Delano Floyd McCoury was born in Bakersville, North Carolina on February 1, 1939. At an early age, the McCoury family relocated north, just above the Mason-Dixon Line in York County, Pennsylvania. It was his older brother G.C. who introduced the young Del to bluegrass through the music of Flatt and Scruggs. "I learned to play music from my older brother, and we always listened to the Grand Ole Opry. In 1950, he bought some 78 RPMs, and one of them was Flatt and Scruggs. When I heard them playing 'Rolling in My Sweet Baby's Arms,' I just couldn't leave that record alone…I wore it out!" Del was so impressed by bluegrass music that he decided to take up the banjo. Although members of the extended McCoury family were versed in old-time music and clawhammer style, finding pickers familiar with the then-new Scruggs style proved more difficult. "Not many people played banjo like Scruggs. I didn't know anyone who played three-finger style, so I had to learn from records."

One of Del's early musical partners was Keith Daniels, a native North Carolinian living in Maryland at the time. The pair appeared on local radio with the Stevens Brothers, then founded Keith Daniels and the Blue Ridge Partners in 1958. During the fifties and sixties, the Baltimore area was a breeding ground for bluegrass talent. Receiving a medical discharge after a stint in the military, Del and younger brother Jerry worked in the Baltimore honky-tonks with the Franklin County Boys and then Jack Cooke's Virginia Playboys. Cooke had recently quit Bill Monroe's band. It was the gig with Cooke that brought Del to Monroe's attention. "I was playing banjo with him one night when Bill Monroe just walked right in and sat down in front of us…scared me to death!" Both Del and Cooke filled in for a brief tour with Monroe, but Del was soon invited to become a full-time Blue Grass Boy in early 1963. Under the impression he was trying out for the banjo job, a surprised Del was offered the guitar slot instead. Upon arriving in Nashville he contacted Monroe from his room at the Clarkston Hotel, right next door to the National Life and Accident Insurance Building, sponsors of the Grand Ole Opry. "I called Bill when I got to my room and he said to meet him in the restaurant. I went down carrying my banjo and saw this other guy in the lobby with his banjo. The other banjo player was Bill Keith, or 'Brad' as Monroe called him. You see there was only one Bill in the band so he called him Brad, which was his middle name. Bill bought both of us breakfast and then we went up to the National Life and Accident Building. Bill said to me, "I want you to audition on guitar." I thought it was strange…I had never even told him I could play one, even though that was the first thing I had learned as a kid. I took out Bill's guitar and played it. He then told me he needed a lead singer. So he hired Bill Keith right then because he needed him for a new recording. He told me he'd try me out for two weeks and then get me into the union, which he did." Del was a Blue Grass Boy from February 1963 until early 1964, when he and his new bride Jean moved to California.

After a disappointing stint with the Golden State Boys, Del decided to return to York County, Pennsylvania. He spent time as a construction worker at a local nuclear power plant, then was employed in the logging industry. Bluegrass gigs were much more plentiful back east, and Del would spend the next two decades as a part of the bluegrass scene in the Maryland, Pennsylvania and Virginia area. Fiddler and Blue Grass Boy alumnus Billy Baker made the trip to California with Del, and upon their return they formed the Shady Valley Boys. It wasn't long before Del soon had his own band, Del McCoury and the Dixie Pals. "In 1967, I started my own band without Billy...that was the Dixie Pals. Billy eventually came back and played fiddle on that first record, on Arhoolie Records." Constant personnel changes were a matter a fact for most bluegrass acts of the day, especially given the pressure of keeping full-time employment while maintaining a band. "Back then I didn't take it as seriously as I do now. It was more of fun thing. Musicians would come and go. I played the bluegrass festivals on weekends, sometimes a thousand miles away, just to keep a band together. I did that all through the seventies. I recorded some pretty good albums and had some good bands, especially for being just part time."

In 1981, Del's son Ronnie began playing with the band on a part-time basis at age thirteen. Among those who encouraged the young Ronnie was Bill Monroe himself. "I took Ronnie with me to a gig at the Lincoln Center. Monroe and a bunch of others were on the bill. He really took a liking to Ronnie and let him play his mandolin. It must have made an impression on Ronnie because when we got back home, he wanted to play mandolin. He was good enough after his first year to play rhythm in the band. I thought he might lose interest because not everyone's cut out to be a musician. But once the boys started playing, they never quit…never put their instruments down." 1987 saw the debut of Robbie McCoury with the band, first on bass then moving to banjo the following year. As the sound of the group evolved, Del was persuaded to change the name of the Dixie Pals to the Del McCoury Band. Albums such as 'Don't Stop the Music,' 'Blue Side of Town' and 'The Cold Hard Facts' helped propel the band to the forefront of the bluegrass world, along with relocation to Nashville in 1992. With Mike Bub and Jason Carter on bass and fiddle respectively, the group has developed into one of the finest units to ever grace a bluegrass stage. The list of International Bluegrass Music Association awards garnered by the band over the next decade is too numerous to mention.

