A Conversation with Paul Burch (continued)

PM: So before we get out of here, I haven't really gotten to the fabulous angle and story, to some degree, of this record, the inspiration and the massive support of two musical giants, Ralph Stanley and Mark Knopfler.

PB: Oh, yeah, we forgot them, didn't we?

PM: So let's take them, if you would, one at a time, and talk about how they came to be included or involved in the project.

PB: Well, both of them were involved, really, just because I asked them, and they happen to be very easy to get along with. Ralph I met on the tour with Laura Cantrell that also produced the meeting with Peel.

PM: What year is that?

PB: That'd be fall of 2005, I guess. Ralph has always been very nice to me. And he's a real interesting guy. My viewpoint of him is that before O Brother, he was not given the respect in the bluegrass community that he should have been. He's always had one of the really great voices. But the bluegrass--when I moved here, bluegrass artists, especially the early ones, like Ralph--the ones that really started it and should have ended it up, Ralph and Bill, they were not given any respect at all. The hottest bluegrass guys were like Jerry Douglas and Mark O'Connor. They were not playing songs, they were just playing their instruments. And so I was really thrilled to meet Ralph, because I knew that he was a huge part of the last fifty years of music. Luckily, O Brother gave him a renewed standing.

We had some great conversations. And I think he was probably really inspired by how good Cash's latter-day records were, and how he could tackle a lot of modern songs. And I think he tried to do that. I'm not sure--he did it through T Bone Burnett, who seems to be a good producer. He certainly has good engineers. I think Ralph could still make records that go far beyond what he's done so far. But I would talk to him about that. He's got great stories. He talked about when he was with King Records. He recorded "Finger Poppin' Time" by Hank Ballard of the Midnighters. The Stanley Brothers did that.

PM: Wow.

PB: And on the Stanley Brothers' version, Hank Ballard is snapping fingers.

PM: Whoa!

PB: Yeah. He talked about meeting James Brown and--

PM: Really?

PB: Yeah, because when the Stanley Brothers were there, James Brown was making Night Train at King Records in Cincinnati.

PM: Holy jeez.

PB: Which is the same studio where "I'm So Lonesome I Could Cry" was recorded, because Nashville didn't have a real studio until Owen Bradley built the Bradley Barn, and Chet made Studio B, which was in '56 or '57. So a lot of country records were cut in Dallas and Chicago and Cincinnati.

PM: You don't say.

PB: So I just asked him and he said, "Yeah." And we sang, and we got along really well. To me, our voices sounded kind of like the Blue Sky Boys. I don't know if you've ever heard them before.

PM: Yeah, I have.

PB: But it was really, really easy. And through someone who deals with all of his schedule and stuff, I said, "Would you ask Ralph for me if he'd record a song." He said, "I reckon Paul is a good boy. I'll sing with him."

[laughter]

PB: As far as Mark [Knopfler] goes, I got introduced to him through friends. And as he's been to a lot of musicians in Nashville, he's just really great--a big music fan, and very supportive of stuff that he likes. He's always trying to renew his game, and stir it up. Not that I stirred up his game. I don't think I did at all. But I mean, he's interested in anything that he likes. And I just said, "Hey, would you play on something?" And it turns out that we could be in England, and I knew he was getting a new studio opened. And I said, "How about recording it in your studio?" And he said, "Well, sure, come over." So we just spent a couple of days over there. But that was like--we recorded ten or eleven hours a day and got half the record done there.

PM: Wow.

PB: And he was just an absolutely great guy, really supportive. He didn't really get in the way. He didn't give production advice or anything like that. He just said, "Go at it."

PM: Well, Paul, thanks a lot for the conversation today. Your encyclopedic knowledge of this music is really fascinating.

PB: Thank you, Frank. I appreciate your time.

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