NC bluegrass guitarist Tony Rice, who influenced generations of pickers, dead at 69

Tributes to the legendary bluegrass guitarist Tony Rice flooded social media after industry media reported his death at home in Reidsville, north of Greensboro, on Christmas Day. He was 69.

Rice, who for many years played regularly at Wilkesboro’s MerleFest, was an icon among bluegrass fans for his precise, jazz-inflected guitar playing and rich baritone voice. Health problems robbed him of both late in life, but not before Rice had influenced generations of the genre’s top performers.

“Tony Rice was the single most influential acoustic guitar player in the last 50 years,” band leader Ricky Skaggs, a former bandmate, wrote on Facebook. “Many if not all of the bluegrass guitar players of today would say that they cut their teeth on Tony Rice’s music. He loved hearing the next generation players play his licks. I think that’s where he got most of his joy as a player.”

Standing stock-still on a stage, long ponytail neatly furled behind his suit jacket, Rice made bluegrass standards sound new and added depth to contemporary songwriters such as Gordon Lightfoot.

His prized Martin D-28 guitar had once been owned by the Byrds’ Clarence White, an early influence. Their voices, Skaggs found when he and Rice became bandmates in J.D. Crowe & The New South in 1974, “blended like brothers.”

Over the following years, Rice’s work covered a range of genres, from the progressive bluegrass of his own Tony Rice Unit to the jazzy quintet of California mandolinist David Grisman, to recordings of traditional tunes with guitarist Norman Blake.

Rice won many awards from the International Bluegrass Music Association, which inducted him into its Hall of Fame in 2013, and a Grammy in 1993.

“It is with a heavy heart we say goodbye to one of the most iconic voices & musicians in bluegrass,” the IBMA tweeted Saturday. “Few will ever match his skill & influence.”

Musicians quickly posted their own tributes to Rice.

“Tony Rice inspired so many including a kid like me from East Tennessee who was in awe of the way he sang and played ‘Me And My Guitar,’ “ tweeted country superstar Kenny Chesney. “I’ll never forget seeing him sing that at the IBMA Bluegrass Festival in Owensboro, Ky. It’s printed in my brain forever!”

“I’m beyond heartbroken to hear about the passing of Tony Rice. No one has had a more profound impact on my musical world,” the mandolinist Chris Thile tweeted. “His playing, singing, writing, and arranging broke the bluegrass mold and will eternally attest to the fact that music can take you anywhere, from anywhere.”

“Rest In Peace my guitar mentor Tony Rice. We lost a giant of the guitar on Christmas yesterday,” wrote violinist Mark O’Connor, who lives in the Charlotte area. “Of course it all comes flooding through the mind, how many times we played together since we first met in 1975.”

“I’ve listened and cried all evening like so many others... heartbroken by the passing of Tony Rice,” tweeted singer and multi-instrumentalist Sierra Hull. “His music has influenced me as much as anyone I could ever imagine... from the moment I heard Church Street Blues at 8 years old till now. This one really hurts.”

Rice had not sung in concert since shortly after being diagnosed with muscle-tension dysphonia in 1994, Variety reported, and had not performed publicly on guitar since 2013 because of other medical problems.

Rice was born in Danville, Virginia, but moved to California as a child with his family, Greensboro’s News & Record reported. He had lived in Rockingham County in recent years with his wife Pamela, the news site reported.

This story was originally published December 27, 2020 at 2:26 PM.