Debuting at The Deck on Saturday evening is a new musical project headed by Marianna Hensley, joined by Gaby Courroux and Greg Beshers: Lee County Ramblers. LengPleng sat down with Marianna to dig into the roots and follow along the branches of this musical family tree.
LP: Lee County sounds very specific.
Marianna: It’s a real place in the southern Appalachian mountains, where I was born and raised – Lee County, Virginia,. I don’t expect anyone to know anything about Lee County, but for me it’s very evocative of the music that’s rooted in that part of the country. I grew up 35 minutes from Carter Family Fold, and an hour from Bristol, where the Bristol sessions saw the Carter Family and Jimmy Rodgers recording within 24 hours of each other. Over the hill is Dolly Parton in Tennessee, Chet Atkins in Knoxville. And then there’s Cousin Doctor Ralph Stanley also from southwest Virginia, the Clinch Mountain area. It’s a birthplace of country music, a very rich tradition.
LP: But we’re not talking about latter day full-on country music here – the common associations are Nashville, maybe the outlaw movement – this is earlier on the family tree?
Marianna: I don’t think people’s first thought when they hear us will be: this is country music. It’s a patchwork quilt. There are common musical roots, but where the various branches go is different. We certainly have a couple of songs that would be more solidly country. And we include a handful of traditional bluegrass tunes, with Gaby singing lead on most of those – Carter Family, Tony Rice, Ricky Skaggs. But that’s really just the toehold of what we’re doing. There’s a lot more newgrass, a touch of blues, styles that I think of as more rootsy Americana, all brushing up against and growing from various folk traditions.
LP: Where are you sourcing the material from?
Marianna: We are bringing in some of the repertoire from Grass Snake Revival. Gaby and I have proposed the majority of the songs, and Greg keeps us honest in terms of: “Marianna, do we really need another obscure ballad? Let’s put something in that people will recognise?” I call Greg the ballast, both in terms of what he brings to the performance but also the sensibility around the evolution of the repertoire. We’ve got a Beatles song in a bluegrass-like arrangement. There are a few songs that will be unexpected because they are associated with another genre.
I have to give huge credit and thanks to Gaby, actually. He reached out to me in the middle of last year, just before I was headed out of the country for a few months. He said, “Let’s just book a gig and do something.” It wasn’t until that last-minute, thrown-together gig that I realised that we can do this, we can just start as two people and see where this goes.
Bless his French soul, Gaby loves this music too, and has a great taste and flair for it. His mandolin-playing friend Felix Masson visited last November and I joined their gig, as the Malo Brothers, at The Vine. We asked Greg to sit in with us on bass for the second half. One of my big hesitations about returning to this particular music had been what to do about bass. The purist in me was wanting a double bass player, but that is easier said than done. But with that November gig I really felt, oh! I can let go of my pure acoustic ideals for this kind of project. And it’s fine to have an electric bass. It really does fill out the sound.
The extended Malo Brothers at The Vine, 16 November 2025
LP: Harmony singing is such a big part of this music.
Marianna: Yes indeed! Definitely multi-part harmonies. We’re still growing into the repertoire and learning a lot of things. Harmonies are something that we’ll continue to flesh out more and more over time. Harmony singing is my happy place and comes most naturally to me–even more naturally than singing lead. Yet, ironically, I’m doing less harmony singing and more lead vocals with the Ramblers at this stage. We’re all finding our way.
LP: The logo – I believe that’s the shape of Lee County while it looks like a mountain?
Marianna: Exactly. I sketched it out by hand. I really wanted to use the image of Lee County in the logo. So what to most eyes would appear to be a mountain with three little figures walking up it, that’s actually a map of Lee County we’re traversing. It’s the little things, the hidden things, like that that make me smile.
LP: Is there much music that people will recognise?
Marianna: That depends on the people. We’ve got some Dolly Parton and the re-imagined Beatles song…
LP: Is the O Brother Where Art Thou soundtrack a useful touchstone?
Marianna: I would say it’s adjacent to that; the more traditional bluegrass songs we’ve got are very much from that spirit. I adore Rhiannon Giddens and anything that she does, so we’ve got some of her solo tunes, plus some by the Carolina Chocolate Drops. For folks in the know, we’ve got some Molly Tuttle, Gillian Welch & David Rawlings. I promise there are a few more songs that people will recognise! Prepare to be surprised–and to be introduced to some beautiful songs you might not have ever heard before. Simple melodies. Sweet lyrics–or horrible lyrics! I like beautiful melodies telling me terrible things – that’s mountain music. I have insisted on one murder ballad for Saturday – there are others on my list but I’ve been encouraged to restrain myself (for now!).
Expose yourself to a murder ballad and much more at The Deck on Saturday 4 April with Lee County Ramblers from 6 pm.