Daniel Routh

Musician
Best known for Guitar

Daniel Routh is a guitarist and singer who founded the North Carolina band Nu-Blu in 2003 with his wife, the singer and bassist Carolyn Routh. He also manages the band and coordinates its touring.

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He started on a Sears and Roebuck guitar at 12, learning from bluegrass on the radio, and went on to play banjo with several local bands, winning some instrumental contests along the way. He studied history and spent some twenty years working in production, studio and live-sound engineering, stage management, marketing and graphic design. He also teaches bass and banjo.

Nu-Blu, based in Siler City, North Carolina, marked its tenth year with Ten (2013), its fifth album. The Christmas EP Shine followed on Voxhall Records in November 2017, with Routh on guitar, Carolyn Routh on bass, TJ Honaker on banjo and Justin Harrison on fiddle and mandolin. A 2020 reissue added “Blueridge Mountain Snow.” In April 2017 Routh played the Martin D-28 that had belonged to Lester Flatt and then Keith Whitley at a Nu-Blu show at the Earl Scruggs Center in Shelby, North Carolina. The owner had already lent it to him for two of the band’s studio recordings.

The band has recorded with Sam Moore on “Jesus and Jones,” a tribute to George Jones, and with Jimmy Fortune on the single “Still Small Voice.” It celebrated its twentieth anniversary with the album Where You’ve Been in August 2024, with Ricky Skaggs and Sharon White among the guests, and it hosts the syndicated television show “Bluegrass Ridge.” At the IBMA’s World of Bluegrass in 2016 Routh led sessions on booking a band.

  • Nu-Blu
    Played on recording with Nu-Blu

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