Don Stover
at Home, Billerica, Massachusetts, 1973

Stover was a bluegrass banjo picker from White Oak, West Virginia. He came to Boston in 1952 with the Lilly Brothers from nearby Beckley and they played together for over twenty years at Boston's Hillbilly Ranch and other venues. As the first bluegrass banjo player of note in the area, he had immeasurable impact on a generation of important young pickers Bill Keith, who popularized chromatic scales in bluegrass as a member of Bill Monroe's band, and Bela Fleck, a bluegrass and jazz-fusion star. This photograph was the cover of Stover's first LP for the fledgling Rounder record label.