Featured Artist

The "Artist of the Month" web site feature highlights a new flatpicking guitarist each Month. This months featured artist is Charles Sawtelle.

	Charles Sawtelle
	Reprinted from Flatpicking Guitar Magazine, Volume 2, Number 2 (January/February 1998) By Dan Miller
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When I first heard Charles Sawtelle play the guitar what immediately captured my attention was not the notes that he played, but the ones he didn't play--the ones he left alone. He chose to give his notes a little elbow room and he allowed the guitar to breathe, and that was refreshing. Once these tasteful bits of silence caught my attention, I then discovered that the real fascinating aspect of a Sawtelle solo was the unpredictable way he resolves that silence. It might be a flurry of notes, it might be a sustained bend or slide, it might be a highly syncopated run, or even just a single ringing note and then more silence, you just never know. Charles' solos were always original, inventive, and full of surprises and at the same time they tastefully complemented the song, the vocalist, and the other instruments. This is not an easy thing to do, but Charles always pulled it off masterfully.

The Charles Sawtelle style of guitar playing is something that all aspiring bluegrass guitarists would do well to spend time studying. The range of left hand techniques he employed, his brilliant use of time, and the dynamics of his right hand attack, both in his lead and rhythm playing, are like that of no other bluegrass guitar player. He had his own voice and his own style. There is no one else who plays quite like him. However, studying Charles' style of guitar playing must go beyond the mechanical aspects of left and right hand technique because the most distinctive part of his style is the feeling.

Charles spoke with his guitar. He played from the heart and communicated an emotion. While his characteristic spontaneity and unpredictably could often convey a sense of intensity, excitement, and/or humor, Charles was equally as adept at filling the listener with the sweet emotion of a love song or haunting expression of a bluegrass ballad. His guitar could speak the words of the song and thus convey an emotion which sinks into your heart and soul. You do not just hear Charles Sawtelle's music, you feel it.

Aspiring pickers might ask, "How do you learn that 'feeling' from tablature?" Well, you can learn the notes from tablature, but with a Sawtelle solo, learning the notes is only a small part of the journey. Charles' playing is full of the subtlest aspects of timing, tone, phrasing, and dynamics that are very hard to grasp if you are trying to learn from a piece of paper. To capture what Charles did, you listen closely, allow the emotion of the song to sink into your bones, and then play from your gut.

The Sawtelle guitar style is about taking risks. Charles was never afraid to play "in the moment" or explore boundaries. He was a very gutsy and intuitive player. Hot Rize banjo great Pete Wernick says, "His whole idea of the way he heard the melody and his phrasing is a love for straight traditional bluegrass coupled with an almost alien be-bop willingness to invent something new that had never been heard on planet earth before. When he went into the experimental mode, there was always a feeling of suspense which really grabbed the listener and was more than just music, it was entertainment because you knew he was going exploring."

While lead guitar playing will always bring a hot player a lot of attention, something that is even more important to the bluegrass band is the guitar player's ability to provide back-up and rhythm in support of the vocalists and the other instruments. In this roll Charles always exhibited the ability to masterfully provide the band with solid support, tasteful embellishment, and a colorful flair that always enhanced the overall sound.

Regarding Charles' rhythm work Pete Wernick states, "One thing that was really neat about his rhythm style is that he created a really good pulse. He knew where the pulse was, but he didn't do a lot of thrashing. In fact, he never thrashed. He liked to punch individual notes and would put in really nice little phrases that were not note blitzes, but well phrased statements that were always in coordination with the other musicians. As another player in the band, one of the things I always appreciated is that I never felt like he was stepping in the way or cluttering the canvas for me to paint my picture. He was always very supportive that way."

Nick Forster had this to say about Charles' rhythm playing: "Charles' mike technique was a big part of the dynamics of what made Hot Rize distinguish itself in the bluegrass world. He really worked the guitar mike aggressively. He wasn't afraid to stand two feet from the guitar mike while he was playing rhythm on some passages and then lean into it to punctuate phrases to create a little extra drive."

Hot Rize was one of the most successful, influential, entertaining and popular bluegrass bands of the 1980s. Wearing suits with wild vintage ties and playing traditional style bluegrass music, yet giving it a fresh sound that was all their own, Hot Rize excited both the traditional and contemporary bluegrass audiences. All of the members of Hot Rize are not only top rate musicians, they are also tremendous entertainers with an appeal that crosses all boundaries.

Charles was not only an integral part of the band musically, his professional and artistic sense, both on stage and behind the scenes, contributed greatly to the band's success. Pete Wernick explains, "A really important influence of Charles in our band was that he always had a keen eye for craft. He would not accept certain things that were flaky. It might be that you didn't shine your boots or that the speakers that we used at gigs were not properly painted, he would just say stuff like, 'That isn't pro. We have got to be pro if we are going to do anything in this business.' He was always a master at putting his finger right on some concept that might be kind of elusive and clearing away the clutter to let you know what is the most important thing in a situation. I always appreciated that."

Tim O'Brien says, "Hot Rize was a really special vehicle for Charles. The band was kind of designed to work around his guitar style. We were of the opinion that we should emphasize stuff that was unique about us. One of those things was to give Charles free reign on his solo to do whatever he wanted. We were kind of engineered to part the waters for Charles when he wanted to do his thing. When his solos came, we just kind of let him go and stayed out of his way and supported that as best we could. He was an amazing architect of the sound of Hot Rize. He was kind of a wild card in our band. People would gasp when he played."

Pete Wernick's former Country Cooking bandmate John Miller gave Charles Sawtelle the nickname "The Bluegrass Mystery" after hearing Hot Rize play a gig in Seattle. The name seems fitting, but no one in the band can really say exactly why. Perhaps it was because Charles was unpredictable, or as Charles said himself, "I like to leave a little mystery." Nick Forster says, "He couldn't describe what he did. He didn't know." Pete Wernick says, "You never knew what Charles was going to do and the fun part of it is that a lot of times he didn't know either." Tim O'Brien says, "He was the bluegrass mystery because his solos were mysterious. He would always keep you guessing. You never really knew how he was going to get to the end of the solo, but he always did. It was amazing."

Perhaps the "mystery" was the way Charles Sawtelle could be so innovative, unpredictable, and original, and yet still somehow fit so perfectly into the traditional sound of bluegrass music. But, then again, to the thousands of fans who made Hot Rize one of the most popular bluegrass bands of all times it is really not a mystery at all, it is just great music.

Charles Sawtelle passed away at 8:00 pm on March 20th, 1999, after a five year struggle with leukemia.

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