CD: $15
MC-0603

Track Listing

This Morning at Nine
The Way You Look at Him
The Green Mossy Ground
Leavin' Rosine
I Love to Tell the Story
No Mother or Dad
Listening to the Rain
The Sweetest Song I Sing
Eight Good Years
Blake's March
Just Because of You
The Rain
Tequila Mockingbird
Why Did You Wander

The fourteen songs making up "the green record" span the history of Bluegrass and includes five originals and another Becky Buller Gospel. Winner of the 2003 Minnesota Music Award for best Bluegrass/Old-time Recording. With Art, Lisa, Mark, Matt and Graham Sones on banjo.

Bluegrass Unlimited Magazine: "Liquid smooth vocals ... upbeat and contemporary"
by Robert C Buckingham, March 2004
Monroe Crossing is a traditional band with liquid-smooth vocals and much-better-than average picking. Lisa Fuglie provides strong vocals and good fiddle. Art Blackburn's smooth vocals also predominate on this project. ...The harmonies are sweet and on the money. This project is swollen with sweetness and even the hard-driving material manages only to sound fast, as in "This Morning At Nine."

That they brought nearly half of the material to the project speaks well of their creativity. They have no lack of that, and do use it to their advantage. This band should find a great following among those who are not too rustic in their tastes, or who do not want to wander too far into the mountains of old bluegrass. While they have drawn their music from some older sources, Monroe Crossing manages to keep things upbeat and contemporary.

Northern California Bluegrass Society
Brenda Hough, October 2003
Monroe Crossing takes its name from the father of bluegrass so it's not a surprise that the band is in the traditional camp of bluegrass. The album (The "Green Mossy Ground") opens with a spirited version of "This Morning At Nine" from the early days of the Country Gentlemen. Another barn burner is the Osborne Brothers' song "Listening to the Rain." The marvelous blending of instrumental sounds, particularly the mandolin and fiddle is further shown in their rendition of Aubrey Haynie's "Leavin' Rosine" tribute to Bill Monroe.

Matt Thompson's mandolin chop is strong and clear throughout the songs and his leads are matched and embellished by Lisa Fuglie's fiddle. Art Blackburn has a chance to showcase his vibrant guitar flatpicking in a tribute to another flatpicker, "Blake's March." Graham Sones is the new banjo player in the band and his mastery of the five string is shown in his fast picking of Pete Wernick's "Tequila Mockingbird."

But a bluegrass band does not thrive on instrumentals alone. With Art and Lisa providing the lead vocals, the band has a tremendous vocal variety. The outstanding harmonies on the gospel "The Rain" and "I Love To Tell The Story" are crystalline perfect. Tim O'Brien's "The Sweetest Song I Sing" has the pure harmonies and exact instrumentation that make this the highlight of the album. An album with something for everyone on every song!