Guitarist Lester Flatt and Banjo player Earl Scruggs met as members of the legendary Bill Monroe's band, the Blue Grass Boys, in 1946. They left the Blue Grass Boys in 1948 and shortly afterwards formed their own band, the Foggy Mountain Boys. The Foggy Mountain Boys became a prolific bluegrass band, performing and recording through the 1960's. Lester and Earl are well known for a number of performances together on the 60's sit-com, The Beverly Hillbillies. They were highly instrumental in bringing bluegrass music to a much wider audience.While Scruggs was progressive minded, adding songs by people like Bob Dylan to the group's repertoire, Flatt, by nature a traditionalist, resisted such changes. Subsequently, the band broke up in 1969, and Lester founded the Nashville Grass and Scruggs, the Earl Scruggs Review. Lester Flatt died in 1979, while Scruggs is still performing occassionally.
Here is a great clip of them together back in the day, performing You are My Flower. While Scruggs is famous for his banjo playing, he is also a fine guitar player, as shown in this video. Notice his use of the thumb and fingers along the lines of the Carter style, which led the way to the use of the flatpick, common to this kind of music today. Notice also the size of Earl's pickguard. I can't imagine anyone needing a pickguard that large, with, perhaps, the exception of Peter Townshend. Notice also, Maybelle Carter is playing the autoharp:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=u3Itz0rTiMU
In 1998, Norman Blake (pictured to the right) had Bob Altman (pictured above) build him a custom guitar. Listen to the great sound of Norman playing "Salt River" on this guitar at:
