Earl Scruggs Music Festival Keeps Spirit of Earl Scruggs Alive
Editor’s Note: This review is a contribution from independent country music journalist and photographer Kevin Smith. All photos by Kevin Smith.
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Earl Scruggs was undoubtedly the single most recognizable figure in bluegrass music’s illustrious history. He most certainly left a permanent and deep legacy for pickers, players, fans, and banjo enthusiasts the world over. His catalog of work with Lester Flatt is considered to be the authoritative model for how traditional bluegrass should sound. Thanks to a popular TV sitcom, he became embedded into pop culture with the theme song to Beverly Hillbillies, and his composition Foggy Mountain Breakdown is the most covered banjo tune of all-time.
Despite these achievements, Scruggs never had a dedicated music festival in his lifetime. That has been rectified with the annual Earl Scruggs Music Festival, now in its fourth year. 2025’s event was held on Labor Day weekend August 29-31 in Mill Spring North Carolina, a short drive from Scruggs’ hometown in Shelby, NC.
The festival has been the dream of Earl’s nephew JT Scruggs. And with the help of the Earl Scruggs Center in Shelby and many other contributing resources, it has become a serious contender for the list of must-do music festivals taking place each year. It is held in The Tryon International Equestrian Center, which is a massive indoor and outdoor facility that resembles a small city. It’s really an ideal place for such an event. The Tryon offers an expansive lodge/resort with rooms, cabins, tent camping and an RV park.
Additionally, there are restaurants, bars, shops, an indoor and outdoor horse performance arena, activities galore for families with children, and acres of space to freely walk around and enjoy a weekend in scenic and mountainous North Carolina.
Certainly a prime tenant of the festival is to ensure that people leave knowing exactly who Earl Scruggs was and to keep his name alive and relevant for new generations. And so in addition to music on four stages, there are also interviews with prominent musicians as well as demonstrations and lectures covering a variety of topics related to the Scruggs legacy.
IBMA-awarded banjo master and recording artist Tony Trischka performed all weekend with assorted musicians playing the music of Scruggs, as well as explaining the finer points of the Scruggs style of playing. During the festival, JT Scruggs personally gave Trischka one of Earl Scruggs’ performance jackets in recognition of his outstanding musical achievements. In past years Dobro master Jerry Douglas was also a recipient of an “Earl Jacket.” Both of these men have done much to keep Scruggs name alive.
For the most part, the Earl Scruggs Festival is bluegrass-based. However, three notable Americana acts were also included on the big stage line-ups: Watchhouse, The War and Treaty and The Wood Brothers. The following are highlights of the musical performances from the weekend in no particular order:
Alison Krauss and Union Station
Hard to believe, but Alison Krauss has been performing on stages for 46 years. In that time she has sold millions of albums, won more Grammys than any other woman save for Beyonce, won IBMA awards and Country Music Awards, and built an enormous following around the world. She is absolutely the bluegrass genres biggest success story.
Her performance on Saturday night on the big stage showed why. Nearly every seat was filled, the General Admission area was packed to capacity with men, women and children of all ages who had come out to see her performance. Playing for over two hours, Krauss held nothing back, playing all the fan-favorite songs from her enviable catalog.
Krauss featured “Let Me Touch You for Awhile,” “Take Me for Longing,” “Lucky One,” “Baby, Now That I’ve Found You,” and so many more. Her band Union Station featured the recent additions of legendary vocalist Russell Moore and fiddle legend Stuart Duncan, and they roared like the finest tuned engine ever made.
The encore featured Krauss and the band gathered around a single microphone playing acoustic versions of” Whiskey Lullaby”,” Down To The River to Pray” and” When You say Nothing At All.” Alison Krauss and Union Station represent the pinnacle of musical perfection, and during the songs, the massive crowd of thousands were respectfully quiet, mostly because they were in awe.
Sister Sadie
This all-female group from Nashville just continues to dazzle crowds everywhere they tour. Founding member and fiddler Deanie Richardson and banjoist Gena Britt have anchored down the band through numerous personnel changes, and the current version of the band is nothing short of spectacular.
