Guitarist and singer-songwriter Dan Crary was born on September 29, 1939, in Kansas City, Kansas, United States of America.
Dan Crary is a flatpicking stylist with an international reputation for innovation, taste and brilliance. With more than 50 years as a performer, Crary is one of the few artists whose work can be said to transcend the boundaries of style and genre. In his travels around the United States, Crary learned and integrated traditional American music styles and tunes, transforming them into strongly personal and creative works that are at once deeply rooted and freshly new.
In the late 1960s, Crary moved to Louisville, Kentucky to pursue a doctorate degree in philosophy. While there, he became a co-founder of The Bluegrass Alliance, one of the first “progressive” bluegrass bands that a short time later included Sam Bush and Tony Rice.
It was there that Dan developed his lead guitar playing skills, and the band was one of the few at the time that featured a lead guitar player. In 1970, he released his first album, titled “Bluegrass Guitar“. He later formed a trio with fiddler Byron Berline and banjo player John Hickman. Berline, Crary and Hickman recorded several projects for Sugar Hill Records and eventually transformed into an ensemble called California that was active through most of the 1990s and won IBMA’s Instrumental Group of the Year awards three years in a row, from 1992 through 1994.
A long and distinguished recording career has brought Dan Crary acclaim as a versatile instrumentalist able to perform from classical pieces by Mozart to Anglo-American fiddle tunes to moody, evocative original compositions.
The 1994 recording, “Jammed If I Do“, with guests Tony Rice, Doc Watson, Norman Blake, and Beppe Gambetta, was hailed as one of the decade’s great gatherings of United States-based guitarists.
Crary’s contributions to bluegrass have enriched the music, and he has served as an inspiration to the numerous lead guitar pickers who followed and learned from him.
Discography:
Bluegrass Guitar (American Heritage Music Corporation, 1970)
Lady’s Fancy (Rounder Records, 1977)
Sweet Southern Girl (Sugar Hill Records, 1979)
Byron Berline, Dan Crary, John Hickman (Sugar Hill Records, 1981)
Guitar (Sugar Hill Records, 1983)
Night Run, with Byron Berline and John Hickman (Sugar Hill Records, 1984)
BCH (Sugar Hill Records, 1986)
Now They Are Four, with Byron Berline and John Hickman (Sugar Hill Records, 1989)
Take A Step Over (Sugar Hill Records, 1989)
Thunderation (Sugar Hill Records, 1991)
Jammed If I Do (Sugar Hill Records, 1994)
Holiday Guitar (Sugar Hill Records, 1997)
Crary & Hoppers And Their American Band (Pinecastle Records, 2000)
Synérgia, with Beppe Gambetta (Felmay, 2001)
Renaissance of the steel string guitar (Thunderation Music, 2003)
Educational videos:
Dan Crary’s Flatpick Guitar Workshop
An Exploration of Dynamic Soloing
Eight Great Tunes and Variations for Flatpick Guitar
Author: Angel Romero
Angel Romero y Ruiz has dedicated his life to musical exploration. His efforts included the creation of two online portals, worldmusiccentral.org and musicasdelmundo.com. In addition, Angel is the co-founder of the Transglobal World Music Chart, a panel of world music DJs and writers that celebrates global sounds. Furthermore, he delved into the record business, producing world music studio albums and compilations. His works have appeared on Alula Records, Ellipsis Arts, Indígena Records and Music of the World.