With her latest album, Highlander, bluegrass/Americana icon Missy Raines takes inventory of where she stands at this current juncture in her storied career — this melodic ode to her native West Virginia, which simultaneously serves as an ideal prism of time and space Raines peers through into the unknowns of tomorrow.
“Making this record and having this band has been sort of a homecoming,” the legendary bassist/vocalist says. “I’m at a point in my life where I’ve been able to look back at what I’ve gone through, what I’ve done, and the path I ultimately wanted to take.”
Throughout her storied career, Raines has garnered some of the biggest accolades in the music industry, including 14 International Bluegrass Music Association honors, with 10 being awarded for “Bass Player of the Year.” Raines’ 2018 release Royal Traveller was also nominated for a Grammy Award for “Best Bluegrass Album” in2020.
Allegheny is Ben Garnett on guitar, Eli Gilbert on banjo, Ellie Hakanson on fiddle, and Tristan Scroggins on mandolin. The band is named for the Allegheny highlands of West Virginia where Raines grew up. This band is a significant nod to her deep traditional bluegrass roots. The music is traditional and hard-driving at its core but energized with Raines’ well-known penchant for originality and innovation.
“I grew up in West Virginia, just a few miles from the historic C&O Canal, the headwaters of the Potomac River, and the Maryland and Pennsylvania state lines. Geographically, it was a pretty straight shot down ‘out of the hills’ to the Washington DC, Baltimore, and northern Virginia areas and my family would travel there as much as possible to hear all the incredible bluegrass that was being made there during the 60’s and the 70’s. Washington, D.C. was a hotbed of bluegrass (both traditional and progressive) at the time with bands like Bob Paisley & Ted Lundy, Del McCoury and the Dixie Pals, the Country Gentlemen, and the Seldom Scene. All of that music affected me deeply then and today I’m having the time of life letting those influences shine through with this band, Allegheny.”