As much as she loves the traditional bluegrass that has informed her life and music, even singer Rosanne Cash can't resist telling a banjo joke: "What do you call all the banjo players in the world at the bottom of the ocean? A good start."
The daughter of Johnny Cash cracks up, laughing heartily over the phone during a break in her tour. It's not necessarily what one would expect from the host of the upcoming broadcast "PBS Arts From the Blue Ridge Mountains: Give Me the Banjo." But part of the idea behind a new series, "PBS Arts Fall Festival," which begins Friday, is to bring some new zest to the somewhat musty format of public television arts programming.
"The banjo was integral to so much music I loved," says Cash, 56. "It has deep associations with Appalachian bluegrass, and, you know, maybe that's why some people dismiss it, people who are into rock." Although she doesn't play the banjo, she became "obsessed" with the Earl Scruggs Revue at age 19, she says, and went on to sing with the banjo legend, who is featured in "Give Me the Banjo."
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