From our archives in 2012:

Graham Sharp from the Steep Canyon Rangers talks about where it all began, digging into his roots in bluegrass and how the band found its voice along the way. He shares how a mix of curiosity, creativity, and a few lucky breaks helped turn casual college jam sessions in Chapel Hill into a full-fledged career.

Along the way, he paints a picture of the Asheville, North Carolina music scene and the role it played in shaping their sound early on. The conversation moves through the band’s evolution, from honoring traditional bluegrass to pushing into new territory with original songwriting.

With plenty of humor and honesty, Graham also gets into what it’s like to stay creative on the road, how live performances keep the music alive, and how the band continues to adapt as the music world keeps changing. It’s a relaxed, heartfelt look at the journey behind the sound.

Chapters

• 00:00 - Introduction to Country Fried Rock
• 02:41 - The Roots of Bluegrass Discoveries
• 04:39 - The Journey to the First Record
• 11:01 - The Creative Process of Recording
• 14:31 - The Art of Music Packaging
• 18:00 - Mountain Song Festival and Charitable Efforts

Mentioned in this Episode

• Ashland, Kentucky
• Asheville, North Carolina
• Athens, Georgia
• Bedrock
• Bill Monroe
• Boys and Girls Club
• Brevard, North Carolina
• Burlington, North Carolina
• Chapel Hill, North Carolina
• Colorado
• Curtis Burch/New Grass Revival
• Dallas, Texas
• David Grisman Quintet
• Del McCoury
• Della Mae
• Full Tones
• Hot Rize
• IBMA Awards (International Bluegrass Music Association Awards)
• J.D. Crowe
• James Taylor
• Jimmy Martin
• John Hartford
• Kruger Brothers
• Larry Keel
• Lions, Colorado
• Miami, Florida
• Mountain Song at Sea
• Mountain Song Festival
• New Grass Revival
• New York
• NoiseTrade
• Norwegian Cruise Line
• North Carolina
• Nuci’s Space
• Paul Simon
• Pisgah National Forest
• Punch Brothers
• Raleigh, North Carolina
• Rocky Grass Festival
• Shannon Whitworth
• Sixth Man
• Steve Martin
• Steve Soto and the Twisted Hearts
• Telluride Bluegrass Festival (1976 recording referenced)
• Town Mountain
• Transylvania County, North Carolina
• Travelin’ McCourys
• University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
• Western North Carolina
• Winnipeg Folk Festival

Recommended If You Like

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Mentioned in this episode:

Don't Click Those Old Links!

These podcast episodes are from 2009-2020. Links are probably dead. Half these places do not exist any more.

Welcome to Country Fried Rock, where we talk with musicians to find out what inspires their creativity.

Country fried rock music uncovered.

My guest this morning on Country Fried Rock is Graham Sharp of Steep canyon Rangers.

Good morning.

Good morning.

Thanks for having me on.

Appreciate you being here with us.

Well, this has been a treat to get to chat with you.

I actually know y' all originally from Asheville, Brevard, kind of western North Carolina area.

Yeah, we've made our home up there for about the last ten years or so.

Everybody kind of lives up in that area, which is really convenient for traveling and getting new together and all that good stuff.

Great community up there and very strongly supportive of bluegrass.

Yeah, there's a great, you know, traditional music scene up there, and that's kind of what threw us there in the first place, you know, back, like, shortly after the turn of the century.

Let's back up a little bit.

How did you get into music as a fan originally?

You know, my first real introduction to bluegrass, I think, was at a teacher in high school who at one point recommended that I out Norman Blake, who still to this day, one of my favorite guitar players, songwriter, singer, guys.

So the only thing I could find by him was this Telluride, right.

1976 Telluride collection.

It had the.

You know, had John Harford on it and had hot rides on it, had new grass revival on it, and those kind of were sort of touchstones that I listened to in bluegrass as an.

Early listener to that.

What was appealing.

I like kind of the directness of the music.

You know, I really like the rootsy feel to it.

I loved all the voices singing together.

You know, I love the speed of the music.

The instruments were really exciting.

I don't know.

I think I just loved everything about it.

And so then how did that develop for you?

A couple years later, probably around 97 or so, I bought a banjo when I was in college in Chapel Hill at the University of North Carolina.

