1978 Steve Morse & Andy West - The Dixie Dregs - 11-Page Vintage Guitar Article

Description

1978 Steve Morse & Andy West - The Dixie Dregs - 11-Page Vintage Guitar Article
Original, vintage magazine article
Page Size: Approx. 8" x 11" (21 cm x 28 cm) each page
Condition: Good
Steve Morse And Andy West:
Forging A
New Southern Sound
With The Dixie Dregs
ONLY A HANDFUL OF GUITARISTS
and bass players are ever infused
with the energy and genius that allow
them to rise to the top of their fields; the
South has had its share of these great instru-
mentalists. What distinguishes guitarist Steve
Morse and bassist Andy West from other
great southern musicians is their amazing
facility in many fields: Rock, country, blue-
grassjazz. and classical elements all abound
in their tightly-fused, highly original music.
With the rest of the Dixie Dregs, Steve and
Andy have been gathering a loyal following
since the band’s first performance nearly five
years ago.
Steve Morse was bom in Hamilton,
Ohio, on July 28, 1954, and he spent his
childhood in Michigan before moving to the
South during high school. Andy West, who
was bom on February 6, 1954, in Newport,
Rhode Island, lived in New York and Mas-
sachusetts before coming to Georgia in
1966. Steve had already played guitar for
five years when he met Andy while they were
both in the tenth grade of Augusta, Georgia’s
Richmond Academy. Soon after they met,
they found a keyboard player and a singer
and formed Dixie Grits, a rock and roll
band. The group stayed together for a couple
of years, finally disbanding when Steve was
accepted into the University of Miami’s
music school. “One evening when I was still
in high school, I saw [classical guitarist]
Juan Mercadel perform,” Steve recalls. “I
said, ‘God, this is too much—I can’t believe
it.’ I found out that he was teachihgat UM.
After I saw Mercadel, I started concocting
my scheme to get into college—J was about
to become a dropout. I wouldn't cut my hair,
so I had to leave high school.” Steve man-
aged to enroll in UM without a high school
diploma, and he persuaded Andy to join
him in Miami. “After the Dixie Grits broke
up,” Steve says, “all that was left was Andy
and me. So we were the dregs.”
At the time, the University of Miami
could boast of having one of the most inno-
vative and productive jazz departments in
the country. Guitarist Pat Metheny, Weather
Report bassist Jaco Pastorius, and fusion
drummer Michael Walden were all associ-
ated with the faculty while Steve and Andy
were there. At UM Steve met drummer Rod
Morgenstein and violinist Allen Sloan, who
had just finished a stint with the Miami
Philharmonic. With Andy on bass, they
formed the Dixie Dregs. As part of a class
project, the group got some 16-track tape
time and recorded a self-produced album,
The Great Spectacular [out of print]. They
added Steve Davidowski on keyboards, and
following graduation, moved up to Augusta.
The Dregs began playing their jazz-rock-
classical-country-bluegrass fusion in south-
ern bands and clubs, gathering a devoted
following along the way. One evening in
Nashville, they shared the bill with Sea Level,
another southern band. Chuck Leavell, Sea
Level’s keyboardist, and Twiggs Lyndon,
former road manager of the Allman Brothers
Band, were so impressed by the Dregs that
they called Capricorn’s president, Phil Wal-
den. Walden heard the Dregs play in Macon,
Georgia, and signed the band around
Christmas, 1976. Twiggs became the band’s
road manager.
Free Fall [Capricorn, CP 0189], issued
the following spring, was the band’s power-
ful debut album. Included are “Refried
Country Chicken” and “Wages Of Weird-
ness,” both of which appeared in an earlier
form on The Great Spectacular. The songs
on Free Fall, all instrumentals written by
Morse, show a classical approach to compo-
sition, with their carefully planned themes
and changes. “You write differently when
you don’t have any vocals,” says Steve.
“When you have vocals you can repeat the
music—you can get the kind of repetition
that lends itself to Top 40 and massive audi-
ence appeal, which is great for the business
end of it. But this music is more challenging
to write and play and just do, which is why
it’s more rare.”
In late 1977 Steve Davidowski was re-
placed by Mark Parrish, who had been an
original member of Dixie Grits. With pro-
ducer Ken Scott at the helm, the Dregs
recorded What //'[Capricorn, CPN 0203].
The LP’s material ranges from dreamy, clas-
sical passages to foot-stomping country and
Andy West’s upbeat “Travel Tunes” jam, and
it is characterized by the Dregs’ precise,
rapid changes and instrumental virtuosity.
“Scott has got this fantastic ability to get
sounds out of you,” says Andy. “He’s got a
definite desire for perfection, and he won’t
settle for anything less. He showed me my
shortcomings.”
Since signing with Capricorn, the Dregs
have continued to tour, appearing as the
opening act for bands including Santana,
the Outlaws, Styx, Foreigner, Marshall
Tucker, Heart, and the Doobie Brothers.
This past summer they were invited to play
the Montreux Jazz Festival in Switzerland;
part of this performance will be included on
their forthcoming third album. “We played
the same night as Sea Level, Larry Coryell,
ajid [saxophonist] Stan Getz,” says Steve.
“We did a set of our own stuff, and then
ended with the old traditional, “Dixie.” It
went over great—it was just like playing in
Alabama. The energy of the audience was
the main reason we decided to use those
tapes for the new album. None of the live
stuff has ever been recorded before—it’s all
new.”
11888-7812-11