Charlie Torch: “Red Rocking Chair”
Peghead Nation fiddle instructor Chad Manning plays a traditional song with his band that includes siblings Jasper and Jayda Manning, Tyler Stengall, and Mark Schatz.
Chad Manning started teaching on Peghead Nation when we launched 10 years ago this fall and has been a student favorite since day one. He is a genre-spanning fiddler who has performed and recorded with the David Grisman Sextet, the David Grisman Bluegrass Experience, Laurie Lewis and the Right Hands, Peter Rowan, the California Bluegrass Reunion, and many other household names in the roots community. In addition to his Peghead Nation courses, Chad teaches scores of in-person students from Manning Music, the Berkeley, California teaching studio he runs with his wife, Catherine.
One of Chad’s recent musical projects is the band Charlie Torch, which brings together Chad’s son Jasper Manning on mandolin and Jayna Manning on guitar., along with Tyler Stegall, a versatile and sought-after player in the Bay Area on banjo. And on bass, Charlie Torch includes two alternating powerhouses: 2-time IBMA bass player of the year Mark Schatz, known for his work with Tony Rice, Béla Fleck, and Nickel Creek, to name a few, and Grammy-nominated Paul Knight, a regular with Ramblin’ Jack Elliott and Peter Rowan. In this video, Charlie Torch plays the traditional classic “Red Rocking Chair.” You can catch the band at their gigs in California and beyond.
And we are kind of a big musical family at Peghead Nation – this video was shot at Gentilly in San Francisco, a New Orleans-themed restaurant and bar that is co-owned by Alexis Hyatt, a long-time student of Chad’s, and the fiddler in Minus Mary, a band with Peghead Nation President Dan Gabel.
Video by Bria Light, sound by Korey Kassir.
Learn fiddle with Chad Manning in his Beginning Bluegrass and Old-Time Fiddle, Intermediate Bluegrass and Old-Time Fiddle, and Advanced Bluegrass Fiddle courses, as well as Theory for Mandolin and Fiddle and Western Swing Fiddle.
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