charm of Dean Miller amid the bright lights of Music City. The SteelDrivers are revving up for a monumental year, so we'll share a sneak peek at their headlining Ryman Auditorium show and the buzz around their 20th-anniversary tour. With festival stages and theater shows on the horizon, plus a cherished stop at the Bristol Rhythm and Roots—complete with family visits and homemade goodies—this episode encapsulates the heartfelt celebration of bluegrass, storytelling, and the anticipation of melodies yet to come.
Speaker 1:
Welcome to Hot Bike with Houston and Hogan.
Speaker 2:
I'm Randy, houston and you are, and from Hogan Holler, dave Hogan here Well, we're two old radio guys telling the radio stories.
Speaker 1:
We've both been on the air around the hollers and the glades and the coves of Western North Carolina and East Tennessee for more years than we, either one want to think about. And we decided to do a podcast and tell some radio stories and we've had such a good time, Dave, doing that. But today is a continuation of a special guest.
Speaker 2:
Tammy Rogers King is our special guest today and Tammy is one of the founding members of the band the Steel Drivers. And I have a question for you, tammy, and one for Randy also. Randy is still active as a DJ and I'm retired. I hear people say, well, the steel drivers, they're not really bluegrass. I hear people say Chris Stapleton is not really country. Now I mentioned on the first podcast that we did with you, tammy, that I have a cousin who is a banjo player and plays for the Graskills. Now they play a completely different type of bluegrass than the steel drivers. So let's talk a little bit about that umbrella of bluegrass music.
Speaker 2:
Under that umbrella, bluegrass has grown to the point. There are different types of bluegrass. Expound on that a little bit. You, randy, as a DJ and Tammy, you as an artist.
Speaker 1:
Tammy, go ahead. I'm glad you brought that up, dave, you put that so eloquently. And Tammy, let's talk about that. How do you guys feel about the different strains of bluegrass, if you will?
Speaker 3:
Well, I absolutely agree with that statement that there are I think bluegrass has it's a much larger umbrella these days than it was when Bill Monroe started the music, and I think that that's been a good thing because, you know, bill was able to create a sound that was unique to him, and if every other band was expected to sound exactly like him, there's no way that the music would have stayed as vital and fresh as it has through almost 80 years now. You know you can't just keep copying over and over and, over and over again and keep people's interests. I don't think so. You know, the fact that you're allowed to have a unique expression and still be under the umbrella is great. You know Lester Flatt and Earl Scruggs. You put on one of those records and you know immediately who it is. You know you fast forward to the Stanley Brothers in the 60s and you know exactly who that is. You fast forward to the 70s with JD Crowe and you know who that is. So I think that's really and you know who that is, so I think that's really. You know, as an artist, to me that's the goal To have a unique and identifiable sound, and you know it's hard to do. I'm not saying that it's an easy task, but when you are able to do that, then I think you've done something pretty special that people can really hear immediately. Know, oh, that's the steel drivers.
Speaker 3:
So you know, we set out to do something different, but we all grew up with the exception of Stapleton, you know. He didn't necessarily grow up playing bluegrass, specifically, he grew up in East Kentucky, of course, but I think he listened to all kinds of different music. But the rest of us, you know, we're very well versed in bluegrass. But, like I said in, you know, the, the first show, the volume one, I, by the time we got the Still Drivers together, it had been about 15 years before I had really played any traditional bluegrass. I had been out touring with country artists and doing recording sessions in Nashville and playing a lot of Americana music, just a lot of different styles of music, and I love that. I love all music.
Speaker 2:
I love what Dale McCurry said there's two kinds of music good and bad.
Speaker 1:
Well said well, you, uh, you talked about traveling with the various artists. You, you spent a lot of time on the road with people like patty loveless and trisha yearwood, and reba mEntire yeah. Picked up a lot of stuff there, I'm sure.
Speaker 3:
And I loved that, you know. I loved the fact that I was able to have, you know, those experiences, you know, because again, I got to sing and play with some of the icons of my generation.
Speaker 1:
Yeah, icons of my generation.
