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Posted on Wed, Aug 17, 2011 : 5:50 a.m.

Bluegrass and more from Detroit area picker Bill Bynum, Ark-bound Saturday with his band

By Roger LeLievre

Bill_Bynum_and_Co_credit_Michael_Hacala_0936_2.jpg

Bill Bynum & Co. play The Ark this weekend.

photo by Michael Hacala

Bill Bynum remembers exactly when he decided to ditch rock and roll for bluegrass.

“I was listening to public radio on a Saturday afternoon (in 1999) and Steve Earle’s ‘Yours Forever Blue’ came on,” Bynum recalled. “I was literally turned around at that moment. I went and saw him play that evening at the Michigan Theater and after that it was all one direction.”

Bynum will play with his band—Mary Seelhorst on fiddle, Chuck Anderson on bass and guitarist John Lang—at The Ark on Saturday night. In his youth, Lang was a member of the Detroit band Gallery, which had a No. 1 pop hit with “It’s So Nice to Be With You.”

A 2004 Metro Detroit Songwriting Contest winner (he wrote the first prize song "Lovin' You''), Bynum is a frequent Ark open mic favorite. In fact, he was voted Open Mic Performer of the Year in 2006 at The Ark and by the Windsor Folk Music Society. He released the album “Daddy’s Word” in 2008.

His musical roots are from the South; Bynum’s parents came to Michigan to work during World War II.

PREVIEW

Bill Bynum & Co.

  • Who: Downriver Detroit resident Bynum, with bandmates Mary Seelhorst on fiddle, guitarist John Lang and Chuck Anderson on bass.
  • What: Southern roots-based acoustic music.
  • Where: The Ark, 316 S. Main St.
  • When: 8 p.m. Saturday, Aug. 20.
  • How much: $15. Info: www.theark.org; 734-761-1451.
“Both my parents were sharecroppers’ children in Arkansas,” Bynum said. “Like a lot of Southerners, there was quite an exodus up to the Detroit area for the work that was here. … I never really recognized until now how music was really the soundtrack to our life. We had a big old AM radio that sat on our kitchen counter and my parents had country music running through the house my whole youth. As a young teenager I had to rebel; I had to do the rock and roll thing. I had three older brothers who were quite involved in rock and roll and I did that myself. As I became a little older, right around 40, I started realizing what was important to me.”

Like many performers, Bynum said he has no fondness for musical pigeonholes.

“I don’t know about labels; they are kind of hard for me. Bluegrass is not really what we are. We don’t have a banjo, we don’t have a mandolin player and it’s hard to label yourself a bluegrass band if you don’t have those things. But we certainly sample from a lot of bluegrass,” he explained. “Right now we’re doing an old Bill Withers’ tune called ‘Ain’t No Sunshine When She’s Gone.’ So we mix it up quite a bit. But that’s where my roots come from, classic country that my parents weaned me on to as a kid.

“What we try to do is reach people on an emotional level. … That’s what we want to do more than anything—take you on an emotional ride through these songs,” he added.

On the menu for Ark show is a mix of old and new. “We’ve written about a half dozen new songs that will be on our new album, which is about 3/4 of the way recorded,” Bynum said. “We need to make at least one more visit to Big Sky studio in Ann Arbor.”

Look for the new CD in the fall.