Buck Ryan

He could use his instrument to summon images of both a "Nervous Breakdown" or a "Nightingale Waltz", and in fact these happen to be the titles of two of Buck Ryan's classic singles for Mercury, cut when that label went on a bluegrass binge in the late '50s. To have such range on the fiddle would have taken oodles of practice, and to play "Orange Blossom Special" the way this fiddler did, leaving the rosin's share of his compatriots back in the sticky dust, would have taken even more. The type of constantly woodshedding fiddler, always seen either carrying or cradling his inst...