Americana Bluegrass Couple Mark and Maggie O’Connor Thrill Fans with Latest Album.

Kicking off their tour, contemporary bluegrass fiddle player Mark O’Connor and his wife, Maggie O’Connor, took the stage with a sold-out performance at the CSI Fine Arts Center in Twin Falls, Idaho. “We started our pre-release gigging,” says the Grammy award-winning couple promoting their new album Life after Life.

 “People in Idaho responded to these new songs they haven’t heard before,” says Mark, excited about the show’s turnout.  “I have to pinch myself that we came up with this recording,” the former Grand Master Fiddle Champion admits. “People are not recording as much anymore. Most people are doing singles or EPs. I can totally see why, because the whole music industry is turned upside down. There are no CD stores anymore.”

Reuniting with the guitar and mandolin, the renowned violinist reminds some of his older fans that he is still a picker.   

  “For a long time, I didn’t play the guitar or mandolin at all,” says Mark, who replaced guitarist Tony Rice in the David Grisman Quintet. “I laid off for twenty years. People might not remember I played these instruments.”

His wife and music partner, violinist/lead singer Maggie O’Connor, says forming the Grammy Award-winning Mark O Connor Band in 2017 helped re-sharpen Mark’s playing. “When we had our [family bluegrass band], we got our feet wet with all these instruments again.” 

“I’m probably playing guitar only because of Maggie’s encouragement,” explains Mark, a two-time national guitar flatpick champion. “It took me months to get my calluses back [laughs]. I still feel like I’m learning every day I pick up the instrument.”

Writing songs during their weekly live stream called Mondays with Mark and Maggie, the couple could experiment in front of a live audience. Maggie recalls, “The pandemic gave us the opportunity to have that extra time for creativity. We did seventy Mondays in a row because we didn’t know how long the pandemic would last. We ran out of our repertoire, fast, and we needed to expand!”  

Mark has a name for their style of music, “We’re building our brand and calling our music Americana Bluegrass,” says the multi-instrumentalist, adding, “We’re tapping into the Americana style, but we are using a lot more poetry in our lyrics.”

 “They are kind of pleasantly surprised,” says Maggie about their fans, “because they didn’t realize we sang.” As a duo, Mark and Maggie are known for virtuosic fiddling. Mark adds, “We sang some on The O’Connor Band stuff. Maggie was singing some lead in that group, and now on this album, she is singing all the lead.”

Talking about some of the highlights on Life after Life, Mark announces, “We do the Stevie Wonder song ‘Love is in Need of Love Today,’ from [his] Songs in the Key of Life album. We turn it into our Americana Bluegrass.” Mark describes the arrangement, “You hear the acoustic guitar, the mandolin and the fiddle, and then all of a sudden, these strings come in.”

Maggie includes the Dolly Parton song Wildflowers. “I really liked the song and the fiddling on it,” adding that she was surprised to discover Mark played on the original.  “That was back in 1987 on the trio album,” remembers Mark, “All these years later, we are looking for a few songs to sing by greats like Dolly Parton, and Maggie landed up on ‘Wildflowers.’” Maggie shares that she loves the song’s message. “It’s such an empowering song for women.”

Although Mark’s collaborations with country stars Vince Gill, Ricky Skaggs, and Steve Wariner on the hit song ‘Restless,’ along with Nashville sessions work, placed him at the center of Music City, it was a new musical idea that opened the next chapter of his life.

Mark explains, “I wanted to expand my horizons and had the musical talent to explore new environments, so I started writing concertos and full-length symphonies. What was great is the Nashville Symphony embraced it.” The former Nashville sessions player describes the situation: “Here I am, a bluegrass and country type fiddler, and I’m coming up with pieces like the ‘Fiddle Concerto.’ They ended up premiering my next three or four major pieces.”

Maggie shares that starting as a musician, she was inspired by Mark’s work with cellist Yo-Yo Ma.

“His projects with Yo-Yo Ma showed me that you can do different styles of music.” Maggie explains, “You can have that bluegrass-Americana background and do classical and create something new with it. Mark crossed that bridge and opened doors for everybody.”

Mark says he is still inspired to try new things. “I love piano, and I have written a lot for piano, so I think that could be a future project. I have always been involved with cross-pollinating to the extreme.”