Biography
Music fans link Detroit most readily with soul, vintage electric blues, or the hard rock of MC5 and Ted Nugent, rarely with bluegrass. Yet the Colwell brothers—Steve, Paul, and Ralph—were all born in that city between 1933 and 1937 amid the usual domestic chaos of young families. Their peripatetic upbringing later carried them through Massachusetts and finally to Los Angeles, where the siblings launched a professional career in the late 1940s. Initial notice came from guest spots on the Tex Williams Show, after which they headed back to the Midwest. There they secured featured slots on major radio outlets in Louisville and Cincinnati before taking over their own regular program on WFBM-TV near Indianapolis.
Hollywood called once more in 1951. Returning to Los Angeles, the trio signed with Columbia and cut several sides that featured the agile string work of Joe Maphis, who contributed both guitar and a distinctive tenor-banjo part on “Bluebonnet Lane.” Maphis coaxed an Earl Scruggs-like drive from an instrument ordinarily associated with Irish and Dixieland styles, even without the fifth string. Jim & Jesse later revived the number in 1961, turning it into a bluegrass standard. Around the period of those Columbia sessions Steve Colwell also tried his hand at baseball, apparently unconcerned about the risk to his fretting hand. His younger brothers were still in high school when country-and-western fan magazines began trumpeting the group’s recordings.
Despite modest sales the brothers soon lost momentum, and Columbia scheduled no further dates. The sole subsequent trace of any member is a passing reference to Paul Colwell in one of Maphis’s interviews. Among the sides they left behind are the buoyant “New Heart Yodel,” the tongue-in-cheek “The Puppy Dogs Tail,” and the dryly comic “The Devil Is a Rascal.” Other acts using the same name later appeared on the Up With People soundtrack, one of whose compositions, “You Can’t Live Crooked and Think Straight,” even earned a place on the Internet’s Miserable Melodies compilation of dubious recordings—an honor that underscores how singular the original Detroit bluegrass trio remains.
Hollywood called once more in 1951. Returning to Los Angeles, the trio signed with Columbia and cut several sides that featured the agile string work of Joe Maphis, who contributed both guitar and a distinctive tenor-banjo part on “Bluebonnet Lane.” Maphis coaxed an Earl Scruggs-like drive from an instrument ordinarily associated with Irish and Dixieland styles, even without the fifth string. Jim & Jesse later revived the number in 1961, turning it into a bluegrass standard. Around the period of those Columbia sessions Steve Colwell also tried his hand at baseball, apparently unconcerned about the risk to his fretting hand. His younger brothers were still in high school when country-and-western fan magazines began trumpeting the group’s recordings.
Despite modest sales the brothers soon lost momentum, and Columbia scheduled no further dates. The sole subsequent trace of any member is a passing reference to Paul Colwell in one of Maphis’s interviews. Among the sides they left behind are the buoyant “New Heart Yodel,” the tongue-in-cheek “The Puppy Dogs Tail,” and the dryly comic “The Devil Is a Rascal.” Other acts using the same name later appeared on the Up With People soundtrack, one of whose compositions, “You Can’t Live Crooked and Think Straight,” even earned a place on the Internet’s Miserable Melodies compilation of dubious recordings—an honor that underscores how singular the original Detroit bluegrass trio remains.