{"id":3613,"date":"2024-07-03T12:55:07","date_gmt":"2024-07-03T17:55:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.stringsbymail.com\/articles\/?p=3613"},"modified":"2025-10-08T12:21:23","modified_gmt":"2025-10-08T17:21:23","slug":"bluegrass-and-bass-a-perfect-combination-for-missy-raines","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.stringsbymail.com\/articles\/bluegrass-and-bass-a-perfect-combination-for-missy-raines\/","title":{"rendered":"Bluegrass and bass, a perfect combination for Missy Raines"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

By Ross Boissoneau<\/p>\n\n

Music video at bottom for your listening pleasure.<\/i><\/p>\n\n

The promotional material for her latest recording suggests Missy Raines has been exploring other sonic territory at the expense of the music she grew up with and has played all her life: \u201cOn her newest release Highlander, the bassist\/vocalist\/songwriter returns to her bluegrass roots.\u201d<\/p>\n\n

Raines is having none of it. Despite dipping her toes into jazz, funk and country\/pop, she\u2019s of the opinion that it\u2019s all been part of her whole. Asked when she left bluegrass, she laughs and says, \u201cNever. In my mind I never left bluegrass. I don\u2019t even know how to do that.\u201d<\/p>\n\n

\"Michael

Missy Raines<\/p><\/div>\n\n

And why would \u2013 how could \u2013 she do that? Raines was the first woman to win the International Bluegrass Music Association\u2019s Bass Player of the Year, and has now won it ten times. In 2018, \u201cSwept Away\u201d from her album Royal Traveller was named IBMA \u201cRecorded Event of the Year.\u201d The song features the First Ladies of Bluegrass, so named for being the first women to win the IBMA Player of the Year award for their instrument: Raines, Alison Brown (banjo), Becky Buller (fiddle), Sierra Hull (mandolin), and Molly Tuttle (guitar).<\/p>\n\n

She\u2019s deeply rooted in the tradition, having grown up in West Virginia and soaked up the Southern Appalachian and Mid-Atlantic bluegrass of the time, as well as the sounds of The Country Gentlemen, The Seldom Scene, The Johnson Mountain Boys, and other groups propelling bluegrass in the 70s. In the early years of her career, she spent hours learning from and playing with many first-generation bluegrass legends and traveled extensively throughout the mid-Atlantic region.<\/p>\n\n

She does admit that she\u2019s included sounds and instrumentation outside what some might consider the bluegrass tradition. \u201cI created music that would not fit in the box of traditional bluegrass, but it was always very rooted in bluegrass. I was doing new things but was not leaving bluegrass,\u201d she insists. To Raines, all her music fits under what she calls the big tent of bluegrass.<\/p>\n\n

Raines was encouraged to pursue music by her parents. They initially bought an acoustic bass for themselves before their daughter, already interested in piano and guitar, found her calling on the instrument that was bigger than she was.<\/p>\n\n

\u201cMy first instrument was piano. That was the instrument in the house and I needed to express myself musically,\u201d Raines recounts. \u201cMy parents were into bluegrass, and I wanted to play guitar and sing. I\u2019d hang out with neighbors and friends and play.<\/p>\n\n

Not many people had a big upright bass. My dad decided he\u2019d enjoy it and bought it and brought it home for himself. I was ten or 11 and curious. I played it and fell in love with it.\u201d<\/p>\n\n

Sorry Dad. Raines started playing bass and never looked back. \u201cI stuck with it. The way notes seem to fall, it had so much power and drive. The allure is there, but it takes years to create that power and drive. I\u2019m still working on that.\u201d<\/p>\n\n

\"Michael

Missy Raines<\/p><\/div>\n\n\n

She\u2019s now been working on it some five decades, and has played with a who\u2019s who of bluegrass stars, from first generation pioneers to the aforementioned First Ladies of Bluegrass. Her latest recording, Highlander, was released on Compass Records, the label run by Brown and her husband, bassist Garry West. Brown also produced the album.<\/p>\n\n

It includes Raines\u2019s touring band, Allegheny, as well as a coterie of guests. Kathy Matteau sings with Raines on \u201cWho Needs a Mine?,\u201d written about how so many in her home state have dealt with the scourge of opioid addiction, with lyrics like \u201cWho needs a mine to kill us dead when a little pill works fine instead?\u201d<\/p>\n\n

Other guests include vocalist and guitarist Dudley Connell of the Johnson Mountain Boys, with whom Raines often jammed, citing their sound as one the major influences on that of Allegheny. Danny Paisley duets on \u201cThese Ole Blues\u201d which Raines discovered on a recent Loretta Lynn album. And producer Brown plays on one track. \u201cShe\u2019s only on one song, but her touch is all over. She\u2019s so thoughtful. Creative and full of human empathy,\u201d says Raines. \u201cThat comes out in her playing and producing. I love her and I love working with her.\u201d<\/p>\n\n

Today Raines plays the same bass her dad bought all those years ago. It\u2019s a late 30s Kay bass made in Kalamazoo. \u201cIt\u2019s from the late 30s, 1937. It\u2019s one of the earliest made of plywood. I\u2019ve played a lot of classical big carved solid basses. My go-to is plywood. It\u2019s got a different sound and reactability.\u201d<\/p>\n\n

She plays D\u2019Addario Zyex<\/a> strings. \u201cIt\u2019s been about 30, 35 years now. The strings simulate gut, give you the best of gut and steel,\u201d Raines says. \u201cThey sound so different, and this marries both.<\/p>
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