Driving bluegrass instrumentals and hot soloing from Richardson on fiddle, matched with Rainey Miatke’s scorching mandolin playing brings the fireworks. Vocally, they’ve got muscle from singer-songwriter Dani Flowers and IBMA vocalist of the year Jaelee Roberts. Highlights of this set include their take on Haggard’s “I’m a Lonesome Fugitive,” the stunning “Avalanche,” and a fan favorite “Well.” I love this band and I think you will too.
Earls of Leicester
You can’t have an Earl Scruggs Festival without playing his songs. This is a supergroup tribute band to Flatt and Scruggs, and though it’s had several personnel changes over its 12-year life-span, Jerry Douglas no doubt keeps this maxim in mind: play the music and songs of Flatt and Scruggs as well as possible and keep the audience wanting more. This version of the Grammy and IBMA winning band featured Rob McCoury on banjo, prompting lead vocalist Shawn Camp and Jerry Douglas to joke that now Del can have a reason to be proud of his son since he’s playing in an Earl Scruggs tribute band.
In addition to McCoury, another guest picker sat in on this entire set, and it was none other than Sierra Hull. She was clearly was having a ball, grinning constantly in between mandolin solos and singing harmony vocal duets toe-to-toe with Shawn Camp. It brought energy and excitement to the stage on a hot Sunday afternoon. Songs like “Down The Road,” “Salty Dog,” “Big Black Train,” and “Foggy Mountain Breakdown” had the crowd from hello.
Sierra Hull
Sierra Hull just might be one of the weekend’s MVPs considering the fact that she sat in with the Nitty Gritty Dirt band on their special Circle Tribute set, sat in with Earls of Leicester, and played a main stage set with her own band. She is a whirlwind and watching her perform is a joy. She warms every stage she’s on, with her mind-blowing picking, great singing and a smile that won’t stop.
Listening and seeing her play her own music up close, you definitely pick up on influences ranging from Bela Fleck to Alison Krauss and Union Station. It makes sense when you consider that she’s toured and played with Fleck quite a few times over the years. No surprise either that she’s been nominated for Grammy awards. What makes Sierra Hull great is her passion, sense of exploration musically, and ability to walk onto any stage anywhere and play with anyone, and make something great.
The War and Treaty
Michael and Tanya Trotter are The War and Treaty, and while you can debate all day about what genre they play and how their music should be categorized, what isn’t a debate is that they are first and foremost entertainers on a grand scale. They are massively talented. Their set on Friday night covered a wide spectrum of American music from the days of Cab Calloway and Nina Simone, to Gershwin, to Aretha Franklin with nods along the way to bluegrass and country.
They currently are featuring a banjo player named Taylor Shuck on their road tour, and this young man dazzled with some serious virtuosity. By the end of the show at the finale, the Trotters took their wireless mics and wandered deep into the audience shaking hands, fist bumping and hugging everyone they could. They had won this traditional bluegrass crowd over.
Shawn Camp and Verlon Thompson- Songs and Stories of Guy Clark
If these two aren’t household names to you, they should be. Shawn Camp is a very successful singer-songwriter in country and Americana Music, and he’s also a stunning musician that happens to be in a Grammy-winning bluegrass supergroup, Earls of Leicester.
Verlon Thompson is a successful songwriter and guitarist from Oklahoma who spent the better part of a decade as sideman for Guy Clark. The set the two performed on the Foggy Mountain secondary stage was not to be missed. They talked about Guy Clark. They picked and sang and told the stories behind the songs. We got to hear the story behind” LA Freeway,”—how Guy and Suzanne were stuck in a massive traffic jam, and Guy wrote the lyrics in the car on a fast-food bag with Suzanne’s eyeliner.
They sang “Desperados Waiting For a Train,” “Texas 1947,” and others. But the crown jewel story came from Verlon Thompson’s experience writing “Boats to Build” with Clark. It would go on to be recorded by Jimmy Buffett and Alan Jackson. According to Thompson, it never quit getting better after that, and things culminated with Verlon meeting the Queen of England in a church in Scotland, all due to the fact he had written that song and been invited by a group overseas to come and do a songwriting workshop.
