A Musical Odyssey
Monica Taylor’s vision for A Red Dirt Ramble is not just a collection of songs but a heartfelt tribute to the godfathers of Red Dirt. With a female's perspective and deep friendships in the music community, she shares a unique connection that goes beyond the chords and lyrics.
Along with her husband, music partner, and producer Travis Fite, this project has been given the attention that the music deserves. Fite has performed with many of the artists and songwriters featured on these albums over the last 20 years. Since 2013, he has also produced the sound and filming of the Cimarron Breeze Concert series in Perkins, OK inside the Old Church. He and his wife began the series to bring top tier, national touring songwriters and bands in to the beautiful old 1892 Methodist Church that sits not far from the banks of the Cimarron river. With the excellent sound and lighting, and a wonderful team of volunteers, the Cimarron Breeze concerts www.cimarronbreeze.comhave garnered an excellent reputation for performances across the country.
As an incredible multi-instrumentalist and vocalist himself, the listener will find that every song showcases his own talents, AND his ability to bring out the best performances of the other musicians on the Red Dirt Ramble recordings.
This is their way of sharing the Red Dirt legacy with the world, starting with Volume One and Volume Two… and eventually Volume 3
Monica Taylor Fite, given the nickname The Cimarron Songbird by Jimmy Lafave and Bob Childers, had a dream to pay homage to those Stillwater area musicians who nurtured her own songwriting and love for music when she was 19 years old. In the early days the music made there in north central Oklahoma was known as the Stillwater Sound. Eventually a new name drifted through the county, Red Dirt music.
That name stuck, especially for the younger generations like Taylor and many of her friends, Tom Skinner, Greg Jacobs, Randy Pease, Don Morris, Gene Williams, Mark Lyons, the Red Dirt Rangers, Randy Crouch, Chuck Dunlap, The Medicine Show, The Great Divide Band, Mike McClure, Cross Canadian Ragweed (Cody Canada,) Jason Boland & The Stragglers, Stoney Larue, Brandon Jenkins, Kurt Nielsen, and so many more Stillwater-based musicians and songwriters who were ‘there’ from the late 1970’s through early 2000’s till now. Monica lended harmony or duet vocals to all of these ‘RedDirt’ family members’ albums and their shows from her very first days in the family.
The phrase ‘Red Dirt music’ was actually around the area in the early 70’s when Steve Ripley (The Tractors, Bob Dylan, Leon Russell fame) started a record label he called Red Dirt Records. It described the color of the soil in our area of Oklahoma: red clay. The red dirt will stain your knees and hands … in gets into your soul, too. Steve, Bob Childers, Jimmy Lafave, and Tom Skinner, and Brad Piccolo, John Cooper, Ben Han, and Bob Wiles - The Red Dirt Rangers- were longtime friends and so we honor them all in this project, along with SO many more Stillwater and Oklahoma based musicians!
To this day, this very large family of songwriters and band members are Taylor’s dear friends and collaborators on albums such as this multi-album recording project, A Red Dirt Ramble: Tribute to the Pioneers of Red Dirt Music.
Join her in paying tribute by becoming a Patron or a Sponsor. 40 years of heartfelt music written, memories, and the talented musicians will be honored in this project!
Click on the Video that Taylor and her husband and Co-Producer, engineer, and multi-instrumentalist musician on this project, Travis Fite, put together to give you a really nice ‘walk down memory lane’ with history of the Red Dirt scene… and a listen to each song on Volume 1.
Travis similarly was surrounded by a variety of musical styles in his youth. Blues, Jazz early east coast R&B and outlaw country were some of the sounds coming from the record player. Leo Kottke, once a resident of Muskogee in his youth, was a friend of Travis’ father. It was not uncommon for Leo to “drop in” during the 1970’s while he was touring the country to spend an entire night playing acoustic music to a small group of friends sitting cross legged on the floor in the the Fite’s residence. “Leo would just show up and usually play all night long,” says Fite, “just a free-flow of his best solo material. That was the first time I heard someone play slide guitar in person, when I was about 6 or 7. I remember his frenetic blues-folk slide sound resonating with me at a very early age.”
In 2009, Monica enlisted the help of producer and multi-instrumentalist, Jared Tyler, to help record a new solo album. At that time, Travis and Jared were partners in SoulTree recording Studio in Tulsa. Monica’s album “Cotton Shirt” was cut and mixed over a couple of months, with the help of Tyler and Fite. Later Travis would be enlisted as the sound engineer for Monica’s own concert series, The Cimarron Breeze in Perkins OK, and various other live concerts hosted around the state. “That’s where our relationship was born,” says Fite “the sincerity, love and very intimate power of live music.” And although Music was what brought Monica and Travis together, it was Love that formed the lasting union. Travis and Monica were married in the Spring of 2021 and since that time they have forged a musical union to bridge their diverse styles and talents. They are each members of the Cherokee nation and so their wedding was a traditional Cherokee ceremony. Blending Blues forms with traditional bluegrass and folk music, the Duo have come to develop a unique sound that was born in the desire to share the gift of live music and the richness of American song.
Over the last few years, (during the pandemic), the couple have recorded Monica’s new solo album “Train, Rivers, and Trails” and 50 plus songs for a compilation known as the “A Red Dirt Ramble,”a multi-volume compilation highlighting the formative years (mid 80’s-late 90’s) of the Red Dirt movement. The phenomenon of “Red Dirt” began at the “Farm” a songwriter’s commune on the outskirts of Stillwater, Oklahoma in the mid 1980’s. Taylor just happened to be part of that early group of fledgling songwriters who all gathered at the farm to study songwriting and live the creative life as practitioners of song-craft. Under the tutelage of the Bob Childers and Jimmy Lafave, known as The Godfather’s of Red Dirt Music, many up and coming songwriters joined the group and learned to hone their skills. Garth Brooks was one of these “up and coming” writer/performers who took inspiration from the fathers of Red Dirt. Now the Red Dirt scene is recognized throughout the United States as a legitimate regional music form that is now promoted all over the world. The Farm’s spirit continues to fulfill its mission to hold song-writing to the highest possible standard in a pop music culture of lowering expectations and artistic homogeneity.