In full swing: Appalachian banjo player and singer Laura Boosinger shares memories of an old-time mountain swing band in Canton with her latest CD, Let Me Linger.
By Michael Beadle
Laura Boosinger was a student at Warren Wilson College in Swannanoa in the late 1970s when she decided to take a banjo class for a college credit.
Little did she know the class would open her up to a whole new world of Appalachian music and performers — including her very own teacher, David Holt, now a Grammy Award-winning musician and storyteller. Soon, Boosinger was going around to folk festivals, and one of her favorite bands, the Luke Smathers Band from Canton, had a particularly catchy sound that intrigued her.
The family band took traditional fiddle tunes, pop tunes from the 1920s,’ “Big Band” favorites, and western swing from Bob Wills and His Texas Playboys and rolled it into a new kind of musical genre they called “mountain swing.” Luke Smathers went on to become a N.C. Folk Heritage Award winner and a Folk Heritage Committee member helping to oversee local festivals like Asheville’s Shindig on the Green and the Mountain Dance and Folk Festival. By the mid-1980s, the Luke Smathers Band was looking for a banjo player, so Boosinger summoned up the nerve to ask about playing with them. They agreed, and a month later she found herself playing gigs with the band and rehearsing at the home of Luke Smathers in the kitchen — Bea’s Kitchen, as it was known, named after Luke’s wife, Bea.
Now two decades later, Boosinger pays tribute to her 13 years with the Luke Smathers Band with a new CD called Let Me Linger that features some of the old favorites the band used to play. The album was recorded in Nashville and features a handful of fine musicians including Josh Goforth on guitar, fiddle, mandolin and vocals; Amanda Luther playing the same bass fiddle that Bea Smathers once played; Buddy Spicher on fiddle; Kenny Malone on percussion; Mark Howard on guitar, ukulele and mandolin; and Joey Miskulin, the accordion player from Riders in the Sky.
For her fifth album, Boosinger set out to have some fun and share part of the wide repertoire she honed while playing those many Sunday evenings at Bea’s Kitchen.
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“To me, it feels like we’re all in Bea’s Kitchen playing,” Boosinger said of the songs on the album.
The 16 tracks include classics like “Up a Lazy River;” sultry tunes like “My Little Grass Shack in Kealakekua, Hawaii” and “Dinah;” and sentimental favorites like “Cacklin’ Hen.” The album opens with “Sally Ann,” the fiddle tune that the Luke Smathers Band would always open with in every practice and concert.
Boosinger provides a rich history of the Luke Smathers Band in the liner notes of the CD. Each song on the album carries a charm and sentimental connection to one of the longest running old-time Appalachian bands ever. Luke Smathers and his brothers George and Harold grew up in the era of barn dances and The Grand Ole Opry. According to Boosinger, in 1928 George offered to buy some musical instruments from the Sears & Roebuck catalogue, and by the following year George was playing guitar, Harold switched from banjo to the guitar, and Luke switched from the ukulele to the banjo. None of them took lessons. Their training came while listening to radio shows and playing at barn dances. Over a two- or three-week period, the story goes, Luke taught himself to play fiddle tunes, and thus began a legendary music career that would last eight decades.
By the 1930s, the brothers were working at the Champion paper mill in Canton, and the mill organized an employee band. Luke and his brothers joined up with Luke playing trumpet, George on clarinet, and Harold on trombone.
Meanwhile, Luke and his family string band played on — adding new members over the years. David Holt, for instance, played banjo in the band for eight years. When Boosinger joined in 1984, the band featured Luke on fiddle, Harold on guitar, Bea on stand-up bass, and Luke’s great-nephew Charles Gidney on lead guitar.
Picking up songs from the radio, Luke and his brothers had learned by ear how to take popular music from the ‘20s and ‘30s and meld it into old-time mountain string music. It wasn’t bluegrass. It wasn’t swing music. It was its own style.
“They surprised me because they were so unlike other bands,” Boosinger recalled.
Just as big jazz bands offer up solos for various instruments during a given song, the Luke Smathers Band did this with old-time mountain music, which normally does not highlight one instrument over another, Boosinger explained. The band could also take on complex chords — far beyond the typical three-chord standard for most songs.
“I was terrified,” Boosinger said of those early sessions with the band. “They were rhythm masters.”
From those sessions in Bea’s Kitchen, Boosinger remembered it was all business — no chatting, no coffee or cookies. Luke wouldn’t even need to tell the members what song came next. They’d listen for it.
“It became like osmosis,” Boosinger said.
And there were plenty of wonderful memories along the way.
Boosinger recalled one time when the band was being recorded by a local radio show. They were in Bea’s Kitchen, and the sound crew wanted to capture the sounds of the band but also the sounds of bacon sizzling on the stove to set the mood for a cozy country home. Trouble was, Bea no longer cooked on that stove after Luke had retired in the mid-‘70s. The radio crew was clueless about the situation, but that didn’t stop them from getting bacon sizzling on the stove.
“Well, it was bogus all the way around,” Boosinger said. “We were all just cracking up.”
If she was in awe of the band she played and sang with, they too came to respect her.
“Laura is a very talented musician with an unusual ability to adapt,” explained Charles Gidney, a longtime member of the band. “In the Luke Smathers Band, we had a very wide repertoire. We played everything from old-time to classic country, waltzes to breakdowns, boogie to gypsy, western swing to Duke Ellington, Bing Crosby to Gene Autry. Very few clawhammer banjo players could handle this and sing it all too.”
Playing in the band was, for Boosinger, a chance to work with a true gentleman and an Appalachian music legend.
“Luke was a great entertainer,” Boosinger said. “He knew about engaging the audience.”
He never would brag about himself, and folks could sense his friendly invitation to hear some toe-tapping, good music. He’d greet an audience with a “Howdy, folks!” and they’d yell back, “Howdy, Luke!”
There were plenty of times at the Mountain Dance and Folk Festival when Luke and the band would play “Cacklin’ Hen” as plastic eggs would be rolled onto the stage.
Even after 60-plus years, the band continued to thrill audiences and performed at Mars Hill College a month before Luke died on July 17, 1997.
At the funeral, several musicians including a younger generation of performers such as Josh Goforth, Amanda Luther and Adam Landers paid tribute to the man who had inspired so many with his music. The last song Boosinger sang for Smathers was “The Waltz You Saved For Me,” which coincidentally is the last song on Let Me Linger.
Bea’s Kitchen may be silent, but the songs from the Luke Smathers Band are alive and well thanks to performers like Boosinger who continue to celebrate such timeless, beautiful songs.
Boosinger keeps a busy schedule performing banjo and singing throughout the Southeast. In May, she will be touring Scotland with other traditional Appalachian musicians. She’s also in the process of recording her sixth album — this time with David Holt and the Lightning Bolts. For more information about Boosinger’s performance schedule or the history of the Luke Smathers Band, or to purchase her new CD Let Me Linger, go to the website www.lauraboosinger.com.