Sam Bush
Sam Bush is one of those guys that makes any stage he plays on or any festival he’s invited to instantly a better experience, particularly in the bluegrass world. For those not in the know, he was part of New Grass Revival—a group of upstarts that included Bela Fleck, Pat Flynn and John Cowan. Throughout the seventies these guys totally shook up the bluegrass world and upended the status quo as it were, forging a brand of progressive grass that allowed for greater creative freedom and led the way for other like-minded-souls to do their own thing.
Sam Bush is a mandolin and fiddle master, and he’s influenced thousands of players along the way. Bush brought his band to perform Saturday early evening to a crowd who was ready for the party they knew was coming. With Bush, it’s about the experience: the picking, the sounds and the moments, much more so than setlists. Sam Bush connected well with this crowd.
Del McCoury Band
Why should you go and see The Del McCoury Band? Because at 86 years old Del is one of the last of the old guard bluegrass legends. He’s got legitimate ties to Bill Monroe and was a Blue Grass Boy in the 60’s. No one has a better tenor voice than Del, and few if any have a better band. Del and the Boys were enthusiastically received by the Scruggs crowd, and songs like “All Aboard” and “Nashville Cats” and “1952 Vincent Black Lightning” drew cheers as they always do. No questions on legitimacy or authenticity with The Del McCoury Band. These guys are the real deal.
Authentic Unlimited
This band made up partially of ex-members of Doyle Lawson and Quicksilver were already legends in the make when they formed this band. One of their secret weapons is a guy named Jerry Cole who happens to have a serious talent for writing melodic and moving songs, something you don’t find in every bluegrass band. Their harmonies are untouchable, so much so that they are the current IBMA Vocal Band of the Year. For reference, listen to their hit song “Fall in Tennessee.” Authentic Unlimited was the first act on the main stage on Friday and they definitely made an impact on the festival crowd.
Travis Book String Band
Travis Book is the upright bassist for Infamous Stringdusters. They are a very big name in the jamgrass circle. When he’s not on the road touring, he pursues his love of old-time mountain music. What really grabbed me about his remarkable set on the secondary stage was his unbridled enthusiasm for this kind of music. You can make old music new again if you can sell it enthusiastically and with reverence and passion, and he’s got all that in spades. What’s also refreshing about his band is he brings youth to the stage, with younger players and up-and-comers. This is going to be the key to keeping these forms of music alive for the next generation. He drew a very healthy crowd to this stage and it was obvious others agree with me.
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To be sure, there were so many bands and artists that played this festival that you couldn’t see them all. With four stages to choose from, you do have to be decisive about what you are going to see and plan accordingly. But that’s also the beauty of this festival, there is something for everyone and its not always found on the main stage, there are gems waiting to be discovered.
But overall, there was one song presented over the entire weekend that moved me more than any other, particularly when I learned the context.
For those who may have forgotten, Hurricane Helene last year hit North Carolina with a fury, and Asheville, Black Mountain, Chimney Rock, Old Fort, Lake Lure and so many towns in the mountains were pummeled. Some lost their lives and some lost everything they had materially. The rebuilding is ongoing, and the way for people to help the most right now is to support these places with tourist dollars.
There is a collective of North Carolina Musicians who have started a movement called Healing the Hollers and they are providing financial support to local musicians and music venues who are struggling due to the after-effects of that storm.
There was a special presentation on the second stage with some of these musicians and this collective. One of the bands is called Unspoken Tradition and they performed along with husband and wife duo Cloyd and Zoe. The song was called “Weary Town.”
This song has become an anthem as it were for the people of North Carolina who have lost and suffered through this tragedy. It’s a song of acknowledgement and a song of hope for many of these folks, and when you hear their stories and find out how entire communities came together to rescue their neighbors, it takes on a lot of meaning. The people of North Carolina haven’t given up, they have rallied and come together and will be much stronger for it.
The 2025 Earl Scruggs Music festival was epic in so many ways. It ended Sunday Night with the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band celebrating the legendary album Will The Circle Be Unbroken. The festival will return next year, and no doubt many thrilled music fans will also return. Earl Scruggs would be proud.
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