New York, NY (Top40 Charts) The highly acclaimed musician, JERRY DOUGLAS, is not just the preeminent master of the resophonic guitar, he's also a 16x GRAMMY Award-winning recording artist, band leader, producer, composer, and member of
Alison Krauss and Union Station since 1998, among many other accolades. Now, the American music luminary has detailed his first album in seven years, The Set. The 11-track album, comprising five new offerings and six revitalized songs from his catalog, is set for a
September 20 release via Nolivan Records across the DSPs in addition to physical CDs and 180-gram vinyl.
Out now, "
While My Guitar Gently Weeps" marks the lead single from The Set. This emotive rendition of the Beatles' 1968 classic highlights the raw talent of The Jerry
Douglas Band, featuring
Douglas (dobro),
Daniel Kimbro (bass), Christian Sedelmyer (fiddle), and Mike Seal (guitar).
"I love how easy it was to play the song," says DOUGLAS, the 30x International Bluegrass
Music Association Award recipient. "It just lays perfectly for the dobro. It gives you all the latitude you need to play the whole song from end to end, in different octaves. That melody always got me, but I never tried to play it. And when I did, it was like, 'Wow! Why haven't I done this before?'"
As a session musician with an estimated two thousand studio albums and tracks to his credit, DOUGLAS is an unrivaled master of versatility. With 12 solo albums and two with The Jerry
Douglas Band, a vast catalog of material is available to draw from. In a similar manner, The Set mirrors what you might hear at a Jerry
Douglas Band show, almost like a companion piece to the concert.
Years ago, DOUGLAS and the band worked up an instrumental version of "While My Guitar Gently Weeps," a song that
Douglas said he'd known forever. When he performed it in London during a Transatlantic Sessions tour,
Eric Clapton joined him onstage for a reunion of sorts. They had previously collaborated on a 2012 recording of R&B artist Chris Kenner's "Something You Got," with Clapton on vocals, that appeared on Douglas' Traveler (2012). The song reappears on The Set, this time more lighthearted and uptempo with
Douglas taking lead vocals.
For the new album, DOUGLAS also turned to his bandmates for material, including Mike Seal's "Renee," Christian Sedelmyer's "Deacon Waltz," and
Daniel Kimbro's "Loyston." In addition, the four musicians collaborated on "The Fifth Season," a concerto commissioned by the FreshGrass Foundation. The Set tracklisting concludes with two instrumentals, "Pushed Too Far" and "Sir Aly B." "When people leave," shares DOUGLAS, "they have a certain song in their head. And we always play 'Sir Aly B' last as the final encore. That's the last thing people hear, so I wanted that to be there, too."
"I'm proud of it. I've left no stone unturned," finalizes DOUGLAS about The Set. "I've been producing records for a long time, so I really, really put on that hat for this record. Usually, I like instrumentalists to have free rein in whatever they do. It's the way they speak. If anybody had an idea, we chased it down to the end. I feel like it's really finished. I'm really happy with the outcome of this whole experience."
TRACK LISTING FOR THE SET:
"Gone to Fortingall"
"Renee"
"What Might Have Been" featuring Aoife O'Donovan
"From Ankara to Ismir"
"Something You Got"
"Deacon Waltz"
"The Fifth Season"
"
While My Guitar Gently Weeps"
"Loyston"
"Pushed Too Far"
"Sir Aly B"
DOUGLAS, the ever-ready performer and 3x CMA "Musician of the Year" winner, will be touring and taking festival stages throughout the summer and fall, including the astounding Red Rocks Amphitheatre and Montana Folk Festival in July, Green Mountain Bluegrass &
Roots Festival in August, and Bourbon & Beyond and The Earl Scruggs
Music Festival in September. For more information and to purchase tickets, click here.
CATCH JERRY DOUGLAS LIVE:
Thursday, July 11 Jackson, WY
Silver Dollar Showroom Session
Friday, July 12 Butte, MY Montana Folk Festival
Saturday, July 13 Butte, MT Montana Folk Festival
Sunday, July 14 Morrison, CO Red Rocks Amphitheatre w/ The String Cheese Incident*
Thursday, July 25 London, England Union Chapel*
Saturday, July 27 Cambridge, England Cambridge Folk Festival w/ Transatlantic Sessions*
Sunday, July 28 Cambridge, England Cambridge Folk Festival*
Tuesday, July 30 Skibbereen, Ireland Skibbereen Arts Festival*
Wednesday, July 31 Dublin, Ireland Pavilion Theatre*
Thursday, August 1 Ennis, Ireland glor*
Saturday, August 3 Wickham, UK Wickham Festival*
Saturday, August 10 Park City, UT Amphitheater at Canyons Village w/
Nitty Gritty Dirt Band*
Tuesday, August 13 Grand Junction, CO Amphitheater at Las Colonias Park w/
Nitty Gritty Dirt Band*
Sunday, August 18 Manchester, VT Green Mountain Bluegrass &
Roots Festival
Tuesday, August 20 Boston, MA City Winery
Wednesday, August 21 Boothbay Harbor, ME The Opera House
Thursday, August 22 Fall River, MA Narrows Center for the Arts
Friday, August 23 New York, NY City Winery
Saturday, August 24 Sellersville, PA Sellersville Theater
Friday, August 30 Mill Spring, NC The Earl Scruggs
Music Festival w/ The Earls of Leicester*
Saturday, August 31 Mill Spring, NC The Earl Scruggs
Music Festival w/ The Earls of Leicester*
Sunday,
September 1 Mill Spring, NC The Earl Scruggs
Music Festival w/ The Earls of Leicester*
Thursday,
September 19 Nashville, TN CMA Theatre at The Country
Music Hall of Fame
Friday,
September 20 Louisville, KY Bourbon & Beyond
Saturday,
September 21 Hiltons, VA Carter Family Fold
Sunday,
September 22 Hagerstown, MD Live at Hub City Vinyl
Tuesday,
September 24
Black Mountain, NC Pisgah Brewing Company
Saturday,
September 28 Buena Vista, CO Billy Strings' Renewal 2024
Sunday, October 6 Eureka Springs, AR Hillberry
Music Festival
Monday, October 7 St. Louis, MO City Winery
Tuesday, October 8 Chicago, IL City Winery
Thursday, October 10 Kent, OHThe Kent Stage
Saturday, October 12 Livingston, KY The Moonshiner's Ball
(*) denotes Jerry
Douglas solo appearance.