Earl Scruggs has left this world. Called by some the “Prometheus of the Banjo,” he was a musical hero to many of us. He’s credited with popularizing a style of picking (3-finger) that “super-charged” the banjo style.

Tunes that our pepper our musical landscape today pay tribute to his and fiddler Lester Flatt’s career, particularly the landmark recording Foggy Mountain Breakdown (1949). It became a super hit when used in the 1967 movie Bonnie and Clyde. For people across the world, this tune characterizes the Bluegrass banjo sound.

But note this information from an obituary at CNN today:

Scruggs was born in 1924 to a musically gifted family in rural Cleveland County, North Carolina. . . . His father, a farmer and a bookkeeper, played the fiddle and banjo, his mother was an organist and his older siblings played guitar and banjo, as well.

I fall into a nostalgia trap. My rose-colored trifocals recall with too much fondness the way life used to work. But life was better when most people in a family could play a musical instrument. Life was richer when singing together as a family and community was a regular part of daily life. When playing music is routine, talent blossoms naturally. A child growing up at the elbow of a music-making relative usually picks it up easily.

Not everyone will be a prodigy, as Scruggs was. Not every child will get the support necessary. But the path to accomplishment and musical fulfillment is wide when music is part of the daily language of life.

Pushing a button on an iPod teaches a child nothing, except how to push a button. Oh, wait! It also reinforces the experience of receiving an out-of-proportion award for no effort.

I remember when MP3 players were new. A smart, highly accomplished student came running to me, brandishing his powerful small player. “Guess what, Dr. Reynolds? I’ve downloaded all of Beethoven’s music.” I was stunned. My first question was, “how do you know you have all of his music?” There are hundreds of pieces Beethoven never published (known as W.o.O. works or Werke ohne Opuszahl). It’s taken a long time for the worthy pieces to get recorded. What source or music service boasted that it offered you all of them?

But the second question was more serious. “What in the world are you going to do with ‘all’ of Beethoven’s music?” Are there enough hours in life to listen to every note the man wrote? What joy or inspiration would come from hitting the start button and plowing through it?

To be fair, the student was justifiably thrilled with his new technology and its potential. He was on the cutting edge of a movement that has literally changed our world since then. And he gave me a good story to use.

Earl Scruggs didn’t have all of anybody’s music. He grew up hearing the music his ma and pa played. He learned from the people down the road, from his siblings, and from music at church. He had sufficient tunes in his head to inspire him. And he used the music he knew to develop a playing style that distinguished him for decades to come.

Learning to pick chords on a mandolin, ukulele, banjo, or guitar is worth gold in a child’s education.  Increasing the “gig” capacity on a student’s iPod? Well, you tell me.