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| This is an excerpt from the print edition of Dirty Linen Magazine #97 (December 2001/January 2002). The magazine is available on newsstands and by subscription. |
Bill Monroe, the father of bluegrass, once described the style of music he created as "music that tells a story. It's played from my heart to your heart and will touch you." Though he hails from the streets of the Czech Republic rather than the hills of Kentucky, Robert Krestán agrees. "When I sing the old bluegrass songs, or when I sing songs I've written in my own language, it's from the heart, with love and respect. And when I sing in my own language, I can express anything."
Krestán is the lead singer and primary songwriter for the group Druhá Tráva. Though the members remain based in their middle European homeland where they've won the equivalent of several Grammys and numerous best artist awards, they've done more than a dozen tours across the United States, and two of their records plus a solo disc by banjoist Luboš Malina are available in the United States from Nashville's Compass Records. They've also been invited to appear at such prestigious events as MerleFest and Winterhawk.
"To me, it's amazing what great bluegrass musicians they are, considering that none of them grew up here," said Compass co-founder Alison Brown, herself a Grammy-winning bluegrass player. "I mean, for them to want to play bluegrass that well, coming from another country, another culture, is just really astonishing to me."
Czech music has a long tradition of incorporating folk themes and regional speech patterns from medieval days when mass settings were sung in Slavic rather than Latin. But that's usually found expression in the classical style, with the works of composers such as Dvorák, Smetana, and Janácek. Though Druhá Tráva has on occasion been known to work a hot acoustic instrumental treatment of Smetana's "Skocna" into its live show, Krestán credits a Pete Seeger tour with getting the bluegrass movement going in his homeland. Krestán himself was a child in the mid-50s when this occurred, but "it was a real beginning. That was the first time the banjo came to our country." It was the start, he said, of the "tramp tradition," a still-evolving style that includes influences from western traditions such as swing, country, and bluegrass.
In this fertile soil, the future members of Druhá Tráva began to find their niche. "When we were young, we all listened to Flatt and Scruggs, and to Bill Monroe, of course," Krestán said. "But we also listened to and were excited by Newgrass Revival, Tony Trischka, David Grisman. People like that, they excited our minds and our hearts." So much so that each of the musicians had early determined on a professional career performing music, "although my parents thought I was going to be a music teacher," Krestán said with a smile.
At that time in the former Czechoslovakia, the music scene was less open than it is now. "We had to say a Bill Monroe song was about workers' rights," Krestán explained. Luboš Malina was being trained in classical music while enlisted in the Military Brass Band, and through friends there he discovered a sort of bluegrass underground and hooked up with songwriter and vocalist Krestán, who had written a song, "Panenka," which was banned by government censors but was nevertheless widely respected by other Czech musicians. "I was writing a lot of protest songs in those days," Krestán recalled.
Lead singer Krestán and banjo player Malina worked together in another Czech bluegrass ensemble, Poutnici, with whom they made six recordings and won a number of awards. Bassist Jirí Meisner was learning his craft on the rock side of things, while Dobro player Luboš Novotný played first with the folk group Duo Cis and later with the newgrass group Prudusky, picking up five Czech Dobro "player of the year" awards along the way. In 1991, they got together with guitarist Martin Ledvina to form Druhá Tráva. The name means "second grass" in Czech, and suggests an idea similar to "newgrass" in English. The men quickly came together as an ensemble, and began winning awards and sharing the stage with well-known bluegrass players including Ricky Skaggs, Peter Rowan, Sam Bush, and Laurie Lewis.
"They bring such high energy to their shows," Lewis said, "and they all seem that they can play any instrument you hand them." Peter Rowan played shows with them in Germany and the Czech Republic, appearing on Malina's solo disc as a guest, and eventually co-writing and recording an album with the group, New Freedom Bell. Rowan had first encountered the group at the International Bluegrass Music Association meeting in 1993. He recalled that for the liner notes of New Freedom Bell: "I heard them jamming in the Bluegrass Unlimited hospitality suite. It was a very freewheeling sound, and I thought to myself, This is international bluegrass, and very unlimited."
This is an excerpt from an article in Dirty Linen #97 (Dec. '01/Jan. '02). Read the full text in the magazine, available via subscription or on newsstands and in bookstores.
