Life as I Know It

Had a 45 minute teleconference with Saturday Night Live and feature film star Steve Martin and a bunch of other starstruck writers today. Among the most talked about topics (at least with Martin) was Shelby native Earl Scruggs.

That’s because, these days at least, Martin is concentrating more on playing the banjo than he is making people laugh. He put out a bluegrass CD, The Crow: New Songs for the Five-String Banjo, earlier this year and will perform in Charlotte on Oct. 10 with Asheville bluegrass band The Steep Canyon Rangers.

Martin talked about how he was introduced to the banjo when he was 17 years old by listening to Scruggs and The Kingston Trio. The banjo was “very noticeable in the 60s when I was growing up,” he said.

He met Scruggs when he was 21 or 22 years old backstage at a show and the two formed a friendship. In 2001, Scruggs asked Martin, now 64, to perform with him on a recording of Foggy Mountain Breakdown, along with country music superstar Vince Gill and Late Night with David Letterman sidekick Paul Shaffer, among others.

A bit of bad news for stand-up comedy fans - it doesn’t sound like Martin has any interest in performing stand-up in the future. On the bright side, he said in 2002 he didn’t see himself ever recording a bluegrass album either, so there’s always a chance he could change his mind.

In the meantime, he does play a pretty mean banjo. He’s considered a master of the five-fingered playing style known as clawhammer, a style Scruggs told The New York Times “I know I can’t play.”

If you want to see Martin, who’ll also perform with Pulitzer Prize-winning author and columnist Dave Barry at the Charlotte performance, visit www.blumenthalcenter.org for details. Tickets run from $54-$79.

And look for more on Steve Martin in the Oct. 4 edition of the Gazette.

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