Here is a brief history of The Pretty Shaky String Band based on interviews done by Steve Rohs and Dave Langdon. Written by Steve. We welcome your comments and additions.
In the summer and fall of 1976, a group of old-time musicians from East Lansing and its environs began to call themselves the Pretty Shaky String Band. The name, as some of the first members have recalled, was conceived during an informal gathering of devotees of the music. Several worked for Elderly Instruments, the family-owned music store established in 1972 on Grand River Avenue in East Lansing across from Michigan State University. Even in the early years in 1972 and 1973, the staff at Elderly had begun to join other friends in old-time music jams in homes and in public venues around the city. By the middle of the decade, one of the most common meeting places was Frank Youngman’s porch, near Valley Court Park. The story goes that after what one person remembers as a “hilarious and awkward” rendition of one of the fiddle tunes that would form the group’s repertoire, Elderly’s owner Stan Werbin opined that the playing was “pretty shaky.” When members of the informal group were asked in the summer of 1976 to play for a wedding, and later benefits for presidential candidate Eugene McCarthy and Michigan’s “bottle bill,”, they chose the name that emerged from those get-togethers. The Pretty Shaky String Band was born.
While many of the first Shakys were inspired to learn and play because a revival of old-time music had developed in the previous decades, the Pretty Shaky String Band was not imagined as band as much as it was an inclusive music jam intended to help newcomers learn tunes and more accomplished musicians to hone their craft. What had been occasional gatherings began to evolve into weekly Wednesday night rendezvous, and when the Michigan winters drove players inside, the group needed to find a larger venue to hold the growing contingent of fiddlers, guitarists, banjo players and other myriad musical talents. Described by one of the original Shakys as being “a wide range of people from the local community, from MSU students and faculty to local business owners and workers, to GM and State workers and more,” the members of the Pretty Shaky String Band sought a spot that could accommodate all. When the space at the old Urban Options house on Linden Street was offered, the Shakys found a more permanent home. By the early 1980s, the group was meeting regularly at the Urban Options house, and honing an approach to old-time jamming that became its calling card. When newcomers would hear the often-repeated phrase “once a Shaky, always a Shaky,” they would begin to learn that an ethos of inclusiveness and friendliness accompanied the playing of tunes. What was important was that, regardless of experience or ability, all were given opportunities to “call” their own tunes, and that advice, encouragement, and mentorship in playing old-time music were provided free by more experienced musicians who had themselves learned from others in the group. Tunes and traditions were passed down from one Shaky to another, and as the years went on, a number of talented musicians grew out of the jam at the house on Linden Street. Some like Joel Mabus, Ray Kamalay, Marcy Marxer, Sally Rogers, Wanda Degan, Kitty Donohoe and others went on to musical recording careers. Others like the Lost World String Band and the Top Drawer String Band became performers, often in demand at dances hosted by the Ten Pound Fiddle and Looking Glass Music & Arts Association. In fact, the Pretty Shaky String Band has, over the years, witnessed the genesis of many musical groups, including Hardtack and Pig’s Feet, The Ragtime Annies, Lady of the Lake, The Scarlet Runner String Band, The Four Hand String Band, The Bosom Buddies String Band, Edna’s Stretch Limo, Pints of Light, Big Al and the Offenders, Asking for Trouble, the Acousticats, the Java Junkies, the Banjo Tramps, The Deadly String Band and Denning & Johnson, among others.
The group has witnessed many members leave as they pursued life experiences elsewhere in the world, but their numbers have been replenished by subsequent waves of newcomers and musical hobbyists. When the first Urban Options house closed, the Shakys followed that organization to its new address on Grove Street, and in later years have moved its Wednesday night jam to the People’s Church in East Lansing. As new generations of Shakys have grown in the music, the group created its own website (https://theprettyshakystringband.com/) and Facebook page (https://www.facebook.com/groups/122921997921/), using those digital sources to pass on the musical tradition. And the group continues to make its music public. Following in the footsteps of the earliest Shakys in 1976, the group has brought old-time music to audiences at the East Lansing Art Fair, the Turner-Dodge House, the Woldumar Nature Center, the Okemos Rehabilitation Center, Meridian and East Lansing farm markets, and other locales, often for little or no compensation. Some members of the original generation of Shakys continue to lead the group and preserve the tradition of playing old-time string band music, including Hanno Meingast, Brian Bishop, and especially Mike Ross and Dave Langdon, who still regularly attend the Wednesday jams, providing guidance, encouragement, and their deep knowledge of the old-time repertoire.
I worked at Elderly late summer and early fall when this was coming together. An amazing time! There was talk about a band possibly forming within the Elderly ranks, this became the Lost World String Band. You could buy a krummhorn or a vintage Martin guitar. Carry Potter over there talking with Sally Rogers. Brian Bishop playing his new old fiddle in the showroom. Joel Mabus and Frank Youngman ever present. I don’t know how they balanced academics and their love for this music and friends.
- 9/7/26 Brief History
The Pretty Shaky String Band 