Banjo

AN EVENING WITH NOAM PIKELNY AND FRIENDS With Aoife O"Donovan (Crooked Still), Gabe Witcher and Chris Eldridge (Punch Brothers), Mark Schatz (Nickel Creek), and Jesse Cobb (the Infamous Stringdusters) At: Brighton Music Hall, Wednesday, 8 p.m. Tickets: $15. 800-745-3000, www.ticketmaster.com It's not something you see often on nighttime talk shows, and it was surely not a moment Noam Pikelny could ever have predicted. But there he was late last year playing his banjo alongside Steve Martin on "Late Show With David Letterman.

NASHVILLE - Doug Dillard, an influential banjo player who helped shape rock 'n' roll and introduce the nation to bluegrass music during a popular run on "The Andy Griffith Show," died Wednesday in Nashville. He was 75. Lynne Robin Green, president of Mr. Dillard's publishing company, said he died due to a lung infection. Mr. Dillard, a founding member of family band The Dillards out of Salem, Mo., was influential in several ways. Mr. Dillard, his brother Rodney, and two band mates moved west in 1962, rather than taking the usual route to Nashville.

NASHVILLE - Doug Dillard, an influential banjo player who helped shape rock 'n' roll and introduce the nation to bluegrass music during a popular run on "The Andy Griffith Show," died Wednesday in Nashville. He was 75. Lynne Robin Green, president of Mr. Dillard's publishing company, said he died due to a lung infection. Mr. Dillard, a founding member of family band The Dillards out of Salem, Mo., was influential in several ways. Mr. Dillard, his brother Rodney, and two band mates moved west in 1962, rather than taking the usual route to Nashville.

(Aram Boghosian for the Boston Globe) We've seen Ed Helms show off his banjo chops as Andy Bernard on "The Office," including in this backstage clip . Now the man who was once the boss at Dunder Mifflin is planning the debut album of his bluegrass group The Lonesome Trio, which features two of his former classmates from Oberlin College. Of course, Helms isn't the only fast-picking funnyman. Steve Martin has won two Grammy Awards for his banjo recordings.

NASHVILLE - Bluegrass legend and banjo pioneer Earl Scruggs, who helped profoundly change country music with Bill Monroe in the 1940s and later with guitarist Lester Flatt, has died. He was 88. Mr. Scruggs' son Gary said his father died of natural causes Wednesday morning at a hospital in Nashville. Mr. Scruggs was an innovator who pioneered the modern banjo sound. His use of three fingers, rather than the clawhammer style, elevated the banjo from a part of the rhythm section - or a comedian's prop - to a lead instrument.

If you've got more than a passing familiarity with contemporary country music, you've heard "Banjo" or its ilk countless times: the boilerplate banjo for tradition, the repurposed metal chords for toughness, the lyrics that play like a panderin' checklist of country livin'. But there's a reason people keep dipping back into the formula, and with "Changed," Rascal Flatts show little inclination to mess with success. That means no sudden infusion of wit - leave that to Eric Church or Blake Shelton - just sentiment so ungussied up that, anemic mandolin and Gary LeVox's twang notwithstanding,...

(Aram Boghosian for the Boston Globe) We've seen Ed Helms show off his banjo chops as Andy Bernard on "The Office," including in this backstage clip . Now the man who was once the boss at Dunder Mifflin is planning the debut album of his bluegrass group The Lonesome Trio, which features two of his former classmates from Oberlin College. Of course, Helms isn't the only fast-picking funnyman. Steve Martin has won two Grammy Awards for his banjo recordings.

BURLINGAME, Calif. - Last Sunday, I met Damien Patton for dinner at a restaurant on the shores of San Francisco Bay, to hear the story of how he hatched the idea for his company in Boston. "I was in Logan Airport one day, and a guy I'd served with during Desert Storm was sitting in a different part of the terminal," Patton told me. "I hadn't seen him since forever, and we both sat there for a few hours, maybe a hundred yards apart, but I didn't find out until later, when I went to Facebook, that he was basically in the same place as I was. " Patton started thinking about a mobile...

It is impossible to overstate the importance of Earl Scruggs to American music. A pioneering banjo player who helped create modern country music, his sound is instantly recognizable and as intrinsically wrapped in the tapestry of the genre as Johnny Cash's baritone or Hank Williams' heartbreak. Scruggs passed away Wednesday morning at 88 of natural causes. The legacy he helped build with bandleader Bill Monroe, guitarist Lester Flatt and the rest of the Blue Grass Boys was evident all around Nashville, where he died in an area hospital.

