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Blaine Sprouse, Fiddler “If You’re Gonna Play In Texas (You Gotta Have a Fiddle in the Band)” was a 1984 Billboard Hot Country Single #1 hit for supergroup Alabama. And Blaine Sprouse was the fiddle player on that memorable chart topper, as well as the rest of the Roll On album. Four years later, the Kenny Baker protégé was tapped for the seminal, genre-blending Masters of the Folk Violin tour in which Sprouse was to fiddle alongside Baker. But Sprouse backed out due to personal commitments and sixteen-year-old Alison Krauss stepped in, paving the way for Alison’s historic rise in music. Sprouse, on the other hand, continued to carve a niche for himself, performing with Grand Ole Opry members as well as the many young turks of bluegrass, such as those who would pick together regularly over the years at Nashville’s world famous Station Inn: Cluster Pluckers, Dreadful Snakes, The Sidemen and Nashville Jug Band. Originally from West Virginia, Blaine Sprouse took the music cue from his father, a clawhammer banjo player who taught him his first guitar chords at age six. A couple of years later, the budding musician turned to the fiddle, at first learning on a glued-together instrument found in a dumpster, plucking out tunes for lack of a bow. By age eleven, Sprouse was picking up money playing guitar at local dances, eventually earning enough to buy a ¾-size fiddle and bow. He then learned how to use the bow to play tunes he had previously only picked, working up the tunes for dances. Taking every opportunity to attend bluegrass festivals within his reach—such as Carlton Haney’s Fincastle— whenever Bill Monroe was appearing, Sprouse followed Kenny Baker, Monroe’s long time fiddler, “because he was my inspiration. Kenny made the fiddle sound like no one else had.” Shortly before his eighteenth birthday, Blaine’s professional career was fast-tracked when he joined Jimmy Martin as a Sunny Mountain Boy, touring throughout the United States and Japan with the “King of Bluegrass.” After a move to Nashville, he left Martin to fiddle for “Father of Bluegrass” Bill Monroe’s son James in his Midnight Ramblers. This positioned Blaine for an unanticipated turn of events as a result of being placed in close proximity to mentor Baker when the two Monroe bands would play double bills. The young fiddler would go on to wear a Blue Grass Boy hat for several months, filling in for Baker when a hand injury sidelined him as well as on other occasions over the years. Sprouse later donned a Johnson Mountain Boys hat, filling in for Eddie Stubbs, when that ensemble toured Moscow. Much in demand as sideman and session player, Blaine toured and recorded with a stunning array of legendary bluegrass and country artists, among them Charlie Louvin, Jim and Jesse and the Virginia Boys, and the Osborne Brothers, often providing the opportunity to perform on the Grand Ole Opry where Sprouse had first taken a bow as a substitute Blue Grass Boy. Other highlights include co-founding—with banjo innovator Butch Robins—The Bluegrass Band, which was poised to become “one of the most important acts in bluegrass music,” as well known journalist Robert K. Oermann noted in his review of Another Saturday Night, the group’s debut album. The ensemble proved to be short-lived, with Blaine joining the Osbornes and another member, Alan O’Bryant, forming the Nashville Bluegrass Band. After the release of three critically acclaimed solo albums, Sprouse’s performing career took a backseat when he fulfilled a lifelong desire to return to school to complete his education and to earn a law degree. But in 2009, interest began to resurface when his 1996 fourth recording, Dogwood Winter, was re-issued as Appalachian Mountain Fiddler. After a decade and a half away from music, Blaine’s heart is answering the fiddler’s call. Also a gifted mandolin and guitar player, Sprouse stated in a Frets Magazine profile in 1982, “Music is my life. I just love to play.” Fiddle and bow in hand, Blaine Sprouse is back.