Fiddle Breakdown: 20 Instrumental Favorites

Don Reno, Reno & Smiley | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (December 9, 1997)
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Rural Rhythm
• ASIN: B000002NV6
• Also Available in: Audio Cassette  |  MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #92,351 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)
  • #82 in Music > Country > Instrumental

Track Listings

1. Goodbye Liza Jane

2. Chicks Waltz

3. Natural Bridge Blues

4. I Saw Your Face in the Moon

5. Kansas City Railroad Blues

6. Kingdom Coming

7. Stomping with Reno

8. Whispering

9. Fiddling Around

10. Red's Virginia Waltz

11. South Sea Sweetheart

12. Black Berry Blossom

13. Love Somebody

14. Lee Highway Blues

15. Mary's Melody

16. Ryan's Stomp

17. Indian Creek

18. In the Pines

19. Ryan's Polka

20. Hog Through Reel

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Best of genre, a must have for your country collection., January 27, 2001

By 

Vocal Music - See all my reviews

This review is from: Fiddle Breakdown: 20 Instrumental Favorites (Audio CD)

If you like classic country or fiddle music, I highly recommend this title. You will find outstanding selections for fiddle, banjo, string guitar, and steel guitar. Natural Bridge Blues (track three) has wonderful guitar picking probably by Red Smiley. Track seven, stomping with Reno, features great fiddling from Buck Ryan with Don Reno picking guitar and nice work from Tom Kiley on steel guitar.

The liner notes states that the album contains examples of western swing, contest fiddling, and many bluegrass standards. I have listened to modern bluegrass and this album sounds more like classic country than bluegrass. There are no vocals and thankfully no rock-style drums that are the bane of modern country music.

My original album had lots of surface noise. This CD solves that problem and brings out the wonderful bass guitar, played by Jerry McCoury, that was barely audible on the original album which had very narrow groove spacing. Although the album has twenty selections, all of the songs are very good and there is no filler material.

Originally released as an album by Buck Ryan, the CD now features Reno and Smiley because of their name recognition. This is one of those rare albums that really merits five stars.

Music Footnote:
Track 18, In the Pines, was also covered by the rock group Nirvana in the early 1990's.

5.0 out of 5 stars Standout, December 28, 2010

By 

Bluegrass Lover (VA USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Fiddle Breakdown: 20 Instrumental Favorites (Audio CD)

There are a few names in bluegrass that are standouts...I always know that ANYTHING by Reno & Smiley is going to be between good & great & this is no exception. If you are new to the genre, consider this part of your basic training.

5.0 out of 5 stars Superb instrumentals by the masters, March 25, 2010

By 

Berby - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Fiddle Breakdown - 20 Instrumental Favorites (MP3 Download)

I bought this vinyl album in the early-mid '80s and played it endlessly. Being a bluegrass musician, I have a lot of this type of music around and was quite familiar with Don Reno. This album features his fiddler, Buck Ryan, who was among the best -- right alongside Johnny Gimble and Kenny Baker. The album has some tunes you don't normally hear on fiddle collections and they are done flawlessly.

I no longer have a turntable, and the old album is pretty well shot so I've been searching for a couple of years now for a CD -- including on Amazon -- and I was saddened to think that this superb collection was gone forever. But I checked again here the other day, saw that it was now available and ordered it, and my copy just came today.

If you like this type of music, you will not be disappointed with this collection.