Hailing from Moorea, French Polynesia — located ten miles from Tahiti —the Froggy Mountain Brothers have staked out a most unique place from which to share their wares. “We’ve lived here about thirty years, although we originally grew up on the shores of lake Geneva at the French-Swiss border for about ten years before moving to the other side of the world,” the band’s banjo player and vocalist Robin Holliger explains. “My brother Laurent and I are simply two siblings that perform together as a duo. We first came across bluegrass music in 2006 when I started learning the banjo, having already become somewhat proficient on the guitar. We quickly began playing that music together, because it is, after all, a type of music that begs to be played, and not just listened to. Laurent brushed up his skills on the guitar, and over the years, we picked up some more instruments, such as mandolin, fiddle and autoharp, to add variety and fun to the mix.”
Robin says that the name was originally sort of a joke. “Because our entire family comes from various mountains of France and Switzerland— the Alps, Jura, Pyrenees — we thought that modifying the Foggy Mountain Boys’ name with ‘frogs’ for Frenchies (an old somewhat derogatory British nickname for the French) would be funny. When we officially started the band, we didn’t really have a better idea, so it stuck.”
While Laurent and Robin make music as a duo, Robin says that they would love to add other band members to the mix if they could find people that they feel that they could really click and provide the same interpretations of bluegrass that they do. They describe their sound as a mix of traditional bluegrass and early country brother duets, with some later bluegrass influences thrown in as well.
According to Robin, those influences can be widespread. “There are so many artists and bands that have influenced us at different times,” he maintains. “The biggest influences have to be the first bluegrass bands that we got into, which, uncharacteristically, mainly consist of the old stuff. Being completely separated from the current trends in bluegrass, we learned the music from the recordings of the pioneers. Bill Monroe and Flatt & Scruggs were probably the first artists that caught our ears, but shortly after that, we became more enthralled by the Stanley Brothers and Jim & Jesse, two very different bands, but both huge favorites of ours. Then, a lot of other bands moved us a lot, from Reno & Smiley to the Country Gentlemen, and we slowly moved forward in time, with some influences seeping in from the likes of J.D. Crowe and Tony Rice.”
Others have captured their attention along the way as well, among them such lesser-known entities as the Bluegrass Gentlemen, the Bray Brothers, and the Red Cravens, the latter an Illinois-based band from the early ’70s that they later became enamored with.
“We haven’t really covered either French or Polynesian music, as we just love the pure classic bluegrass the best,” Robin explained. “We also sing and write in English almost exclusively.”
So far, their performance opportunities have been confined to small venues on their home island and a few in Tahiti. “We’re not super active at the moment in person,” Robin continued. “However after COVID shut down most of our opportunities for shows in 2020, we started a weekly online live show on various platforms — Twitch, Facebook, YouTube, Kick — that’s a lot of fun to do, and which has also started garnering some traction in the past year. We don’t have any regular music festivals in our country, and though we visit the US regularly, being foreign nationals makes touring or performing at venues in the US a major red tape headache.”
Nevertheless, he said they have had the opportunity to meet and make friends with several other bluegrass artists, some of whom have invited them to pick a song or two with them on stage. “We’ve played with Ralph Stanley II, Larry Efaw, Caney Creek, and Alex Leach,” Robin recalls. “Of course, apart from actually performing, bluegrass festivals have been a great opportunity to jam, sometimes with well-known artists or their band members. That’s always fun, thrilling, enriching, and humbling all at the same time.”
In the meantime, Robin said he and his brother have made it their mission to expose the local population to bluegrass music, due to the fact that it’s an otherwise unknown entity in their part of the world.
“We are the only bluegrass band in these parts,” he notes. “However I think people have mostly been receptive, and they usually like it once they hear it. The novelty is a big thing, and the (occasional) flashiness elicits positive reactions. The obvious similarity to classic country also strikes people, because country is rather well-liked by many locals. On the other hand, I would say most people’s actual understanding of country music is nebulous at best, even though the local music has a lot of country influence, partly through Hawaiian music.”
So far, the Froggy Mountain Brothers have recorded one self-produced album. It was released a few years ago and is currently only available on Bandcamp.
“We are currently preparing a new album that we will try and push to more platforms — Spotify, Amazon and the whole lot,” Robin added. “We will probably then try to make the first one available through those outlets as well. Both albums are comprised entirely of original songs, written by one or both of us. We write our own songs and, in fact, we’ve accumulated several in the last few years, which is why we’d like to record a couple new albums just to let them out. That being said, whenever we perform, being traditionally inclined, we like to play covers from past and present as well. There are so many great songs that we like to play and that we want people to hear! So we normally do a mix of covers and originals. We don’t really have a set list of songs that we do because we are always learning new ones, or digging back for songs we haven’t done in a while. As a result, we rarely play the same songs over and over except when it comes to regular requests.”
Consequently, it comes as little surprise that Robin has his own opinion as to why bluegrass enjoys such international popularity.
“I think it’s a kind of music that makes people smile and breathe, although that might seem strange because of the dark themes and fast tempos,” he suggests. “It’s not pretentious, and you don’t have to dig that deep into it to appreciate it… although you can! It’s simple and seems lighthearted, but it has powerful melodies carried by heartfelt singing, haunting harmony vocals and engaging instrumental breaks. I think the simplicity makes it accessible and allows For strong emotional vocals and instrumental performances.”
He then added one final thought as well. “It’s a music that feels so good and right to me, and it makes me feel — and hopefully be — so much better. I can only hope that everyone finds such a deep connection with any kind of music as much as I have with bluegrass.”
