Country musician Ricky Skaggs brings his dad's favorite songs to Edmonds

NASHVILLE, Tenn. — Ricky Skaggs doesn't mind saying so. Before he was a first-class picker, he was a first-class brat.

The 55-year-old country legend, who appears Friday at Edmonds Center for the Arts, cringes when he remembers his petulant attitude as a child. He'd act up as his father — Hobert Skaggs, a welder and musician — tried to teach him how to play the mandolin.

"I'd get mad and didn't want to play, or I thought I had it right and he'd say I didn't," Skaggs recalled. "I'd be a smart aleck and say something, and I regretted it so much. Later, I apologized to my dad so much for my strong-headedness."

Now, Skaggs is offering much more than an apology. On his new CD, "Songs My Dad Loved," Skaggs pays homage to his father, who died in 1996. The disc is a collection of songs Hobert Skaggs sang around the house, like Ralph Stanley's "Little Maggie" and the Louvin Brothers' "What Is a Home Without Love."

Skaggs plays every instrument (mandolin, banjo, fiddle, guitar and piano) and sings every note. He keeps most of the arrangements simple, just as he and his father used to play them.

"My dad never played for a living," Skaggs says. "He could easily have sang or played with Bill Monroe. He was that good. But he wanted to stay with his family and work to where he could be home on the weekends."

Ricky Skaggs had 11 No. 1 country hits between 1982 and 1989 and has won 14 Grammys.

He returned bluegrass in the 1990s and became one of the genre's leading figures — and one of its most adventurous, working with artists including rock singers Bruce Hornsby, John Fogerty and Jack White.