Dobrofest 1999 were performances to honor the 70th anniversary of the creation of the Dobro, a musical instrument patented by the firm of Dopyera Brothers. I doubt that the name of this instrument needs any further explaination. This festival has grown to international distinction and outshines almost every other Slovak festival, especially with the active participation of stars from other countries.
Dobrofest a huge musical marathon stretched a full six days from the 24th of August through the 29th of August. If you wanted to catch everything, you'd need three things: a week's free time, a good car and nerves of steel.  You'd almost need to clone yourself to hear all 180 musical acts! Since I only had two days, I caught the two main events on Friday and Saturday in DKO Tirnavia (culture house).
The International Dobrofest Tranava '99 started officially at 19:00 hours on Friday night and ended sometime in the early morning hours. As is the custom musicians who normally play in the horizontal position changed places with those who play in the vertical position.  A tradition of Dobrofest since its conception.
Lionel Wendling and the Honky Cats from France opened the evening.   The Cats were a real surprise. The band had an authentic country flavor and the audience appreciated their excellent steelguitarist, who fired up the crowd with some genuine country rock slide.
Blues musician Dave Peabody (GB) was no a greenhorn to  Dobrofest. He brought his Australian friend with him this time, who played with him at concerts through England and Scotland this year. Of course, blues fans were in their element with the likes of Mike Dowling (USA) and Pepe Ahlqvist Delta Blues Quartet (Finland) who both have a similar sound. Mike Dowling is well-known for his multistyle talents. Besides the blues he plays great bluegrass, country, jazz and so on. I, myself, preferred the sound of the Pepe Ahlqvist Delta Blues Quartet's set.  This particular group was created by the combination of two teachers Pepe Ahlqvist - mouth harmonica, Jarrka Rissanen - resophinic guitar) and their students (Juha Kartano - mouth harmonica, Jonne Kulluvaara - resophonic guitar). At the end of last year they joined together into this one Quartet. Both harmonica virtuosos blew me, as well as many in the audience away.
Of the "horizontal" Dobro players LeRoy Mac (LeRoy McNees) is the one who really surprised me. At sixty years old this musician exhibited unbelievable vitality, and his choice of an accompanying band was an eye-opener. Mac played along with the Slovak band "Blueland" and I must say that the guys sounded like the real thing.  If you weren't watching you'd think it was Flatt and Scruggs themselves on stage.  It just goes to show that these days Slovakia is producing top notch bluegrass pickers.
Next came American Dobro player Roger Williams, who had no other musicians with him; but he found out two great pickers in the Czech Repubic to do some concerts with him.  Williams is like a little big man. Little in his height but big in his playing. The material they played left me with a good impression.
From Germany came a band named Shady Mix with their lead vocalist Wil Maring. The group is an American-German association and won the prize Band of the Year in 1997 and 1998. Maring proved her songwriting abilities as the band played a brand of progressive bluegrass, which was amplified by her vocals.
Next was the Slovak bluegrass band "Fragment".  What can I say about this band that could possibly give you an idea of how good they are.  Even with a sound problem they played like true professionals. Most of the songs they played were from their new CD "One of These Days", and I naturally bought it and highly recommend it to you.  Interestingly enough this band has had to fight for time in the USA and now are invited after someone heard this CD.
Saturday's show was headlined by Allan Mikusek with his AM Band.  Allan once again confirmed that he is number one on the Slovak country music scene.  He said that after a long time on the road Dobrofest gave him a chance to play in his homeland. One thing that annoys me about his music is that his lyrics seem to be written for teenage girls.  The music itself is lively and wonderful to hear.
I'll conclude by discussing the star of both nights - Jerry Douglas.  Jerry along with Bob Brozman, Peter Szabados, Tut Taylor, Curtis Burch and Rob Ickes, won the John Dopyera Prize. Jerry did a show at Dobrfest in 1996 but it was with Peter Rowan.  This time he came with his own group of musicians, including  Bryan Sutton, a hot young guitarist from Ricky Scagg's Kentucky Thunder, and an electric upright bassist Byron House.  House's unusual electric upright looked much like a pencil with strings.  He is well known as a studio and stage musician supporting the likes of Emnylou Harris and Dolly Parton. Their show was a delight for the ears and eyes. The band members command of the stage was confirmed when Bryon Sutton broke a string and had to go change it off stage leaving Jerry and Byron to stupefy the audience with some pretty unbelievable imporvisations; and as Bryon came back on stage, they continued to play as if nothing had happened. Bryan a short time later received more applause than Jerry, when he played his solo with perfect precision, it was a clean blistering instrumental.  Of this I am sure , this will not be Jerry Douglas' last appearance on the Trnava stage. I think he was truly touched when the audience gave him a standing ovation and believe me he earned it honestly.
My wish for this festival is that it would set its sights to attrack a higher calibur of musician and name bands so that stars like Douglas' will be excited to accept an invitation to play at Dobrofest.

Bruno "Bigfoot" Zvolensky
with Denise M. Smith