Peter Rowan

Peter Rowan occupies a revered status as a cult icon among devotees of progressive bluegrass. A Grammy-winning roots musician, he took part in multiple boundary-pushing endeavors throughout the late 1960s and 1970s prior to establishing a prolific solo trajectory in the 1980s. Although best known as a guitarist, Rowan also handles vocals, yodeling, and an assortment of mandolin-family instruments. His extensive roster of groups and musical partners encompasses Earth Opera, Seatrain, Muleskinner, Old & in the Way, the Rowan Brothers, Rowan & Greene & the Red Hot Pickers, Tony Rice, Jerry Douglas, Don Edwards, and Flaco Jiménez, along with numerous additional associates.

Born in 1942, Rowan spent his formative years in Wayland, Massachusetts, outside Boston; several family members, including his parents, pursued music, prompting him and siblings Chris and Lorin to perform rock and bluegrass together from an early age. While still in high school he assembled the Tex-Mex outfit the Cupids, and following college he contributed vocals and mandolin to the folk ensemble the Mother Bay State Entertainers beginning in 1963. Additional early work came alongside Jim Rooney and Bill Keith, leading to his 1964 entry into Bill Monroe’s storied Blue Grass Boys as vocalist and guitarist. Rowan exited that ensemble in 1967 to form the stylistically adventurous folk-rock band Earth Opera with mandolin virtuoso David Grisman; the group issued two albums and frequently supported the Doors. He subsequently relocated to the San Francisco Bay Area and joined Seatrain, a bluegrass-rock fusion group, appearing on a pair of albums released in 1970 and 1971 before departing to collaborate with Jerry Garcia and Grisman in the bluegrass outfit Old & in the Way and, separately, with Grisman in Muleskinner.

In 1975 Rowan united with brothers Chris and Lorin to create the progressive bluegrass collective the Rowans, which issued several well-regarded albums across the ensuing years. He also performed with Flaco Jiménez in Mexican Airforce and delivered his initial solo releases, Peter Rowan in 1978 and Medicine Trail in 1980, both on Flying Fish. The Tex-Mex project Texican Badman appeared on Appaloosa in 1981, accompanied by an album from his Nashville-based Wild Stallions. The Walls of Time arrived in 1982 as the first of many Sugar Hill recordings that extended well into the 1990s.

Particularly noteworthy among these were 1985’s The First Whippoorwill, a warm homage to Monroe, and 1988’s New Moon Rising, which emerged as the defining statement of Rowan’s solo catalog through its inclusion of several signature compositions. Dust Bowl Children, issued in 1990, consisted entirely of solo performances, while All on a Rising Day in 1991 sustained his inventive momentum. Further albums continued through 1996, among them 1994’s Tree on a Hill, which reunited him with Chris and Lorin, and 1996’s Yonder, a duet collection with Dobro master Jerry Douglas.

Rowan paused his solo activities for several years yet remained active as a guest on recordings by others, including Czech folk ensemble Druha Trava. He resurfaced in 2002 with High Lonesome Cowboy, a Shanachie collaboration alongside Don Edwards that also featured Tony Rice and Norman Blake. You Were There for Me, a long-awaited partnership with Tony Rice, surfaced in 2004 and yielded another joint effort, Quartet, in 2007.

The Peter Rowan Bluegrass Band delivered the Alison Brown-produced Legacy in 2010, featuring Jody Stetcher, Paul Knight, and Keith Little in the lineup; guest appearances came from Ricky Skaggs, Del McCoury, Gillian Welch, and David Rawlings. Old School, released in 2013, assembled remaining alumni of Monroe’s Blue Grass Boys together with a newer cohort of musicians steeped in that lineage. Later the same year a raw collection documenting Rowan’s Trang & Groove project, a fusion of reggae, R&B, and bluegrass, appeared.

In 2006 producer John Chelew visited Rowan’s painting studio and encountered spiritually oriented songs previously performed live but never captured in the studio. Chelew scheduled sessions at the Record Plant in Sausalito, where Rowan and his band tracked several pieces; additional recording occurred in Los Angeles and New Orleans with contributors including bassist Jack Casady and Welch. The resulting album, Dharma Blues, emerged on Elk Run through Omnivore Recordings in summer 2014. Omnivore issued My Aloha!, a set of Hawaiian-style material performed by Rowan on guitar and baritone ukulele, in 2017. Ahead of 2018’s Stanley Brothers-inspired Carter Stanley’s Eyes, Rowan joined Rebel Records. Calling You from My Mountain, a 2022 collection of original and traditional songs, included guest contributions from Shawn Camp, Billy Strings, Molly Tuttle, and Lindsay Lou.