Ronnie and Robbie McCoury have developed into two of the finest instrumentalists of their generation. The brothers' contributions to the success of the group should not be overlooked. It was their input that helped revitalize Del and gives him the inspiration to carry on. While both grew up absorbing Dad's influence, they aren't afraid to bring fresh contemporary arrangements and material to the group. The savvy Del knows better than to dismiss their ideas and treats the boys as musical partners. "The boys think of music like I do, so their ideas are similar to mine. When you have that chemistry, it's much easier to play. If I hear a song I know right off if I'll like it or not. The boys are really good at that, so I'm letting them do more and more these days. I used to have to do it all…material selection, lead singing and teaching everyone the parts. Now these young guys are hearing much more different music than I am. They hear all kinds of styles."

Throughout the nineties, the Del McCoury Band has embodied the best qualities of bluegrass. They have received exposure in the mainstream media for collaboration with the alternative rock group Phish. Another big fan of the Del McCoury Band is Steve Earle, with whom the band recorded 1999's 'The Mountain.' "When Steve came up with the idea, I thought about it and figured it would help both of us as well as the music. He has admired bluegrass ever since he came to town." Another factor cited by Del that piqued his interest in Earle's project was the wealth of new material, a meaningful subject in Del's opinion. "Back when Bill Monroe first started playing, he didn't have songs of his own. But once he started to write his own songs and later when Lester Flatt joined the group writing songs, bluegrass had its own style. We have to get new songs into the bluegrass genre to keep it fresh and up to date. You have to keep things growing." After a highly successful relationship with Rounder Records, the Del McCoury Band recently signed with Ricky Skaggs' Ceili Records. The first project to test the new relationship, 'The Family,' was also released in 1999 to wide acclaim from fans and critics alike. He is revitalized, re-energized and making the best music of his illustrious career. Today, the Del McCoury Band enjoys the praise of traditional bluegrass lovers and tie-dyed clad 'Del-Heads' alike. Del has proven not to be a relic of bluegrass music's past, but an architect of its future.

At his age, some artists would probably be content to take the triumph of two consecutive years of top industry awards as the equivalent of a gold watch and chain, but that's not Larry Sparks' style.  Named as the International Bluegrass Music Association's Male Vocalist of the Year in 2004 and 2005—and as winner of both Album of the Year and Recorded Event of the Year honors in the latter for the star-studded 40—the legendary veteran returns on [date] with The Last Suit You Wear, his debut for Del McCoury's McCoury Music label.  Wrapping his warm yet mournful voice around a choice collection of new songs and showcasing his distinctive, muscular guitar picking with the help of a crackerjack core band and a sprinkling of carefully chosen guests like McCoury, country piano legend Hargus "Pig" Robbins, and IBMA Hall of Honor member J. D. Crowe, The Last Suit You Wear makes a powerful case that, when it comes to Larry Sparks' music, the best is yet to come.  As one rising young bluegrass artist put it recently, "if the IBMA were to give an award for just being 'The Man,' Larry Sparks would win it every time."

Indeed, if Larry Sparks is only now, in the wake of 40's succes, becoming known to audiences beyond the hardest of the bluegrass hard-core, it's surely for purely circumstantial reasons.  Born in Lebanon, Ohio in 1947, he's chosen a quiet life in semi-rural southeastern Indiana, emerging only to hit bluegrass festival stages and occasional clubs in what have amounted to lightning campaigns.  Sparks leaves it to others to make the media rounds and promotional tours, and has always tended to let his music speak for itself—but for those who listen, it has told a story that runs like an unbroken thread through more than 40 years of bluegrass history. 

