CMT Blog: Archive

If you love Jesus and Jimmy Martin, track down a brand new bluegrass gospel album called Old Friends Get Together. Released by Crossroads Music, the heavenly project unites bluegrass stalwarts J.D. Crowe, Doyle Lawson and Paul Williams for a harmonious tribute to their former boss, who died in 2005, thus leaving behind hundreds of colorful stories. For their first recording together, the three longtime friends focused on Martin's favorite gospel numbers, including a few he wrote. The praise-singing is just marvelous, and with Ron Stewart on fiddle and Cia Cherryholmes and Sonya Isaacs on high harmony, I just want to shout "Amen!" Part of the reason I like this album so much is because the tempo doesn't drag. You can almost "feel the spirit," as some might say, when the singers race through "Prayer Bells of Heaven" and "The Little White Church." The project has been in the works for a while, as Lawson writes in the liner notes that Martin was able to hear some of the tracks before his death. And I have to believe he's now somewhere on the sunny side of the mountain, smiling down on the final results.