Speaker 3:
And when I look back now I have to pinch myself because as a young person I wouldn't, I didn't. I mean I've said this before. I don't think I dreamed big enough. Because if you'd asked me at 13, 14 years old if I would ever get to step on stage with Emmylou Harris or Reba McEntire or, you know, dolly Parton, any of these people, I would have thought you know, you're crazy, that's not going to happen, you know. So the sheer fact that those experiences, plus many, many more, came my way, I mean I still can't get over it. So it's just been an unbelievable, magical gift to me that I've been able to meet and play and know these people. I just can't explain it any other way.
Speaker 1:
Well, you've just outlined a whole lot of road travel, a whole lot of time spent on the road. Oh, yeah. I mean tell us about that life. I mean raising a family and then being on the road as much as you are. You still are on the road a lot.
Speaker 3:
I am, you know, the Steel Drivers, which has been my main gig since about 2009. I kept touring in the early days with the band. I kept touring with Reba until 2009. And by then the band, you know, we'd already been nominated for a Grammy and we were starting to get some really good you know dates booked and I couldn't keep juggling both.
Speaker 3:
Um, but you know I'll tell you it it's, it's not easy and you know it's not for the faint of heart. Uh um it it, you know it. It takes, takes a, as they say. And definitely, being married to another professional musician, jeff King my husband, he's been. I've said this over and over and over again I would have quit the band a dozen times if he weren't behind me saying you can't quit, you love this too much.
Speaker 2:
Now, Jeff is an East Tennessee boy.
Speaker 3:
He is. He's from Townsend Yep.
Speaker 2:
Down in the Smoky Mountains.
Speaker 3:
Mm-hmm, and we've been able somehow between the two of us, to juggle incredible studio life and touring life, and we have one daughter that is 22 now and you know to her this is normal what mom and dad do.
Speaker 2:
How is Chris Stapleton handling superstardom?
Speaker 3:
You know, I think he's stayed pretty grounded. I mean, obviously we don't chat every day or even every week, but we stay in touch and I did get to visit with him in person oh gosh, maybe it was back last fall and when we do see each other, it's just like the same Chris that I've known now for close to 20 years.
Speaker 2:
I would imagine that if not too long ago, Chris could walk around Nashville unrecognized, but he can't do that anymore.
Speaker 3:
Yeah, I don't think so, Although Nashville is, you know, as far as that goes. You know, there's so many artists that live here that most people pretty much leave them alone.
Speaker 2:
That's great, that's wonderful.
Speaker 3:
You'll see Vince Gill out at a restaurant, or you know somebody else, and I mean I've seen Keith Urban and Nicole Kidman around Nashville and and people are very respectful here, which is why so many of them want to live here, I think.
Speaker 2:
I heard a funny story and I don't know if it's. I'm going to let you tell the story. I don't know how stories get exaggerated along the way, but I heard a story about your mom when she was living with you in Nashville and she was a big fan of larry gatlin. Oh yes, do you know the story we're talking about?
Speaker 3:
oh yeah, okay, tell that story we uh mom was visiting um and we had a different house than we're in now but we had a home studio down in the basement and Jeff was doing some work, some studio stuff with Larry Gatlin and he would come in through the bottom of the house and you know, not to disturb what was going on upstairs. And he'd come over several times and she had expressed to Jeff how much she loved Larry and gosh the next time that he came over. She would just love to meet him. Sure enough, the next time he came over, jeff brought him upstairs to meet my mom. Larry is just the most, if you haven't met him the most outgoing, friendly guy you would ever want to meet. And Jeff brought him upstairs to the kitchen and my mom was standing there in her house coat.
Speaker 2:
And her hair in curlers.
Speaker 3:
And she was obviously thrilled to death to get to meet Larry and he just grabbed her and hugged her and loved on her and after they went back downstairs she was like I'm going to kill that Jeff King. He didn't make any notice and here I am standing in my old house coat.
Speaker 2:
I love it. What a story I've heard so many. She was horrified.
Speaker 3:
It was a good story.
Speaker 2:
Good story. I've heard so many good things about Reba McEntire. Talk about your touring with Reba, and what kind of person is Reba McEntire?