A musician by the time he started high school, Larry Sparks stepped into the history books and into the heart of the music when he began making appearances as the legendary Stanley Brothers lead guitarist before graduation.  With the death of Carter Stanley in 1966, he became Ralph Stanley's right-hand man, moving into the Clinch Mountain Boys' all-important guitarist and lead singer role and carrying on the Stanley sound even as he began to make his own contributions.  Three years later, he formed his own band, the Lonesome Ramblers, and quickly became favorite of the growing audience in the "Bluegrass Belt" that stretches from the Mississippi River through Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, Kentucky and on across to the powerhouse bluegrass area around Baltimore and Washington, DC.  Developing his bluesy, signature guitar licks and resonant, soulful voice into the building blocks of a traditional, yet immediately identifiable personal sound, he recruited up-and-coming players like mandolinist Wendy Miller and banjo man Dave Evans and produced a steady stream of gripping albums, culminating in a pair of late 70s masterpieces: John Deere Tractor, which made instant classics of, among others the title track, Allen Mills' "Love Of The Mountains," "The Girl At The Crossroads Bar" and Keith Whitley's "Great High Mountain" (personally handed to Sparks by its writer), and Larry Sparks Sings Hank Williams, which revealed Sparks' profound affinity not just for The Drifting Cowboy's legacy, but for the enduring simplicity of classic country sounds.

While "progressive" sounds dominated the bluegrass scene in the 1980s, Sparks remained true to his singular artistic vision, training younger musicians like banjo virtuoso Scott Vestal and Nashville studio fiddler Glen Duncan in the discipline of the Lonesome Ramblers sound.  His perseverence was rewarded early the following decade, when he released another gem for the ages in Silver Reflections (1991).  Featuring mandolinist David Harvey (Moody Bluegrass, the Claire Lynch Band), banjo man Barry Crabtree (Wildfire), the album created another set of instant classics, including "Tennessee 1949," "Blue Virginia Blues" and "Don't Neglect The Rose," and as traditional bluegrass began to make a comeback, Sparks' lonesome sound and sternly personal approach to music and career drew new and renewed admiration.  By the end of the decade, he could look back on such highlights as appearances on Ralph Stanley's star-packed Saturday Night, Sunday Morning; on Austin City Limits' 1995 "Bluegrass Special," where he was teamed with Stanley and fellow Clinch Mountain alumnus Ricky Skaggs; and at the 1997 Bill Monroe memorial show that resulted in the CD/DVD release  The Legend Lives On: A Tribute To Bill Monroe—and by the middle of the next, the homage paid by generations of bluegrass and country stars on 40 had finally helped to carry him to the prominence he'd long deserved. 

The Last Suit You Wear makes a compelling case that Sparks not only deserves his accolades for past performances, but that he's at the peak of his creative powers.  Where 40 recapped many of his great hits of the past with contributions from admirers, the new collection looks to the future with a set that's short on career nostalgia and heavy on new songs that fit him like a glove.  As always, there's room for powerful stories like Connie Leigh's moving "Casualty Of War," Mark Brinkman's opening "The Old Coal Mine," and Tim Stafford, Larry Cordle & Bobby Starnes' retelling of the first Christmas, "Follow The Star," while long-time favorite writer Marshal Warwick returns with the near-autobiographical "I'm Country And Nothing More."  Sparks' gift for the traditional "heart songs" category is given free rein on both modern and classic-sounding entries like "For Your Love," "Hand In Hand," and "Those Blue Eyes Don't Sparkle Anymore," and a nod goes both to the singer's past (a remake of "Goodbye, Little Darlin'," which he first recorded some 35 years ago) and to his picking prowess, displayed on Sparks' own Latin-tinged "Larro."

Yet while the new project is of a piece with the best of Larry Sparks' earlier work, there are some distinctive new touches, too.  The title track, penned by award-winning songwriters Larry Shell, Larry Williams and Kim Williams, offers a hushed, profound meditation on life lessons that's filled with Sparks' own hard-earned wisdom, while the singer fulfills a long-held dream by bringing in the legendary Hargus "Pig" Robbins to add piano to "The Last Suit You Wear" and two others.  Producer/mandolin player Don Rigsby thoughtfully blends members of the Lonesome Ramblers, including Sparks' son Dee, mandolinist Jackie Kincaid and youthful banjo picker Josh McMurray, with instrumental stars like banjo/fiddle phenom Ron Stewart, hot dobro picker Randy Kohrs and fiddle master Stuart Duncan, and a couple of inspired guest turns by J. D. Crowe and long-time friend and admirer McCoury.  Yet as stellar as their contributions are, the spotlight's always where it needs to be—on the quiet power of Larry Sparks, guitarist and master singer.  

Memorably crafted and brilliantly performed, The Last Suit You Wear serves unmistakable notice: there's a lot more to be heard from Larry Sparks.