“High Lonesome Sound,” also titled “That High Lonesome Sound,” was written by Peter Rowan. The phrase itself is a familiar description of the keening, mountain-rooted vocal style of bluegrass, and the song takes that idea as its subject.
The song dwells on that sound and the longing bound up in it, treating the music of the mountains as something to hold onto. It is a song about bluegrass written from inside the tradition.
Rowan sang it with Old and in the Way, the short-lived 1973 group that paired him with David Grisman, Vassar Clements, John Kahn, and Jerry Garcia on banjo. Their live performances were released years later on the album “That High Lonesome Sound.”
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