I had actually known Woody and Charles, our talented bass player.

I had known them before that or friends and acquaintances, and I don't think either of them owned an instrument at the time either, but.

But I got a banjo, and Charles started taking bass classes at unc, and he had played bass in school a little bit before, but hadn't played any bluegrass or anything like that.

So we'd go down to the music building there on campus, and that's where the bass was.

He couldn't take it out of the building.

So we just go back in the stairwells of the school building.

There, down near the elevators or wherever and play music.

And it actually turned out to be a great place to play because that's where the musicians were at the school.

So we ended up meeting a couple of the other early members of the rangers there who actually had experience, you know, with the music.

That was really nice.

Was there a traditional music scene in chapel hill at the time?

You know, not so much in chapel hill itself.

You know, I mean, we kind of felt like we were sort of on an island, like with the bluegrass band.

But, you know, right around that area, I mean, if you take quarter mile out of town in any direction, you're going to start running into these amazing players.

You know, I mean, there's just.

That's really the hotbed for the music is traditional players.

There's a great old time scene down there.

Great.

Tons of great bluegrass players right around the raleigh, durham, chapel hill, Burlington, all the way through that stretch of north carolina, you know.

Yeah.

Really surrounded by it.

But at the time, we had no idea.

It took a couple years, I think, for our eyes to be open to the fact that, oh, we're actually surrounded by this world of music that we never even knew was there.

Hey, this is graham sharp from the steep canyon rangers, and you're listening to country fried rock.

So how did that expand for you all?

Well, I guess at some point, Charles bought a bass.

Kind of.

From the start, we were just wanting to learn the music.

We were all totally new to it, and that's all we were in it for, you know, was to kind of figure out how to do that.

So we were, you know, we were writing our own music pretty early on from the start.

Once we could get through a handful of songs, we just, you know, got a bar to let us come play in the corner one night.

We were obviously very lucky from the beginning because we had all our college buddies there.

So first show was like, sold out, jam packed.

And, you know, we probably played the same five songs over and over again.

Nobody cared.

And so then when did it expand beyond the college scene?

Well, for me, starting out with that telluride CD and that being my starting, you know, and for other reasons, we sort of ended up gravitating towards Colorado, sort of the music scene out there.

You know, we went out there, we'd go out to that festival, just drive out to the rocky grass festival lions every year.

Just love that festival.

And played the band competition.

And one year we won the band competition.

We were just like, wow, okay, well, this is cool.

So we just sort of Kept at it.

And I think that cemented it in a lot of our minds that we could.

You know, I don't think any of us really thought we'd play professionally, but, you know, just that, you know, we keep the band going, kind of kept at it, kept traveling around and playing kind of regionally.

And one thing led to another, and before you know it, we were doing it full time.

What led to the first record?

Well, we had a dobro player playing with us time, who's from Kentucky, and he knew Curtis Burt, the original Newgrass revival.

He said that Curtis would come help us out and make a record.

So, you know, we couldn't believe that.

We were totally amazed.

You know, we drove up to Alaska, Kentucky, it was.

Drove up there and had about four or five days in the studio and got the record done and got to hang out with Curtis, which was awesome and amazing.

He's a great guy, great player.

I don't know if we would have made the first record if not for that, but, you know, we had all those songs.

It's all originals.

I think there might be one Bill Monroe song on there, and I don't know, it all seems really natural.

You know, we were just a group of friends who were just sort of continuing what we begun.

It just sort of progressed naturally.

Things have moved and progressed quite a bit for you all since that first album.

Yeah, you know, I mean, we probably put in 20,000 hours practicing together as a band kind of once we decided we were going to do it, pretty much went after it.

We didn't have the luxury of, you know, a lot of people in bluegrass have, you know, growing up playing the music or maybe playing with a.

Serving an apprenticeship, which is kind of the standard in bluegrass, having an apprenticeship with a more established act.

We never had any of that.

It was just kind of us just learning how to do it.

What were y' all listening to?

Everything.

Rock and roll.

I listened to a lot of blues, IDY co songwriter stuff, obviously a ton of bluegrass.

First generation, Jimmy Martin, all that stuff.

Spent a lot of time trying to learn, play the banjo like J.D.

Crow.

