My fiddler is always throwing ideas at me for new tunes for us to collaberate on. Recently he's been on a Kenny Baker kick. I had resisted Kenny Baker for a long time as I figured that he would be so tainted by Bluegrass that I wouldn't find his tunes too appealing.
Boy was I wrong, even on the tunes penned by Bill Monroe. Kenny's playing is very old timey to my ears and his playing is flawless. And I have read that he would visit with old time masters like Jarrell and Fraley.
Towards the end of his life, Art Stamper went back to Old Time fiddling with a passion after a chance meeting with John Herrman. Stamper, to me played some of the greatest OT fiddle in a bewildering array of cross tunings imaginable. I have both the Cd he made with Herrman and Dirk Powell and the one with Harry Bickel. I wish that something similar would have happened with Kenny Baker before he passed away. An album backed by top-flight OT musicians. Perhaps his tunes and reputation would have greater circulation in the OT community.
Some of Kenny's tunes we are playing are: Gold Rush, Scotland, Lonesome Moonlight Waltz, Dancing With Kenny, Grey Eagle, and of course Jerusalem Ridge. Even the Monroe compositions are fairly easy to learn and can be tweaked to sound very old timey.
Any other Baker fans?
Don