Crooked Still plays traditional songs with a contemporary sensibility. Like Gillian Welch, the young band makes old music sound new. "Hop High" is seductive and exciting. Aoife O'Donovan's gauzy voice rips through Welch's "Orphan Girl" as the banjo races and the bass and cello groove. The unusual instrumentation gives the music a dark, mysterious sound. These guys can play: Cellist Rushad Eggleston was nominated for a Grammy with band Fiddlers 4, O'Donovan sings with the jazz/bluegrassy Wayfaring Strangers, and Bela Fleck asked to learn Greg Liszt's banjo technique.

 "For the Love of the Music: The Club 47 Folk Revival" sheds a lot of light on the historic Cambridge venue. To dig deeper, we asked Millie Rahn, a folklorist who has studied and written extensively about Club 47 and its legacy, to share some facts most people wouldn't know about the fabled listening room. The original Club 47 was opened by Joyce Kalina and Paula Kelley at 47 Mount Auburn St. near Harvard Square on Jan. 6, 1958, as a European-style coffeehouse and jazz club.

DUBLIN - "Banjo" Barney McKenna, the last original member of the Irish folk band The Dubliners, died Thursday while having a morning cup of tea with a friend. He was 72 and had just marked his 50th year with the troupe. Irish classical guitarist Michael Howard, who was with Mr. McKenna when he died, said he was talking with his longtime friend at his kitchen table, when "all of a sudden Barney's head dropped down to his chest; it looked as if he'd nodded off. " Howard said paramedics talked him through emergency revival procedures over the phone, but Mr....

When Earl Scruggs died last week at 88, he was justly celebrated as a musician who revolutionized the way we hear and think of the banjo. "He defined the way the bluegrass banjo should sound, and while he did not invent the style, his . . . three-finger picking, string bending, and use of tuners established the ‘Scruggs style,' " says Gerry Katz, executive producer of the Joe Val Bluegrass Festival and a Boston Bluegrass Union board member. "Bill Monroe is credited as being the creator of bluegrass music," he adds, "but it was not until Earl Scruggs became a...

If you've got more than a passing familiarity with contemporary country music, you've heard "Banjo" or its ilk countless times: the boilerplate banjo for tradition, the repurposed metal chords for toughness, the lyrics that play like a panderin' checklist of country livin'. But there's a reason people keep dipping back into the formula, and with "Changed," Rascal Flatts show little inclination to mess with success. That means no sudden infusion of wit - leave that to Eric Church or Blake Shelton - just sentiment so ungussied up that, anemic mandolin and Gary LeVox's twang notwithstanding, there's...

It is impossible to overstate the importance of Earl Scruggs to American music. A pioneering banjo player who helped create modern country music, his sound is instantly recognizable and as intrinsically wrapped in the tapestry of the genre as Johnny Cash's baritone or Hank Williams' heartbreak. Scruggs passed away Wednesday morning at 88 of natural causes. The legacy he helped build with bandleader Bill Monroe, guitarist Lester Flatt and the rest of the Blue Grass Boys was evident all around Nashville, where he died in an area hospital.

NASHVILLE - Bluegrass legend and banjo pioneer Earl Scruggs, who helped profoundly change country music with Bill Monroe in the 1940s and later with guitarist Lester Flatt, has died. He was 88. Mr. Scruggs' son Gary said his father died of natural causes Wednesday morning at a hospital in Nashville. Mr. Scruggs was an innovator who pioneered the modern banjo sound. His use of three fingers, rather than the clawhammer style, elevated the banjo from a part of the rhythm section - or a comedian's prop - to a lead instrument.

DUBLIN - "Banjo" Barney McKenna, the last original member of the Irish folk band The Dubliners, died Thursday while having a morning cup of tea with a friend. He was 72 and had just marked his 50th year with the troupe. Irish classical guitarist Michael Howard, who was with Mr. McKenna when he died, said he was talking with his longtime friend at his kitchen table, when "all of a sudden Barney's head dropped down to his chest; it looked as if he'd nodded off. " Howard said paramedics talked him through emergency revival procedures over the phone, but Mr. McKenna "was pretty...

BURLINGAME, Calif. - Last Sunday, I met Damien Patton for dinner at a restaurant on the shores of San Francisco Bay, to hear the story of how he hatched the idea for his company in Boston. "I was in Logan Airport one day, and a guy I'd served with during Desert Storm was sitting in a different part of the terminal," Patton told me. "I hadn't seen him since forever, and we both sat there for a few hours, maybe a hundred yards apart, but I didn't find out until later, when I went to Facebook, that he was basically in the same place as I was. " Patton started thinking about a mobile app to deliver alerts...