Cedric Rainwater was the stage name of Howard Watts (1913 to 1970), the bass player in the first true bluegrass band. He played bass in Bill Monroe’s Blue Grass Boys in the 1940s, including the 1946 lineup with Lester Flatt, Earl Scruggs, and Chubby Wise. In 1948 he left with Flatt and Scruggs and became a charter member of the Foggy Mountain Boys. He entered the International Bluegrass Music Hall of Fame in 2007.
Why Rainwater matters
Every bluegrass bass player stands on the floor Rainwater built. He played on the records that defined the music, and he did it with a steady pulse that let the pickers fly. The Bluegrass Music Hall of Fame credits him as the first bass player to walk the bass, four notes to the measure, from the start of a song to the end.
Life and career
Watts was born on February 19, 1913, in Monticello, Florida. He started out in the 1930s as a singer and guitar player in Florida bands. In Jacksonville he met fiddler Chubby Wise, who became his friend.
He moved to Nashville in 1941 and played guitar in a western swing band, where he took up the bass fiddle. With help from Wise, he joined Bill Monroe’s Blue Grass Boys on bass. He held the job off and on for about five years. In the band he played a comic character named Cedric Rainwater, and the name stuck.
His first records with Monroe came in February 1945, in Chicago, for Columbia. In September 1946 he recorded with the classic lineup: Monroe on mandolin, Flatt on guitar, Scruggs on banjo, and Wise on fiddle. In the spring of 1948, Flatt and Scruggs left Monroe and formed the Foggy Mountain Boys. Watts went with them as a charter member and played on their first four Mercury sessions, which included Foggy Mountain Breakdown.
He later toured with Hank Williams and the Drifting Cowboys and worked as a Nashville bass player for many country stars. He died of a heart attack in Nashville on January 21, 1970.
Playing style
Watts came to bluegrass from western swing, and he brought the walking bass with him. On about half the songs at his first Monroe session, he walked a quick four beats to the bar. Rocky Road Blues and Blue Grass Special are two of them. On the 1946 sessions he walked through songs such as Heavy Traffic Ahead and Blue Yodel No. 4.
Historian Tom Ewing described his time as a reference point for the whole band. The pickers never had to wonder where the beat was. He also sang. He added baritone and bass parts to Monroe’s gospel quartets.
Influences and legacy
Watts learned the bass in a western swing band, and swing shaped his walking lines. He played beside Bill Monroe, Lester Flatt, Earl Scruggs, and Chubby Wise on the records every bluegrass band still learns from. Jake Tullock held the Flatt and Scruggs bass job after him, and George Shuffler took walking bass to the Stanley Brothers.
Signature tunes and songs
Blue Grass Special Rocky Road Blues Heavy Traffic Ahead Foggy Mountain Breakdown Remember the Cross, which he wrote with his wife, Alice.
Essential recordings
Bill Monroe and the Blue Grass Boys, Columbia sessions (1945 to 1947) Lester Flatt, Earl Scruggs and the Foggy Mountain Boys, first Mercury sessions (1948 to 1950)
Awards and honors
International Bluegrass Music Hall of Fame (2007)
What to learn from Rainwater
Learn the bass part to Blue Grass Special or Foggy Mountain Breakdown. Play the root and fifth first, then fill the space between chord changes with a walk: four quarter notes that step up or down to the next root. Keep every note the same length and volume. That even walk is what freed the 1946 band to play fast, and it is still the core of bluegrass bass.
Sources
Howard Staton “Cedric Rainwater” Watts, Bluegrass Music Hall of Fame and Museum Blue Grass Boys, Wikipedia List of Foggy Mountain Boys members, Wikipedia Awards by Category, IBMA
Related players
See the bass players hub and the bass guide. Jake Tullock and Bessie Lee Mauldin held the bass chairs in the Flatt and Scruggs and Monroe bands after him. George Shuffler carried the walking bass to the Stanley Brothers.