12.17.2007
Local artist up for Grammy
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The man called “Poppy Lou” has taken on the role of a human jungle gym, enabling small children to climb all over him at his Statesville day-care center.
Lou Reid, whose bluegrass band, The Seldom Scene, has just received its third nomination for a Grammy Award, seems just as comfortable in the role of playmate as he will when he travels to Los Angeles in February for the Grammys.
“It’s nice, but it’s not like I’m saying: ‘Now we’ve got to go for the win!’ ” Reid said of the nomination. “Truly, it’s just an honor to be nominated.”
The Seldom Scene has been nominated for Best Bluegrass Album for its 2007 Sugar Hill Records release, “Scenechronized.” The group won a Grammy in 1982 during Reid’s break from the band.
This time around the competition is pretty tough. Cherryholmes, J.D. Crowe and The New South, Jim Lauderdale, and The Double Banjo Bluegrass Spectacular are among the nominees The Seldom Scene is up against.
The winners will be announced Feb. 10 during a ceremony at The Staples Center.
“I hope they win,” said Christy Reid, Lou’s wife. “But there’s some stiff competition. J.D. Crowe and The New South are really popular right now.”
The band’s founder, Ben Eldridge, said politics play a large role in Grammy voting.
“The Bluegrass Spectacular features comedian Steve Martin on banjo and famed picker Earle Scruggs,” Eldridge said. “When you’ve got names like that, they’ll probably win.”
Considered the “black sheep of the music categories,” the bluegrass awards are typically handed out during a pre-awards show that is not televised, Eldridge said.
Reid, in his second tour with the band, which has been performing for 36 years, played lead guitar and sang vocals with the group from 1986 to 1992. He was asked to rejoin the band full time in 1997, taking over mandolin and tenor vocal duties a year after the band’s leader, John Duffey, died suddenly.
“Lou’s an amazing singer,” Eldridge said. “And I’m not kidding when I say that he can play any instrument and all the parts.”
During Reid’s five-year break, The Seldom Scene won a bluegrass album Grammy for their 1982 release, The Greatest Show On Earth.
Being in a band is a demanding vocation, Reid said.
“I’m on the road about 100 days a year,” he explained. “About 75 days with The Seldom Scene and about 25 days with my own band (Union Grove-based Lou Reid and Carolina.) Having my own group gives me some freedom to do other things.”
Reid is an old hand at Grammy exposure. He shares the same Sept. 13 birthday with the father of bluegrass, Bill Monroe, and played with the legendary musician on a previous Grammy show. Reid was on-stage in New York’s Madison Square Garden performing backup with Ricky Skaggs when Skaggs won the Best Country Instrumental Performance Grammy in 1984 for Wheel Hoss.
Reid went on to record his own CD, “When It Rains,” on the Sugar Hill Records label in 1991.
Reid met Christy while the two were bandmates in Carolina, a “hard-charging bluegrass group.” The couple married two years ago and opened A Better Place day-care center in September.
Christy was also in the day-care business and had lots of experience working with kids when they met, Reid said. They bought the facility in April and renovated it before opening.
Reid loves the work.
“I think the kids miss me when I’m gone,” he added.
Since marrying Christy, Reid has embraced more balance in his life.
“I don’t think I could live without the music,” he said. “But I couldn’t live with music alone.”
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