Eddie Pennington

NOTE: Eddie does not write down TAB or Notes so this class should plan on video recording his teachings.
Not to be shared.

Students should have an understanding of Alternating Right Hand Thumb work. This class is geared towards Intermediate and Advanced Fingerstylists though Beginners are welcome to attend and see what is in store and grab what they can.

Eddie Pennington is a native of Nortonville, in western Kentucky. His father, a coal miner, played fiddle and exposed him to songs about the hard life of men who labored in the mines. Family members say that Eddie's great-great-grandfather, Edward Alonzo Pennington, was a fiddler who was unfairly convicted of a murder and who played a tune still played today called "Pennington's Farewell" as he sat on his coffin watching the hangman prepare the noose. Pennington didn't follow his dad into the mines but made his living as a funeral director and county coroner. He's now retired.

Nearby Muhlenberg County is known as the birthplace of a complex guitar style called thumb picking. This instrumental technique requires the thumb to keep a regular rolling rhythm while the fingers pick the lead melody. Muhlenberg County was popularized in John Prine's song "Paradise." The county is also associated with guitarist Merle Travis, composer of "Dark as a Dungeon" and "I Am a Pilgrim." Travis, Ike Everly (father of Don and Phil) and Chet Atkins are credited with bringing the thumb-picking style to a national audience.

Pennington began playing the guitar when he was nine. When he was 18, he heard Travis play and decided to devote himself to the thumb-picking style. Pennington also learned thumb picking from his friend Mose Rager of Drakesboro, Kentucky, the guitarist whom Travis credited as a major influence. Merle Travis' brother once said of Pennington, "He plays so much like Merle. If you didn't see them, you wouldn't know who was playing." In performance, Pennington likes to tell humorous stories between songs, tales that often recount the lives and experiences about mining in his western Kentucky homeland. Over the years, he has continued to develop his musical talent, playing both acoustic and arch-top electric guitars, and has won two national championships in his country ragtime style.

Eddie added " Might mention I’ve had some awards in the past national Heritage Fellowship award, Kentucky, governors award and arts, honorary doctorate from Western Kentucky University.    

I have performed at most of the national folk festivals in the past 30 years.

I performed for the Smithsonian institutions festival on the Washington mall. I performed at numerous colleges throughout the country and even perform once at the Kennedy Center.

My town Princeton, Kentucky even held a Pennington festival for 20 years where we had many great artist appear.

I was fortunate enough to live in the same area that Merle Travis came from and got to learns many things from his mentor. Mr. Mose Rager.

My style of playing is in the West Kentucky thumb picking style that is associated as Travis picking.

I have taught that many music camps around the country and I feel like I can pass some of my Travis type thumb picking on the others that desire to learn it. "

‍

‍