The Songs of Roland

Roland White might not be tall, but when he picks a mandolin, he's a giant among musicians. For about a year, I took lessons from White, struggling to pick it up myself and marveling at his fluidity and speed.

Yet until June 5, I never saw that brilliance onstage. Roland just reissued his 1976 album I Wasn't Born to Rock and Roll ... But I Like to Cook, and brought most of them out for a 2-hour Station Inn set. Between sets I talked music with a nice lady about to relocate to Music City from Woodstock, N.Y. (a different, but equally important, music city). But whenever Roland and his crack band struck up a note, my attention never wavered.

In many ways, Roland epitomizes bluegrass - despite his great skill and having played with Flatts & Scruggs, Bill Monroe and appeared on the Andy Griffith Show (Roland is right next to Andy), he couldn't be more friendly, humble and appreciative for his audience. He even snapped pictures of the crowd before kicking off with KC Railroad Blues. His players - guitarist/wide Diane Bouska, fiddler Aaron Till, bassist Mike Fleming and banjoist Richard Bailey, the latter two also of the Steeldrivers - were all top-notch.

Till would later bring the house down with a solo guitar rendition of Tennessee Waltz he said he learned from an old record - a very old record, as it happens, because 30 seconds, he began his impersonation of a severely scratched LP, repeating lines and eventually skipping to the side's end (you had to be there, but it was hilarious).

Along with songs from the re-release, they threw in bluegrass standards like Salt Creek, Dear Ole Dixie and Pike County Breakdown, rarely missing a note or lacking in vibrancy. They also broke out part of Roland's Marathon, a suite of six songs he said DJs loved in the 1970s because they could throw it on, take a break and return with time to spare.

Another magic moment came on Powder Creek, which Roland and his late guitar-playing brother, Clarence, conceived spontaneously while driving on the Jersey Turnpike in the Sixties. They pulled off and quickly recorded a version in a rest-stop bathroom. The storytelling aspect of many songs here was as intriguing as the progressions.

Ringed by chic lounges and high-end condo towers, the Station Inn also comes without ego. Its dark but cozy set-up runs counter to the pack'em in mentality of the Lower Broadway honky-tonks.

Perhaps the only negative to bluegrass modesty is the small but boisterous crowds. Here was one of the best mandolin pickers around, and he drew 100 people. With the atmosphere and energy of the Station Inn, it could have been 10,000, with people from as far away as Japan, Australia and New Zealand. He pulled the audience in for the chorus of The Last Thing On My Mind, and barely any voices stayed silent.

Within the comfort of the Station Inn, Roland's songs required no defense. They hovered gently and stayed with the crowd long after they departed with Will You Be Lonesome Too. After those sets, there wasn't any chance of that.