Local Music Makers
- 50Plus
- 1 hour ago
- 4 min read
For the Love of Mary Ellen Davis
By Peggy Ratusz
I met Mary Ellen in 2002 where she was working as a waitress at Westville Pub on Haywood Street. It was the best new restaurant in Asheville but back then, it was also a music venue.
Every Sunday, Westville Pub hosted a Blues jam. Mary Ellen was mutually acquainted with the first guitar player I worked with in town, the late great, Eual Owens.
Eual and I used to meet at the jam and for several Sundays in a row, we took turns prodding Mary Ellen to take off her apron and go up and play a song. Eventually, she did, and of course blew us all away with her raw and down home, authentic style and panache.
After all, she was no stranger to performing in front of people then, because the wheels around her music career have been spinning since her youth.
After growing up and graduating from high school in Macon Georgia, Mary Ellen Bush went to college at the University of Alabama.
She was heavy into playing soccer at that time … until she wasn’t. “I quit the soccer team to play music.” We’ll delve into what happened after that, in a moment.
Her maternal grandmother, Margaret Love gifted her a guitar when she was in the 7th grade. “That side of my family was very musical. Grandma Love’s cousin, Egbert Francis Yerby wrote the fight song for the Ole Miss marching band. There’s a building on campus named after him.”
She took guitar lessons from an older gentleman named Roger Boudleaux Allen. Even though he kicked her out of lessons because she couldn’t figure out how to read music, she remembers him fondly.
“I could play by ear, anything he assigned me to learn, but he was frustrated with me because he wanted me to learn to read the music to play it.”
Her next guitar mentor, a classmate from eighth grade, was more forgiving. “I’d go over to his house every day after school. We’d play cards, talk and drink tea for an hour and then we’d play music with his older brother and father. He taught me all the chords.”
So what happened after she quit playing soccer in college?
She visited a university bar and music hangout called The Booth. “I got a gig instantly at The Booth. I went in one night and the guy running the place was playing. I walked up to him during the set break and told him I wanted to play there.
"He asked me if I knew 'If I Could' which is a song the band Phish recorded with Alison Krauss. He invited me to sit in on that tune so he could audition me.” When she was through, he gave her a Tuesday night residency.
Every week for a year, Mary Ellen played the cover tunes everyone wanted to hear. She regularly left there with several hundred dollars in her pocket and for a young college student this was a heady experience. For the first time, she set her sights on becoming a full time, professional musician.
She told her dad, “I don’t need to get a degree, Dad. I’m just gonna be a musician.” His reply, “Mary Ellen, let me tell you something; having a degree is like having a pair of pants. Nobody notices, unless you’re not wearing any.”
She listened to her dad and continued with her studies. At the same time, she immersed herself into music projects, forming or joining bands and playing gigs on the side. She gained more experience and improved her chops along the way.
She started attending area festivals with girlfriends. “I just fell in love with all these young people from Asheville I met at my first Merlefest. And on top of that, it was the first I’d heard mountain music.”
She was so taken by the experience that she decided to move here after graduation. A school chum warned her, “You can’t move to Asheville. Girls don’t shave underneath their arms there.”
Davis serendipitously worked as a camp counselor for Kanuga Conference and Retreat Center in Hendersonville during her last two summers at UA. She met and started recording spirituals with the musical director there, Fran McKendree.
McKendree was a real deal kind of mentor. His band, McKendree Spring was signed to Arista Records and toured with Fleetwood Mac and shared the stage with many greats from the 1970’s including Joni Mitchell and Elton John.
Davis says “He was my foray into recording. He took me under his wing and saw me as someone he could nurture. I recorded on several of his projects and I was in his church camp band.”
Native Ashevilleans and early WNC transplants will remember the all- female trio Ménage. Mary Ellen and her co-workers from Westville Pub, Sarah McDonald (Roberts) and Rhett Thurman were overnight sensations, partly thanks to McKendree who became their band manager.
By 2004 their harmonious blend of originals and signature sound, combining Country, Soul, Western Swing and Blues, was resonating with everyone lucky enough to hear them. They were in full tilt, touring extensively with the Avett Brothers and Chris Isaak.
One of their original songs, “Tomatoes” was featured in a national commercial campaign for Hunt’s canned tomatoes.
Though they took a much needed break in 2012, Mary Ellen and Sarah continued to pursue music projects and other interests. They both married and started families. Sarah married her band mate Matthew Roberts and they are in a band together called The Feels.
Thankfully, Ménage is back by popular demand. Along with founding members, Mary Ellen and Sarah, the enormously and equally talented Melissa Hyman joins them now on bass, guitar, cello and vocals. Their blend is just as compelling as it ever was.
Davis was a freelance graphic artist until two years ago. Leaf Global Arts founder, Jennifer Pickering recommended her to interview for the position of events planner and booking manager at White Horse Black Mountain.
Pickering saw in Mary Ellen what we all see: A calm, cool, collected fun and charming soul who is also an immensely talented artist. She’s an inspiration to everyone she encounters.
Asheville loves you back, Mary Ellen Davis ...
Peggy Ratusz is a vocal coach,
song interpreter, and songwriter.
For vocal coaching email her at