In-demand dobro master retakes the stage

Billy Joel was the piano man. Young gamers compete to be the guitar hero. Frank Sinatra spent much of his career billed simply as “The Voice.”

As for Jerry Douglas’ area of expertise? It may be rarer than the ones listed above, but he’s more than happy to stand out.

Search the bluegrass veteran’s name online, and one superlative after another pops up: “dobro master,” “dobro wizard,” “dobro specialist,” even “the Muhammad Ali of the dobro” (that’s from singer-songwriter James Taylor, quoted on Douglas’ own website). If dobro masters are few and far between, well, that just Douglas’ finger-picking more in demand.

“It’s a hard instrument to play, and it’s, in the scheme of things, a pretty new instrument,” Douglas said earlier this month by phone from his Nashville home. “The dobro was born in the late ‘20s, so it’s not something that you can just go to the store and say, ‘Oh, yeah, I’ll pick between 20 of them.’ It’s not like guitar or banjo or mandolin. It’s still kind of a minority of an instrument, and I really like that.”

For those needing a definition: A dobro is a guitar-like instrument with a metal cover plate in the center of the body and an aluminum cone for amplification. It was invented by the Dopyera brothers, who melded the first syllables of “Dopyera” and “brothers” to coin the name “dobro.” Among folk instruments, it provides a hybrid sound of sorts: part twangy banjo, part warm acoustic guitar, part stinging electric.

Douglas, who grew up in a musical family and later joined his father’s band, began studying the instrument when he was 11 or so. Over the years, he went on to play with Garth Brooks, Dolly Parton, Reba McEntire and others. And Sunday, he’ll bring one of his most famous collaborations to the Pacific Amphitheatre for the OC Fair’s summer concert series.

That would be Alison Krauss & Union Station, with which Douglas has played for nearly two decades. Douglas met Krauss when she was 14 and on the verge of releasing her first album, and the two of them worked on, among other things, the 2000 “O Brother, Where Art Thou?” soundtrack, which won the Grammy for Album of the Year and sparked a bluegrass craze.

For Douglas, the “O Brother” exposure gave an overdue spotlight to musicians who had played for years under the mainstream radar. When 9/11 struck a few months later, he sensed an additional reason for the record’s appeal: The songs, which mixed melancholia and foreboding (“O Death”) with chipper, keep-the-faith optimism (“I’ll Fly Away”), proved therapeutic for many.

“Bible sales were skyrocketing, and copies of that record were flying out,” Douglas remembered.

In addition to Krauss, Douglas will join another institution of American roots music onstage at the Pacific Amphitheatre: Sharing the bill Sunday is Willie Nelson & Family.

Nelson, whose career spans more than half a century, previously performed at the OC Fair in 2007 and 2012.

Dan Gaines, the fair’s entertainment director and Pacific Amphitheatre general manager, said past ticket sales had made another Nelson appearance an easy call.

“He’s always a big draw, which is one of the reasons we have him back,” Gaines said. “We’re constantly facing that battle of ‘How many times have they played there?’ versus ‘What’s new, what’s available?’ If we have somebody like Willie Nelson who sells out or comes close to selling out every time we have him, that’s the people speaking.”

The combination of Nelson, Krauss and their respective bands, he added, should amount to a dose of Americana in its purest form.

“I love the traditional feel of it,” Gaines said. “There are so many things today that are called country that don’t even feel like country.”

If You Go

What: Alison Krauss & Union Station featuring Jerry Douglas, Willie Nelson & Family

Where: Pacific Amphitheatre, OC Fair & Event Center, 88 Fair Drive, Costa Mesa

When: 7:30 p.m. Sunday

Cost: Sold out, but $40 to $70 if tickets become available

Information: (714) 708-1500 or pacamp.com/pa