If you have caught Ricky Skaggs & Kentucky Thunder at a live performance this past year or so, you may have noticed that they have been including new instrumentals which Ricky has written in the show. The band has been in the studio as time allows since last summer recording a number of these songs, and now their first all-instrumental CD is due for an August 1 release on Skaggs Family Records.

The CD is entitled Instrumentals, appropriately enough, and includes 11 tracks, 9 of them Skaggs compositions. The current members of Kentucky Thunder are all featured: Cody Kilby on guitar, Jim Mills on banjo, Darrin Vincent on guitar, Mark Fain on bass, Paul Brewster on guitars, Andy Leftwich on fiddle, and Ricky Skaggs on mandolin, a variety of guitars, mandocello and clawhammer banjo. Guest performances are also included from Jeff Taylor (accordion and pennywhistle), Andy Statman (clarinet) and The Nashville String Machine.

We can’t find any audio samples up yet, but will be sure to let you know when they are available.

Jim Mills talked to us about this project a few months ago, and discussed it during his GrassCast interview which we posted in May. You can hear the interview here.