The Eagle and The Pearl

The Eagle and the Pearl captures a season when music first carried me beyond Columbia. At the time, Sean Canan, Andrew Weir, Wil Reeves, and Danny Carroll were touring together as Bockman's Eupho. When Phil Merker moved to Italy, Danny stepped into Joe Stickley's Blue Print, and before long we found ourselves on the road together. Night after night, Blue Print opened the show before Bockman took the stage, traveling from city to city, playing bars, clubs, and festivals—including High Sierra Music Festival, where Steve Earle and the Bluegrass Dukes headlined.

Those miles changed Blue Print. We came home road-tested, tighter as a band, and full of new ideas. Sean also began sitting in more regularly, bringing his unmistakable electric guitar to songs like "Vandalia Pain." Looking back, I can hear the beginnings of a musical partnership that would eventually become Falling Fences.

I wrote "Traffic in Harmonia" as a thank-you to that season of life and invited Sean to sing one of the verses on the record. More than two decades later, we still play that song together. When I hear The Eagle and the Pearl, I don't just hear the songs—I remember a van full of friends, miles of highway, and the feeling that anything was possible. We had the time of our lives.