Rual Yarbrough

Rual Holt Yarbrough (January 13, 1930- September 21, 2010) was an American five-string banjo player who worked with some of the most famous bluegrass musicians.

Biography

Yarbrough was born in Lawrence County, Tennessee. He grew up listening to Bill Monroe on the radio and eventually learned to play the banjo. In the mid 1950s he joined the Alabamians. He formed the Dixie Gentlemen in 1956 together with Jake Landers and Herschel Sizemore. In the beginning they called themselves the Country Gentlemen but when they found out that another group already had that name, they quickly changed theirs to the Dixie Gentlemen. They later recorded with fiddler Tommy Jackson. The group disbanded in 1966 and Yarbrough found work with Jimmy Martin's Sunny Mountain Boys. He continued working with Flatt & Scruggs and the Foggy Mountain Boys, Jim & Jesse and the Virginia Boys and Bobby Smith and the Boys From Shiloh. When Yarbrough was performing in Columbus, Ohio with the Boys From Shiloh, he met Monroe who offered him a job with the Bluegrass Boys since his banjo player Vic Jordan had just left. Yarbrough was hired and made his first recordings with Monroe two days later, on March 26, 1969. Between 1969 and 1970 he made 21 recordings with Monroe. Rual Yarbrough passed away from complications from pulmonary fibrosis in Florence, Alabama on September 21, 2010.

References

• Vladimir Bogdanov, Chris Woodstra, Stephen Thomas Erlewine, All Music Guide to Country: The Definitive Guide to Country Music, 2003 (p. 209)
• Neil V. Rosenberg, Charles Wolfe, "Bluegrass, Bill Monroe", Bear Family Publications, 1991