Remembering an old friend: On Cinco de Mayo of 2021, Brown County lost one of her finest and most prolific musicians, Slats Klug. A long-time resident of Brown County, Slats was a consummate musician equally at home in folk, bluegrass, rock, blues and jazz, and a dedicated multi-instrumentalist, adept on all manner of keys (including piano, organ, accordion and synth), guitar, squeezebox, harmonica… and probably a few others I don’t know about.
Everyone hereabouts knew Slats, and to know him was to know his music and to respect his enormous talent. He is sadly missed.
There will no doubt be many heartfelt memorials and testaments to Slats in the days ahead by folks who were closer to the man than I was. I’ll try to update this post with links to the best ones I run across.
Slats Klug was a beloved musical fixture in the constantly-evolving Brown County scene for decades — and some might say essential to keeping local music alive and well during the early 2000s. He was an easy-going fellow in my experience, soft-spoken and humble, warm-hearted and generous of spirit.
For several years he released one Brown County-centric album after another, bringing together many of the county’s best players to create uniquely down-home collages of original and traditional tunes that were eagerly anticipated by the residents and tourists of Brown County.
I had several opportunities to work with Slats over the years. He tapped me to play 5-string banjo on a couple of his CDs, and he lent his formidable talents to a few of my own recording projects. For instance, he tossed a deliciously swampy B3 organ part on Bobbie Jane Lancaster’s tune Fast Car (from On With The Show by Stella & Jane feat. Jeff Foster):
And his multi-instrumental contributions were central to achieving David Bartlett’s euro-inspired vision for his tune, Paris Hotel (from Lead Your Life By a Song by David Bartlett):
On Paris Hotel Slats had laid down three perfectly good tracks (harmonica, squeezebox and accordion) in one session. But later in the week I got a call from Slats, saying he wanted to come back in to redo his accordion track: “You don’t have to pay me, man… I just just know I can do it better”. At the time, that seemed a bit hard to believe, as both Bartlett and I were thrilled by what Slats had created in only one three-hour session.
But sure enough, his new accordion track elevated the entire feel of the tune, particularly in the instrumental bridge with his slowly ascending, languorously melancholy chording, creating an impressionistic sound-painting that made you almost see with your ears the rain on the window pane mentioned in Bart’s final verse:
And in that Paris Hotel
I wrote your name upon the window pane
And through the sun and the rain
Between the pleasure and the pain
Only your name still remains
In your case, Slats, much more than just your unique name remains. Your music is part of Brown County’s rich musical history now, and we all love you for what you gave us. Rest in peace, buddy.