Speaker 3:
Reba is incredible and has been so good to our family. I mean, jeff still tours with her when she goes out. The way she appears on screen and in concert is exactly the way she is behind the scenes. Um, you know, just wonderful. She's got a great sense of humor. She loves to laugh. Um, as a matter of fact, our neighborhood here in Nashville we really do up Halloween and this past fall she was in town and she and her boyfriend, rex, wanted to go to a neighborhood that had trick-or-treating. So they came over to our house and she was kind of dressed up in costume and we just sat there and Rex gave out candy and we had a little fire pit going in the front yard and she just enjoyed herself so much. And then we started walking around the neighborhood and knocking on doors and I don't think anybody realized that Reba McEntire was coming up to their door. But she just couldn't get over it. She just had such a good time. It was just a fun, fun night.
Speaker 2:
Another person I want to ask you about is Dean Miller, son of the late Roger Miller Back in the 1960s, when country music was just trying to regain its legs or grow new legs after it was almost destroyed by rock and roll. That's when I got into radio in the 1960s and we used to have a disc jockey convention in nashville and at that time djs got together in october and were able to get to know and meet a lot of the artists of that era, and one of the artists I can't say I was on a first-name basis with Roger Miller, but I was able to get to know Roger and he was a wild but wonderful person. Wild and wonderful is the way I would describe him Back when they had the King of the Road in where Ronnie Millsap got his start in Nashville. What kind of person is his son, dean?
Speaker 3:
You know Dean is a wonderful talent and he's done several records himself Extremely kind. You know I just was always struck he was a crossover superstar. So you know, he just always struck me, as you know, being such a down-to-earth, normal person, to have been brought up in that, in that world, a great guy, really, really great. And now he's he's producing a lot of records. You know he's he stayed in Nashville and had a good songwriting career and, you know, has kind of moved into producing and he's doing great.
Speaker 1:
Well, Tammy, you've been so kind with your time. As we wrap up our second visit here, let's talk a little bit about what the future holds, what dates coming up, road trips, tours, what's coming up on the on the horizon here?
Speaker 3:
well, we've got a nice year going for the steel drivers. We've got um a big show. I'm not sure when this podcast will air, but may 16th we're headlining the ryman here in Nashville, which is always a big, big show for us. We love playing the Ryman, you know. We love its history. The sound there is unlike any other place. It's just our favorite. And then you know, good amount of festivals scattered through the summer and then as we move into the fall we'll we'll get into, you know, back into doing theater shows and things like that. But next year we're really looking um towards a big 20th anniversary tour. That'll be the the 20th anniversary of the founding of the steel drivers.
Speaker 3:
So we're we're super excited um for that and see how that all comes together for us and you'll be in western north carolina later in the year in try on, oh really earl scruggs event that tell us about that um, we haven't played that one before, so I'm very excited to get over there and I'm always excited to get to Western Carolina because I usually get to see my dear cousins Margo and Lita.
Speaker 3:
Yes, We'll come down to them. I love them so dearly and the guys know Lita because she usually treats them to home-baked goodies, so they're always excited to get either some pound cake or some brownies or whatever she feels like making. And we're also going to be back to the Bristol Rhythm and Roots this fall, which is always a big show for us up there. So a lot of good things, a lot of good things in the next little bit.
Speaker 2:
Well, speaking of try-on, and Randy and I just recently went down to the Equestrian Center there in try-on. Yeah, and that's where the Earl Scruggs show will be in memory of the late Earl Scruggs, but it brings up in my mind the fact that you, rogerses, is that the way you say? Rogers plural.
Speaker 1:
Rogerses.
Speaker 2:
You Rogerses are all horse people, it seems.
Speaker 3:
Yes, definitely yes.
Speaker 1:
Well, I can't thank you enough, tammy. Uh, dave, like I said, he he's always told me about, uh, tammy rogers, and one of these days we're gonna call tammy and I kept yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, we've done it and I can't wait to meet you in the fall in Tryon. We'll be there Fantastic. Yeah, we want to meet and say howdy and we want to thank you again so much for being a part of our Hot Mike with Houston and Hogan.
Speaker 3:
Thank you, tammy, we appreciate it so much.
Speaker 1:
Thank you so much, you guys have a good day, all righty See you soon.
Speaker 3:
Bye-bye, thank you so much.
Speaker 1:
Have a good day All right, see you soon, bye, bye. Be sure to click the subscribe button for another episode of hot Mike with Randy Houston and Dave Hogan.