And so that was a lot of my musical education, you know, I think a lot of it was just learning how to sort of have our own identity also.

And that is something that, to me is very distinct and has gelled for you all for quite a long time, is you can listen to something and immediately Know that's a steep cany Rangers song, right?

We didn't really have the opportunity to, you know, learn it from somebody who learned it from somebody who learned it from somebody.

So much as we tried or would have liked to have sounded like some of those bands wasn't really an option for us.

We just kind of had to end up sounding like ourselves.

Several great musician friends of Country Fried rock generously donated songs for a free music sampler.

Download it at noise trade.com countryfriedrock 19 songs to help raise awareness and money for new cheese space, a non profit serving the mental health needs of musicians in the athletes Georgia area.

Find out more about New Cheese at n u c I.org I hear a lot of the songwriter influence, which is not always the case in traditional music.

Yeah, I mean, we try really hard.

You know, it's not to necessarily follow a formula for anything.

You know, we have a song and we.

If we like the song, we sort of try to treat it as a song and not try to fit it into a certain niche or a certain genre.

But I mean, that said, bluegrass is the foundation, so it's kind of the touchstone for the whole thing.

But it all just kind of grows out of that.

So how does that develop for you all when you're working up new material?

Sometimes it can be fast, sometimes it can be slow.

You know, the writer, myself or Charles usually will bring a song to the band and just kind of toy around with it.

You know, I mean, change the key, change the chords, change the signature at your.

I mean, that's the fun thing about being in a band like this is that, you know, you have a lot of flexibility and nobody's gonna judge you or, you know, anything like that.

We all are working for the common goals.

You know, if it takes 10 minutes to get a song how you like it, or if it takes five years to get a song how you like it, you know, I mean, that's kind of what we're all in it for.

As much as you're on the road, is that a time when you can then work up songs or is that a time when that's put aside for a while?

Yeah, that's definitely the time when we work on.

You know, we get a lot of time in hotels or in our van that we can do all that.

And for me, that's actually when I get most of my riding done, is when I'm on the road.

It's a really good time for us.

It's always refreshing whenever you get the juices flowing and feel like you really hit on something, you know, that's a good feeling.

A lot of times you hear people segment those bits of creative time into separate things.

So that's working more symbiotically for you all.

Yeah, we've all got pretty busy home lives.

I've got family and two children, and Charles does, and Mike's got a young son and Woody and Nikki have a lot going on around home.

So it kind of works for us to.

When we're on the road, that's time we can really devote to it.

Well, so a lot has changed for you all from that first record in developing what your own individual distinct sound was.

And you've had some nice, nice little sidetracks on the way there.

What's kind of transpired in a nutshell up to now?

Well, about three years ago, we started working with Steve Martin, you know, traveling with him, probably doing about 40 or 50 shows with him over the years.

And, you know, I mean, we had done four other Steve Canyon records between that time and felt like we were, you know, in a pretty good spot as a band.

But, you know, working with Steve is just.

Just gets a different level of media exposures.

Been huge for us.

And I think musically it's really sort of refocused us a little bit on the Steve Canyon Rangers, you know, kind of on what we do well and what our strengths are.

And Steve has really been good for that.

You know, I think to encourage us maybe more to play through our, you know, really are our strengths.

Check out the Steve Canyon Rangers@www.steepcanyon.com.

Yeah, I've spoken with several bands who have had nice little side things that have really increased the exposure to their music.

What does that change for you all?

You know, I don't think it's changed a lot.

You know, we've.

Coming into our last record, we recognized that it was probably going to give us a chance to gain a little bit wider audience for it.

That was a good feel and I think it really focused this, you know, going into making it.

Nobody knows you.

I think it really sort of just encourages to be that much more creative.

As you are heading in to make a new record.

Do you go in with a batch of songs already?

We do, yeah.

I mean, we go in with probably, I don't know, we probably had 10 or 12 songs ready and then probably four or five others that were in various states of readiness.

And just depending on how things were going and how the album was shaping up was what we kind of decided to Use as we went along, we probably had eight or nine songs that were pretty sure we were going to record.

Then after that, it's just seeing what fits and what kind of direction, what kind of flavors and stuff you want to add in from there.

Are you all road testing new material before recording?

