On the Slide with Pat Ivory - Master of the dobro surfs a slide guitar trend

Feb. 18, 2004

When you bend the string of your thoughts towards dobro music in Northern Michigan, chances are that one name resonates in response: Pat Ivory.
Performing lap-style on a resonator guitar, Ivory is a frequent side-man or soloist at square dances, folk fests, jam bands, benefits, art fairs, weddings and recordings throughout the region. Currently, he‘s on the leading edge of a musical trend that‘s made the resonator guitar, or dobro, one of the fastest-selling instruments in America, thanks to the popularity of artists such as Ben Harper, Corey Harris, Kelly Joe Phelps, Mark Knoffler, Ry Cooder, Dickie Betts, Eric Sardinas, Bonnie Raitt, Rory Block and Keb Mo, to name a few.
Catch Pat at an open mike and you‘ll see the audience light up at his performance, which ranges from the “Aloha-oe“ of Hawaiian sounds to ragtime, bluegrass, jazz and blues.
“It‘s something that‘s unique and happy,“ he says of the dobro. “I try to concentrate on providing a steady, strong rhythm. Even when the situation doesn‘t involve dancing, I try to imagine that there are dancers in the audience to get people tapping thier feet and feeling the beat of what I‘m playing.
“ I concentrate on beat and rhythm rather than content,“ he adds, “because you can always play something pretty and not make much of an impact, but when you play something with a good beat, you can change the mood and make the listeners more animated.“

GETTING TO KNOW THE DOBRO
Ivory says the resonator got its start early in the 20th century when the National Guitar Company developed a steel-bodied guitar with a metal cone shaped like a perforated pie pan. It literally resonated with a louder sound.
“It was a guitar designed to be played with swing bands and was meant to be loud enough to compete with horns,“ he says of the pre-amplified era. “The company claimed that their resonators were seven times louder than regular guitars, which definitely isn‘t true.“
Two Czech guitar-making brothers split off from the National Guitar firm to launch the Dobro Company, creating resonator guitars of their own design. The word dobro is said to be a Czech word for “well-being.“
The Dobro Company made their resonators with wood bodies, giving them a warmer sound. Somehow, the guitars gained popularity with Hawaiian musicians who developed the signature languid sounds of the so-called “Hawaiian guitar.“ The dobro also caught fire with a bluegrass artist named Brother Oswald and has been a mainstay of the genre ever since. Meanwhile, Ivory says, National‘s steel guitar was a hit with bluesmen early on. Many titans of the early blues made their mark with slide guitar sounds, including Son House, Muddy Waters, Robert Johnson and Leadbelly. Jerry Douglas transformed the dobro as a virtuoso lead instrument in the newgrass movement, while Roy Rogers was among the artists who adapted it to western and cowboy tunes.
In modern times, slide guitar has blossomed into a broad range of playing styles, from the electric leads of Led Zeppelin or the Allman Brothers to the folky bluegrass of Nancy Griffith.

PAT‘S BACK PAGES
Ivory fingerpicks his square-neck resonator in the traditional lap style, creating complex instrumental patterns. “It‘s a really efficient way to play the guitar,“ he notes. “The strings are higher off the neck so you can press down with the slide harder to get more tones.“
It looks difficult, but Ivory flings off notes with a breezy abandon, honed perhaps by many hours of playing to the accompaniment of football games -- a passion that springs from genetics, considering that his father once played guard with the Detroit Lions.
And, if the happy sounds of the dobro are indeed infectious, Ivory manages to capture the instrument‘s spirit with his own sunny personality, which is especially enthusiastic about all things musical. “I like all kinds of music and I‘ve worked in a lot of record stores,“ he notes. “When I was a kid, I went to the record store every day and always wanted to be a participant in the music scene. I always liked being involved in what was going on.“
Born in Detroit, Ivory began playing the guitar at the age of 16, hanging around the Music, Strings & Things shop on Woodward Avenue in Birmingham where he was raised.
Music was to cast a life-long spell. “I liked Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young and Poco and all that kind of stuff and we‘d listen to alternative radio like ABX and I wanted to be part of that world,“ he recalls. “I gravitated to folk pretty early.“
An impetus toward acoustic music was the first concert he ever attended, where Arlo Guthrie performed on banjo, guitar and piano. Ivory also worked for a time for a local guitar-maker at Franklin Guitars, picking up some country blues and fingerpicking styles.
He did a stint as a student at the experimental Thomas Jefferson College in Grand Rapids, but when he started sinking roots in the stodgey, conservative town, he abruptly moved to Traverse City.
“I moved here in 1980 because I was afraid if I didn‘t leave Grand Rapids, I was going to end up living there the rest of my life,“ he says. “I remember when I first came to Traverse City at eight-years-old, I had a feeling of destiny that I‘d live here someday.“

MUSICAL COMMUNITY
Through the years, Ivory has become deeply involved in Northern Michigan‘s musical community, picking up the dobro early on and hanging close to the music scene in all its manifestations.
“The turning point for me was meeting some guys in a band called Roadkill Stew and asking if I could play with them,“ he says. “They said they didn‘t need a guitar player, so I thought that maybe if I got a dobro they‘d let me play.“ He traded some work for his first dobro from Mr. Gig‘s in Traverse City and has been performing on the instrument for more than 10 years now.
Today, Ivory performs both solo and with numerous acoustic musicians. He plays a western swing set of honky-tonk and cowboy tunes with Mark Camp of The Dopes; joined occasionally by mandolinist Don Julin as the Farm & Orchard Time band. Ivory also performs with songwriter Nick Talantis at Poppycock‘s in Traverse City. He‘s also done gigs or recordings with local musicians such as Bill Wagner, Robin Lee Berry, Kirby, and Benny Bowmaster to name a few. In addition to the dobro, he also performs on standard acoustic guitar and banjo, playing everything from jazz to bluegrass. In the process, he‘s become that rare commodity, a “musician‘s musician,“ in demand from performers at the top of their game.
“I‘ve met all of these people through playing the guitar and they‘ve all become good friends, so the music doesn‘t matter so much to me as the friendships,“ he notes. “It‘s a good way to get out and meet people and it‘s the kind of life I‘ve always wanted to live.“

Pat Ivory performs with Mark Camp as Farm & Orchard Time on Thursday, Feb. 19 at the Loading Dock in TC. He‘s available for gigs at resophonic@hotmail.com.