I made the trek to Nashville this past weekend to get a few cuts for my first recording project. I was fortunate to spend a good bit of time with Randy Kohrs in his home studio. The main reason I met up with Randy was to get his and other's takes on a new version the official reso-anthem "Fireball Mail". I've always been a big fan of traditional tunes because you really get to tap into the creativity of a picker on a traditional tune. Most likely the melodies are highly engrained and the musician can really have their way with it. I also like the concept of having multiple musicians of the same instrument on the same tune in the spirit of the version of 'Fireball Mail' on The Great Dobro Sessions . It's a good way to compare and contrast each pickers style. I wanted this track to be in that vein but present an entirely different cast of resoists that have come of age in the last 10 years (and me). This weekend I captured three, Randy, Andy Hall & Mike Witcher. What a treat.
Kohrs is an extremely impressive individual to me. To start, I could rant about his reso skills (clearly one of, if not the best picker in the reso world depending on your taste) but everyone knows about those. Next, he's a top-notch singer & songwriter which most poeple are aware of. I heard several cuts from his latest projects (too many to mention) and I'm not sure what's better; the writing, the singing or the pickin'. To top it off, he's established himself as an in-demand sound engineer catering to one of the most exciting and lucrative acoustic music scenes in the world.
The guy is seething with creativity.
His studio is stacked with multiple high-quality signal chains and there are recording booths tucked throughout his home. The gear and environment combined with his tuned ear and engineering senses produces a very high quality sound. There are instruments in virtually every room on stands or in cases stacked in the corner. Resos, guitars (lap & standard), banjos & steels - you name it. He can pick up each one and tell an interesting story about it and then proceed to play the crap out of it. If someone didn't know his history and met him at home for the fist time; they'd have no idea what his primary instrument is. I'm not sure he has one. Once we got my audio tracks into his system, his keen and intuitive senses immediately kick-in and he began panning channels, tweaking EQ's and applying effects right off the bat. The amount of time and critical thought and listening he's dedicated to this art in itself if pretty obvious.
Despite his instrumental, vocal, and engineering skills, the most impressive aspects to me were his work ethic & talents outside of music. I'd be willing to bet that he's in his studio anywhere between 6 & 12 hours a day, plus sessions for others, playing out, remodeling his kitchen & prepping his workshop to do auto-body work (which he's also an expert in - not your everyday handyman talent). I'm sure there's much more that I wasn't exposed to. Lot's of times you meet musicians of his caliber and they don't do much besides music. No shallowness here. He's up early in a town that sleeps late and probably one of the most definitive renaissance men I've ever met.
