Bluegrass legend Dr. Ralph Stanley has been singing "O Death" for a long, long time.
Two years before Stanley, a singer and banjo player, cast his first vote for president for Harry S. Truman in 1948, he formed a bluegrass band with his guitarist older brother, Carter.
Over the next two decades, the Stanley Brothers and the Clinch Mountain Boys became one of the most acclaimed bluegrass groups in the world. The Virginia natives not only wrote their own songs, but they also put a whippin' on "O Death" and other traditional Appalachian folk songs such as "Man of Constant Sorrow."
Two years before Stanley, a singer and banjo player, cast his first vote for president for Harry S. Truman in 1948, he formed a bluegrass band with his guitarist older brother, Carter.
Over the next two decades, the Stanley Brothers and the Clinch Mountain Boys became one of the most acclaimed bluegrass groups in the world. The Virginia natives not only wrote their own songs, but they also put a whippin' on "O Death" and other traditional Appalachian folk songs such as "Man of Constant Sorrow."
After Carter's death in 1966, Ralph thought about giving up music
until, he says, he received 3,000 letters and phone calls urging him to
continue. Stanley will continue his musical legacy when he performs May
1 at Destination Daytona in Ormond Beach.
But even more acclaim was to come to Stanley after his brother's death.
When record producer T-Bone Burnett was creating the soundtrack for the film "O Brother, Where Art Thou?," he recruited Stanley to perform "O Death."
"He wanted it in the Dock Boggs style," Stanley told interviewer Don Harrison in Virginia Living magazine. "So I got my banjo and learned it the way he did it. You see, I had recorded 'O Death' three times, done it with Carter. So I went down with my banjo to Nashville and I said, 'T-Bone, let me sing it the way I want to sing it,' and I laid my banjo down and sang it a cappella. After two or three verses, he stopped me and said, 'That's it.'"
The recording won Stanley his first Grammy Award in 2001, for Best Country Male Vocalist Performance.
"I was a little surprised, but that was the one I really hoped to win," Stanley says in his press biography. "It just felt so good I can't hardly tell you."
Stanley won a second Grammy that year for his contribution to the "O Brother, Where Art Thou?" soundtrack when that multi-artist work was voted Album of the Year.
Stanley won his third Grammy in 2002 for Best Bluegrass Album for "Lost in the Lonesome Pines," recorded with the Clinch Mountain Boys and Jim Lauderdale.
Now 82 years old, Stanley has performed on more than 170 albums. He's toured the United States, Japan and other countries. In 1976 he was awarded an honorary doctorate of music degree from Lincoln Memorial University in Tennessee.
A member of the Primitive Baptist Universalist Church, Stanley still lives in the same area where he was born -- Dickenson County, Va.
Having served on the Dickenson County School Board, Stanley got active in politics last year when he supported Democratic candidate John Edwards for president. After Edwards dropped out, Stanley endorsed Barack Obama and even recorded a radio ad for the Obama campaign in October 2008.
If You Go
WHO: Bluegrass Bash featuring Ralph Stanley, the Lovell Sisters and Cherryholmes
WHEN: 7 p.m. May 1
WHERE: Destination Daytona, 1637 N. U.S. 1, Ormond Beach
TICKETS: $20 plus handling fee, available at the Daytona Beach International Festival box office, 212 S. Beach St., Daytona Beach; online at dbif.com; by calling 386-257-7790, or at the door.
But even more acclaim was to come to Stanley after his brother's death.
When record producer T-Bone Burnett was creating the soundtrack for the film "O Brother, Where Art Thou?," he recruited Stanley to perform "O Death."
"He wanted it in the Dock Boggs style," Stanley told interviewer Don Harrison in Virginia Living magazine. "So I got my banjo and learned it the way he did it. You see, I had recorded 'O Death' three times, done it with Carter. So I went down with my banjo to Nashville and I said, 'T-Bone, let me sing it the way I want to sing it,' and I laid my banjo down and sang it a cappella. After two or three verses, he stopped me and said, 'That's it.'"
The recording won Stanley his first Grammy Award in 2001, for Best Country Male Vocalist Performance.
"I was a little surprised, but that was the one I really hoped to win," Stanley says in his press biography. "It just felt so good I can't hardly tell you."
Stanley won a second Grammy that year for his contribution to the "O Brother, Where Art Thou?" soundtrack when that multi-artist work was voted Album of the Year.
Stanley won his third Grammy in 2002 for Best Bluegrass Album for "Lost in the Lonesome Pines," recorded with the Clinch Mountain Boys and Jim Lauderdale.
Now 82 years old, Stanley has performed on more than 170 albums. He's toured the United States, Japan and other countries. In 1976 he was awarded an honorary doctorate of music degree from Lincoln Memorial University in Tennessee.
A member of the Primitive Baptist Universalist Church, Stanley still lives in the same area where he was born -- Dickenson County, Va.
Having served on the Dickenson County School Board, Stanley got active in politics last year when he supported Democratic candidate John Edwards for president. After Edwards dropped out, Stanley endorsed Barack Obama and even recorded a radio ad for the Obama campaign in October 2008.
If You Go
WHO: Bluegrass Bash featuring Ralph Stanley, the Lovell Sisters and Cherryholmes
WHEN: 7 p.m. May 1
WHERE: Destination Daytona, 1637 N. U.S. 1, Ormond Beach
TICKETS: $20 plus handling fee, available at the Daytona Beach International Festival box office, 212 S. Beach St., Daytona Beach; online at dbif.com; by calling 386-257-7790, or at the door.
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