Country Artists We’ve Lost in 2012: Doc Watson

Grammy Award-winning singer and guitarist Doc Watson died in May after a brief illness that followed a fall in his home in Deep Gap, N.C. Watson pioneered his own style of finger picking, and was a major influence on future greats like Ricky Skaggs, Sam Bush and Pete Huttlinger. “An old ancient warrior has gone home,” Skaggs said of Watson. The blind singer formed the popular MerleFest in Wilkesboro, N.C. after his son Merle died in a tractor accident in 1985. He is survived by his daughter Nancy.