Yeah, I mean, we were doing that right now for another record.

Constant process.

Once a record comes out, you know, those are songs you've written a year or two ago.

You know, by the time you've recorded it and released it and done all that, it's always sort of a game playing catch up like that.

What's different for you all now with what will be new material for us?

I mean, we've always seen ourselves this way and I think always will.

I mean, we're still learning, you know, we're still trying to get better, write better songs, play better, sing better, and just sort of keep growing, you know.

It's kind of been the main thing for our band, you know.

And that doesn't necessarily mean to like, do like experimental music or anything like that.

It means, you know, not to say we're going to do this, this or this, or be beholden to this and that.

Just, you know, follow where our folly leads us.

Keep it fresh.

Yeah.

What would you all like to bring into a recording process that you have not done yet?

I think right now we're.

We've had some really great producers in the past.

I think now, you know, we may be just trying to look to a producer who has like a really interesting sort of flavor to add something that's going to really mold an album together, give it a lot of continuity.

I think the role of a producer with any kind of traditional music can be somewhat different than say, you're bringing in a rock and roll band and you're going for like that producer's sound.

How does that work for you all?

For me, a lot of it just has to do with setting, you know, just getting the band in the right setting, getting it just capturing the sound the way we want it to be.

That said, you know, we're also a little bit off traditional, so a lot of tweaking and arranging we can kind of do within our music.

We've always done pretty much 99% of that ourselves within the band and continue to, you know, it's also something where if you're in a position to take advantage of somebody who has made a lot of great music, why not do that?

You can buy Steve Canyon rangers music@stevecanyon.com.

What type of environment do you all like when you're in that recording mode?

We've done different ways, I think different things have worked at different times.

For our next one, we're just kind of going to try to look at just setting up a few mics in a room and then try and lay it down as it goes live.

That's kind of what we're looking towards.

We've done records like that.

We've done records, you know, tracked out too.

So I think both can work.

But right now I think the feeling for us is to go to a more just a live in the studio kind of setting up.

How do you feel about songs in their life as a recorded product versus their life as a live product?

Well, I mean, when you're recording, you're really just trying to capture a moment, you know, I mean, nothing cemented as far as the songs go, you know, I mean, our songs still change on how we do them and stuff like that.

So you're never.

You're not setting it down necessarily for eternity how the song is.

You're just trying to capture a good moment in that song, really.

Are there any in particular that stick out to you as that have changed quite a bit?

I would say, you know, between Midnight the Dawn is sort of constantly changing a little bit.

Natural disaster as well, you know, it's just sort of product of different playing a song live versus playing it, you know, for a record.

You kind of have to just respond to those things a little differently.

I think I would be remiss if I didn't mention this because it also got a IBM A award recently.

When I first got this record, I was absolutely taken with the packaging.

I like the tactile part of music.

That's part of it to me.

But how did that process develop?

Yeah, this great company that actually really wonderful for us, they're out of Dallas, called Bedrock.

And we came to know the owner of that through some film work that Steve was doing, you know, as a way of thanking us for working on that project with them.

He sort of offered their services for graphic design and all that.

I mean, they're just wonderful, wonderful graphic designers.

You know, I think they really understand the feel of the music and, you know, translate that in a really smart way onto the page.

So, yeah, those guys.

Wonderful.

That was a perfect way to explain it.

The feel of the music in both internally as well as the physical product.

Yeah, I mean, you know, it's.

I'm like you.

I like the physical product too.

And you know, when you can.

When Something looks how it sounds, you know, it all just comes together, right?

What are you all seeing with your music of the difference with people who are consuming it digitally versus other, more traditional methods of accessing music?

Well, most of our CD sales are really, you know, what we sell at our concerts.

By and large, bluegrass is sort of one of the final bastions of the physical record as it was, you know, for us, it's been nice.

We can offer vinyl with a digital download card in it, which is what a lot of bands are doing, which is really nice vinyl record at home, which gives you that physical copy, and the vinyl sounds great.

And then you also get a download card so you can put it on your device and take it anywhere you go.

Not only is the consumption of music changing or the methods in which people are consuming music, what's changing for you all about the audiences that find you?

Well, you know, I mean, we've always played to very diverse audiences, and that's kind of still the case.

