ABout the HighGround Drifters

Home • Drifters Sounds • The Boys • Band News • Gig Schedule • Message Board • FAQ's • Contact Us • Links

Paul Williams:

Paul ‘Willie’ Williams first became exposed to bluegrass music after frequenting the Philadelphia Folk Festival in his youth. In his early 20s, he first performed bluegrass music as a bass player/vocalist in the band ‘The Acoustic Reptiles’, where he was joined by banjoist Mike Reilly and his brother Paul on Acoustic Guitar. After moving to New Orleans, he became a founding member and guitarist/vocalist in the bluegrass band ‘The Yard Farmers’ in 1997. The Yard Farmers recorded two albums in which Willie played guitar/mandolin, sang lead/backup vocals, and contributed several original songs.

Currently, Willie is a founding member and mandolinist/vocalist for the New Orleans-based bluegrass band ‘The High Ground Drifters’.

John Noble:

John (Johnny Banjo) Noble was born and raised in New Orleans, Louisiana, and, as such, has been (and continues to be) influenced by a broad and wild range of ridiculously diverse musical styles. Presently, he picks his most awesome Nechville Phantom (with Galaxy inlay!) Banjo with a talented group of fellows comprising the High Ground Drifters!

Jeff Bagwell:

Jeff is a New Orleans native. Trained in classical violin, Jeff has played Bluegrass and folk music from an early age due largely to his family’s Tennessee roots, and a home environment filled with down home pickin’ and harmony. In addition to his work with the High Ground Drifters, Jeff played fiddle for some years with the New Orleans Bluegrass outfit Wabash Co. His guest appearances include work with The Yard Farmers, the Syreens, and the Motor City Sidestrokers.

Grant Ligon (Pick'in Ligon):

Grant, a West Texas boy, was first exposed to Bluegrass by his Dad, who INSISTED he watch Hee Haw every weekend for years. This scarred him sufficiently that he began guitar learning Wishbone Ash and Emerson, Lake, and Palmer. This was even more scary because he learned guitar on the front porch of his brothers half finished log cabin in the tic-infested backwoods of Arkansas. First guitar song learned? Neil Young's "Tell Me Why?" First song you could recognize? Oh, that was MUCH later!

Teenage summers pickin' tators in the hot sun and then pickin' guitar on the porch at night. To the rustlin' of the copperhead snakes in the leaves and the moonshine induced howlin' of the neighbor in the cabin over the holler. Since moving to New Orleans, Grant has played at the Neutral Ground, entered in the World's Worst Band Contest (finishing second when some moron tried to play "Dixie" on a chainsaw (a rules violation that rankles to this day). You can usually hear him about 5:30 am on the front porch, giving concerts that are inspired until the call comes to "walk the dogs and stop waking the neighbors!!"

He's been in the Drifters for over two years and enjoys pickin' and-a grinnin'. Figures it'll be just a matter of time before the HGD will be featured on Country Music TV doin' some Big and Rich inspired thang.

Greg Nichols:

Greg Nichols grew up in the early 1940's on a four acre goat and okra farm in an unincorporated and unnamed town in Owyee County, Idaho. His parents died when he was very young, and he was left to tend the farm on his own. Unfortunately, he was far too lazy to care for the goats or the okra, and the goats quickly died. Fortunately, preternatural marketing acumen – combined with the fact that even starving and untended goats won't touch raw okra – led him to make his first million by age seven when he cornered the now world-famous Idaho goat-and-okra gumbo market.

By age nine, Greg fashioned his first bass out of goat gut, a tree branch and an old tub he found rusting in the barn. It smelled horrible. But the sweet sounds it made brought admirers from all over the county. Again, fortune stepped in to help young Greg's career: he was a terrible bass player, but since music was illegal in every county within 400 miles except tiny Owyee County, his fame grew by leaps and bounds and he was soon the most sought after bassist in the tri-state area.

Greg soon moved to New Orleans where he found his place playing blue grass and traditional music with a band originally called "Prince and the New Power Generation". Known today as the High Ground Drifters, Greg formed the original line-up of the band in the Fall of 1953 with the legendary Skinny "Fatboy" Proebestein on trombone. Several decades passed in which the band trudged through a flurry of financially draining copyright infringement lawsuits, 3 or 4 unfortunate food poisoning deaths, and an ill-advised but blessedly brief period in 1979 when Greg legally changed his name to an umlaut.

Today, Greg is the only surviving original member. Critics and long time observers of the band favorably note that over the decades his bass playing has seen very slight improvement.