Jack Rose

Jack Rose is an American folk guitarist from Fredericksburg, Virginia. He is associated with acoustic guitar, instrumental music, freak folk and the New Weird America scene, and he is also known for work that draws on folk, country blues, ragtime and related fingerstyle traditions. He dies in 2009.

Pelt

In 1993, Rose joins the psychedelic drone band Pelt with Michael Gangloff and Patrick Best. The group is sometimes joined by Mikel Dimmick and Jason Bill of Charalambides, and it releases its first album in 1995. Rose plays a range of instruments in Pelt, mainly electric guitar at first, before the band moves towards acoustic, folk-derived material in the late 1990s and he switches to acoustic guitar. Pelt tours steadily in the United States, opens for Sonic Youth, and works with groups including Harry Pussy and Charalambides. The band releases more than a dozen albums and a number of smaller releases on VHF Records, Eclipse Records and its own Klang imprint.

Solo work

Rose concentrates on acoustic guitar in the late 1990s and develops a solo approach built around original and traditional material. His early CD-R releases include Hung Far Low, Portland, Oregon and Doctor Ragtime, the latter combining country blues and ragtime and including covers associated with John Fahey and Sam McGee. His first full-length solo album, Red Horse, White Mule, is released on vinyl by Eclipse Records in 2002.

He becomes a prolific recording artist, issuing albums, EPs and compilation tracks on at least ten labels. His Eclipse Records releases Red Horse, White Mule, Opium Musick and Raag Manifestos attract critical praise, and Raag Manifestos appears in The Wire's list of records of the year. He also appears on Devendra Banhart's Golden Apples of the Sun compilation, which increases his profile.

In 2005, Kensington Blues is released on Tequila Sunrise Records and features ragtime, ragas, country blues and lap steel. He also makes a Peel Session in 2004, which coincides with wider attention in the United Kingdom. Later releases include the live LPs I Do Play Rock And Roll and The Black Dirt Sessions on Three Lobed Recordings, both reviewed positively, and The Wooden Guitar compilation on Locust Music, which is issued on vinyl and quickly goes out of print. Some of his best-known records, including Kensington Blues, are repressed on vinyl.

Style, collaborators and instruments

Rose's recordings are mainly for 6-string guitar, 12-string guitar and Weissenborn-style lap steel guitar, and he often uses open tunings. He is compared with players associated with the Takoma label, including John Fahey, Robbie Basho and Peter Walker, and he names Charley Patton, Blind Blake, John Fahey, Robbie Basho, Zia Mohiuddin Dagar and later Link Wray as influences.

Outside Pelt, his collaborators include Jason Bill, Donald Miller of Borbetomagus, Glenn Jones of Cul de Sac, Ian Nagoski and Keenan Lawler. In 2008, he reunites with Pelt members and other musicians including Micah Blue Smaldone for Dr. Ragtime and His Pals.

Final releases and posthumous material

Jack Rose and The Black Twig Pickers, his ninth LP, appears in 2009. His final solo LP, Luck In The Valley, is released after his death by Thrill Jockey and forms the third part of his self-described “Ditch Trilogy”; it features Glenn Jones, Harmonica Dan and pianist Hans Chew. A tribute compilation, Honest Strings: A Tribute To The Life And Work Of Jack Rose, follows, and his final recording, the electrified Ragged and Right with D. Charles Speer & The Helix, is released as part of Thrill Jockey's singles club. Rose is buried at West Laurel Hill Cemetery in Bala Cynwyd, Pennsylvania.