Music

A minor legend in our state died last week. Larry Dickson was known as a musician, teacher, mentor, historian, raconteur, retail merchant, husband, father, grandfather, and a fine person to have as friend. That’s not much compared to the idols we seem to hold in such veneration these days.

Some older individuals in Arkansas remember him as leader of a Bluegrass band that included his wife Jackie, Mike Benetz, and James Matthews. They appeared often on a local morning TV and were regulars at countless Bluegrass festivals throughout the Midwest. They dated back to a time when a young Allison Kraus would show for the festivals with a lollipop in her mouth, pulling a red wagon with her fiddles in it, going from jamming group to jamming group. Also in those days, daughter Debbie might pal up with a young Marty Stuart for the duration of a festival.

Larry could tell you how to fine tune an instrument and, in the same sentence, mention how nobody could play Earl Scrugg’s banjo because he kept the strings so high in order to “make it pop like nobody but Earl could do.”

I knew Larry because of a chance encounter with a friend. I didn’t know then what a “Bucket List” was, but I secretly confessed that I had formed a bizarre yearning to play the banjo. Don’t ask. I think it stemmed from the days that Sainted Mother and I watched the Flatt and Scruggs Martha White show together on trips home from college or the military.

The friend recommended Larry, and I trekked out to his music store one day. “Tell you what,” he said. “You come for lessons once a week, and practice 30 minutes a day, and I’ll have you jamming at festivals this summer.”

He was true to his word. I never was that good, but I was loud and incoherent. Odd that I never became a Republican. Just kidding. I love to kid my Republican friends.

Back to the topic, you might think that they don’t make ‘em like the Dicksons anymore, but they do. Larry’s protégé Mike Benetz still teaches young kids and a few old ones, turning out a star on occasion. If you believe as I do that music might save us, that’s important.

I think Larry Dickson
would have enjoyed this.