Buddy Merriam perfects bluegrass mandolin

When lightning struck, Buddy Merriam listened.

Merriam, 58, who lives in Sound Beach, has made a living as a bluegrass musician for the past 30 years - a career launched after lightning hit a neck chain he was wearing at a 1976 bluegrass festival in the Berkshires. As he recovered in a hospital, he decided to follow his muse and become serious about the mandolin - a key component of any true bluegrass outfit thanks to Bill Monroe, the father of bluegrass known for his signature song "Blue Moon of Kentucky."

Before the concert, Merriam had met Monroe in the parking lot. "I was very intimidated," said Merriam. "I heard that he didn't like northerners or hippies and I qualified for both, but we talked and he told me to learn how to play the mandolin right."

When Monroe later heard about Merriam's lightning encounter, he took the young man under his wing. Merriam went on to perfect his mandolin technique, form a band and, in 1980, embark on a music career.

Over time, his reputation spread and he became known as "the best Monroe-style mandolin player in the world," said Tony Williams, a concert promoter in Kentucky.

Last spring, to mark the 30-year-anniversary of his bluegrass career, Merriam was on the cover of the quarterly magazine Mandolin.

Inside, an article said Merriam has "managed to stay true to the Monroe style, while still making it seem fresh and new, and somehow he's made it his own sound, too," and his original songs "richly deserve to become part of the Bluegrass canon."

He continues to host "Blue Grass Time" on WUSB (90.1 FM, 6 p.m. Wednesdays), serves as the artistic director of the Long Island Bluegrass Festival every August in Copiague and performs local concerts.

Recently he produced a new CD, "Back Roads Mandolin," on his own label, Lily Pad Records (named for a Monroe song "Frog on a Lily Pad"). A review in Bluegrass Unlimited magazine praised Merriam for keeping "the music rooted in bluegrass while occasionally integrating the influences of gypsy jazz, Native American music, and even a touch of polka."

And since bluegrass musicians don't make rock star money, Merriam supplements his income by repairing wind instruments.

Merriam said he and Monroe became friends, in part because they "bonded over farming." Monroe farmed land in Kentucky "the old-fashioned way with horses and mules, and I had a vegetable garden and a flower garden. We talked about that and became friends."

Monroe offered him lessons and subsequently invited Merriam's band, Back Roads, to Nashville, Tenn., to perform at the Grand Old Opry and record one of his songs.

Merriam said Monroe would give him mandolin lessons when his tour brought him to the Northeast. And when Monroe died, in 1996, Merriam attended the burial in Rosine, Ky., and said he was surprised Monroe's family and friends knew who he was.

Last year, a health crisis gave Merriam reason to worry about the future of his own music. The episode convinced him that if anything happened to him, all his original music would be lost: Much of the mandolin music he created - more than 1,000 songs - was never formally recorded or written down. So he decided to winnow his collection, many of which are captured on cassette tapes, and transcribe the best ones.

Promoter Tony Williams recalled an appearance by Back Roads at the 2003 Kentucky Lakes Bluegrass festival, where Merriam won over the crowd.

"I got several e-mails asking when I was going to bring that Yankee band back and I reply 'as soon as possible,' " said Williams. "Back Roads is a band that everyone in New York should be proud of."