Leather Britches

Leather Britches was formed when Mac Traynham introduced Linny Greer and Jim Mohr back in 1975 or so. Mac and Jim had accepted a job playing at the now long gone Andy's Patio on Grace St. in Richmond, VA. They had wandered into the bar with their instruments and commenced playing. After they were offered a gig in two weeks, they decided that they had better put a band together and I was enlisted. That began over 30 years of playing music of one style or another. Leather Britches was the name of the original group as well as the title of an old fiddle tune that we actually played at one time. Mac moved on to Southwest Virginia and became a force in old-time music and Jim and I drafted Steve Lowry and Joe "Earthquake" Briggs to form the group's second incarnation and later went on to form Nobody's Reel with Scott Bradley, Donnie Durham and Hal Addington of Station Break. After years of playing all over Central VA, we all scattered and Jim and I eventually formed North Forty with Jim Frizzell and Clyde Colgin. In the middle of all of this, Jim and I were given the responsibility of demonstrating some American music to the citizens of Beijing and Shanghai in a cultural exchange. I'm not sure what we got in return but it gives one pause. In early 2008, Tripp Johnson and Skip Andrews joined up with Jim and Linny and formed the current lineup of Leather Britches bringing with them decades of experience in playing everything from rock to classic old-time fiddle tunes. So get out and hear our new stuff.