They're just a little bit bigger these days, play in very traditional settings, and we play settings where they don't get a lot of bluegrass bands through there, you know, where our music lies somewhere in the middle.

Everybody's just kind of appreciative.

We go one place, we're considered a traditional band, and if we go another place, we're considered, you know, very contemporary band, you know, depending on the audience.

But I hear you about how depending on who else is on, say, a festival bill or who the crowd is, their expectation and definition of you may be different.

Yeah, 100%.

Do you get a chance to hear much other live music?

We're lucky to go to a bunch of festivals and hear a lot of great bands at different festivals.

You know, whether it's a bluegrass festival and get to see a bluegrass band that hasn't seen for a year or so, or we do some other really diverse stuff.

We were up in the Winnipeg folk festival this year, and lots of great traditional music of all kinds up there.

So try to get your eyes opened up by it as much as possible.

It's all really good.

Inspiration Mountain Song at Seas will be cruising out of Miami February 1st through 4th.

Lots of the greatest bands in bluegrass and acoustic music.

We hope you can join us at sea.

Has anybody in particular caught your ear?

A great soul singer up in Winnipeg.

Name?

The flying eagle of soul.

I can't remember his name, but I don't know.

I just pretty much like it all when it comes to music.

So any chance to see the live stuff Is the best.

When you all are out in headlining events, do you all like to have someone you select be an opener?

Sometimes, but, you know, sometimes we also take a cue from somebody who's more local, who kind of has a feel for it, you know, in general, I think it's better to have somebody who's not another bluegrass band.

In my opinion.

It always.

When we play at a festival where we follow somebody who's not a bluegrass band, it sounds better.

You know, a little bit of variety, I think, goes a long way.

Has there been anyone in particular where that's worked real well for you all?

Well, I mean, you know, we always love on the chances where we get to go open for another band kind of outside of our genre.

It's always nice because, you know, the bluegrass makes a them by surprise a little bit.

That's always a fun thing to do.

We don't get to do an awful lot of that.

Quite a benefit last week with steve martin, with paul simon up in new york, that I guess Paul simon was there, Stevie wonder was there.

James taylor was there.

Paul simon's great band was doing a lot of music.

But you could tell, like, when the bluegrass when we started playing, you know, it just shifted people's attention a little bit.

So it was a really good experience to take it to those kind of settings.

That's very cool.

Do you all have any particular causes that you all try to work your music for?

Yeah, you know, our guitar player, woody is about seven years ago, founded the mountain song festival.

It benefits the boys and girls club, Pennsylvania county.

You know, it has great community support.

And it's raised.

I think after six years, it's raised about $300,000.

That's our festival.

Like I say, it's raised $300,000 for the boys and girls club in transylvania county and musicians and stuff like that, and a beautiful country out there.

It's about 30 minutes south of asheville, Right on borders of pisgah national forest down there.

Yeah, so that's been kind of our main charity that we do.

And then when we do our shows in asheville every year, we started continue steam, but in asheville rather than brevard.

Last year, we benefited one of the schools there in asheville.

And this year we're gonna have our concerts there benefit two of the other schools.

Well, and mountain song has expanded.

There's like mountain song at sea or something, isn't there?

Yeah.

So this is the first year of mountain song at sea, which is great production company called six man that takes what we're doing at our Mountain Song festival, but put it on a Norwegian cruise liner in the Caribbean.

So, yeah, this is the first year for Mountain Song at sea.

It's like I said, it's kind of a reflection of the music we have at Mountain Song.

Obviously ourselves, Del McCurry and the Travel, McCurry's David Gristman Quintet, Punch Brothers, Kruger Brothers, Della May, Town Mountain, Shannon Wentworth, Larry Keel.

Lots of folks, you know, that we've just come to.

We're lucky.

We get to like for these festivals, we get to choose these bands that we really want to hear and invite them to come play.

So, yeah, it's February 1st through 4th, I think, sailing out of Miami and like I say, it's kind of first thing of its kind because the whole boat is actually dedicated to the cruise.

There's going to be all sorts of music related events with the bands and stuff like that around.

We're really looking forward to it.

Thank you so, so much for your time, Graham.

I really appreciate it.

Yeah, thank you, Sloane.

Glad we finally caught up.

Country Fried Rock.

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