Legendary banjo player Eddie Adcock had been shaving left-handed, writing like a
doctor, and hitting some sour notes for 15 years.
He has what is known as an essential tremor, which he calls an ‘intent’ tremor, meaning if he intends to do something with his right hand it starts to
shake at the most inopportune times.
“My wife, Martha, noticed a difference in my handwriting around 1990 and I had
noticed a difference in my playing in about 1993,” Adcock said.
“If you consciously intend to use your hand, that’s the only time it tremors. So, if I go to write my name, it will tremor.”
A member of the International Bluegrass Music Association Hall of Fame, Adcock
made his name for more than five decades playing professionally with bands
including The Country Gentlemen and Bill Monroe’s Blue Grass Boys.
Eddie and Martha Adcock also perform together and have been referred to for many
years as the “Sonny and Cher of Bluegrass.”
Vanderbilt neurosurgeon Joseph Neimat, M.D., and neurologist Peter Hedera, M.D.,
performed Deep Brain Stimulation (DBS) surgery on the 70-year-old Adcock
recently to block the tremor and restore his playing.
The three-part surgery requires implantation of electrodes into the brain as
well as insertion of a palm-sized battery-powered generator within the chest
wall, plus lead wires to connect the two.
