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Bluegrass Festival serves up Nothin' Fancy

The popular Virginia band performs today and Saturday at the Sertoma Youth Ranch festival.

By LOGAN NEILL
Published November 24, 2006

SPRING LAKE - At the beginning of this week, the guys in Nothin' Fancy didn't know exactly where their Thanksgiving dinner would be coming from. All they knew was that about the time their families would be sitting down to eat turkey, they'd be on stage performing at a bluegrass festival in South Carolina.

"I doubt we'll be going hungry," said Nothin' Fancy's mandolin player, Mike Andes, by cell phone as he drove through Charleston, W. Va. "The nice thing about playing bluegrass festivals is that fans are always inviting you for dinner."

Nothin' Fancy will no doubt have plenty of supper invitations when it arrives today at the Sertoma Youth Ranch for the Thanksgiving Bluegrass Festival, where it will perform at 4 p.m. and 8:15 p.m. today and at 3 p.m. and 8:15 p.m. Saturday.

Considered one of bluegrass music's most personable outfits, the group has amassed a loyal following wherever it goes.

In the 13 years since it formed, the Virginia quintet has developed a well-earned reputation for being a crowd pleaser. Pairing soaring harmonic vocals with precision instrumentation, the band has earned accolades from critics, many of whom eagerly draw comparisons to stalwarts such as Seldom Scene, the Country Gentlemen, and J.D. Crowe and the New South.

Good press aside, the band prides itself on being fan-friendly, with members going out of their way to be accessible.

"People know we don't go and hide in a tour bus when our show is over," Andes said.

"For us, playing music is only part of the business. The real fun is going out and meeting the people who make it possible for us to earn a paycheck."

Sometimes, that means taking on a few gags. Fans are apt to see the band in all kinds of crazy costumes. In fact, at the Nothin' Fancy Music Festival this past summer, members decided an appropriate way to draw attention to their annual Bluegrass and Bikinis Caribbean cruise was to perform in hula skirts and flower leis.

Andes, whose original song, I Met My Baby in the Porta-Jon Line, has become something of a novelty hit in bluegrass circles, believes that the members' attitude toward the music is perhaps the reason the original band has remained intact so long.

"The focus isn't on just one individual," Andes said. "Everyone directs their energy toward the band and the music. It's taken us a long way."

Logan Neill can be reached at lneill@sptimes.com or 352 848-1435.

[Last modified November 23, 2006, 22:47:14]