Vernon McIntyre's Appalachian Grass

Vernon McIntyre’s APPALACHIAN GRASS is a bluegrass band with style. The band delivers an entertaining stage show with driving instrumentals, close knit harmonies, amusing novelty songs, and a show stopping trick fiddling act. The combination of music, energy, showmanship, and humor just can’t be beat.

Vernon McIntyre’s professional career began in age 15 as the banjo player for Earl Taylor and the Stoney Mountain Boys. Over the years, Vernon has been an active performer and recording artist, both as a banjo player and as vocalist/rhythm guitar player. He was a founding member of the Bluegrass Pardners of Wheeling Jamboree fame. His banjo work with the Easterners was outstanding. He has played with the greats of bluegrass such as Jimmy Martin, Earl Taylor, Jim McCall, Scott Stoneman, James Monroe, and Walter Hensley. Today, Vernon’s guitar work drives the Appalachian Grass sound and his entertaining emcee work complements the band’s energetic stage presence.

Raised in the Cincinnati area with a background of classical music, Appalachian Grass' fiddler, Kitty McIntyre, played in the school orchestra and the Cincinnati Youth Symphony through high school, but then put her fiddle in the case. Her plans included college and graduate school, not becoming a musician. However, everything changed in the 1980’s when Kitty heard the bluegrass sound. She took her fiddle back out of the case and practiced ’til she could join Cincinnati’s premier bluegrass band, Vernon McIntyre’s Appalachian Grass. She has been touring with the band ever since.

By day, banjoist Robert Campbell is Director of Information Technology for a local software development company. By night, his hard-driving banjo is the backbone of the Appalachian Grass sound. Robert Campbell was born in Cincinnati, OH, grew up right outside of Sharonville, OH. He played guitar in the Princeton Junior High jazz band and periodically plays guitar solos with the Appalachian Grass. At age 16, he began banjo lessons with Vernon McIntyre at Famous Old Time Music Company and has been a dedicated banjoist ever since.

Tammy Powers on upright bass sets the rhythm for Vernon McIntyre’s Appalachian Grass. She was born in Hamilton, Ohio, grew up in Fairfield, Ohio and resides there today. Tammy went to her first bluegrass festival in 1996 and has been hooked ever since. Having some musical background she learned how to play electric bass and then moved onto an upright. Tammy joined the Appalachian Grass playing bass in February of 2003 and has been there ever since.

Mandolin picker, Susan Shook, was born and raised in rural Chesterton, Indiana and now resides in northern Kentucky. She grew up surrounded by musical siblings, all sorts of instruments, and was exposed to all sorts of musical genres from classical to folk to pop. Deciding on a whim to start mandolin lessons in her mid-forties, Susan became entranced by bluegrass music’s toe-tapping rhythm and drive, tight vocal harmonies, melodic and often speed-defying instrumental passages, and how an entire group of pickers builds from and coordinates with other musicians – and their crowd of listeners. As the saying goes, “She’s hooked.”

Jenny Lee joined Vernon McIntyre’s Appalachian Grass in 2018 as a singer and backup rhythm guitarist and has just released her first CD. Jenny Lee was born and raised in Northern Kentucky, and grew up with an eclectic taste in music and an eagerness to learn about all genres. She played clarinet throughout her school years. Her passion for music led her to Ireland where she studied Irish folk music, which influenced her to learn the guitar. After seeing a KET special on Bill Monroe, the father of bluegrass music, her interest in bluegrass was sparked. Her musical heroes are the Osborne Brothers, Ella Fitzgerald, Otis Redding, Paul Williams, Jimmy Martin, Ronnie McCoury, Tony Rice, and The Country Gentlemen.