History Archives - The Birthplace of Country Music

The Carter Sisters Radio Transcriptions with Chet Atkins

History Museum

September 25, 2023

Posted on September 25, 2023December 6, 2023 by Guest Blogger

Ed Hagen is a volunteer gallery assistant and guest blogger at the Birthplace of Country Music Museum. His recent blog posts include The Carter Family on the Border Radio and Will the Circle Be Unbroken.

The original Carter family became nationally famous after being recorded in the 1927 Bristol sessions. A. P. Carter sang bass and harmonies on many songs, and very occasionally played guitar, but his principal contribution acted as a songcatcher, working to find, rewrite, and rearrange traditional songs. His wife Sara Dougherty Carter was the lead singer, co-wrote many songs, and performed playing either a guitar or autoharp. Sara’s cousin Maybelle Addington Carter, (who was married to A. P.’s brother Eck) also sang, but is remembered today as a guitar virtuoso (more on that later).

Their record sales crashed with the Great Depression of the 1930s, but an opportunity to perform on a radio station on the Mexican border revived the fortunes of the group. In those days, Mexico and the United States had a dispute over AM radio signals, and some Mexican stations were given many times the wattage of U.S. stations. That meant that the Carters’ border radio shows were heard all over the country, reviving their popularity. The border radio station XERA had a massive 500 kilowatts, and could broadcast across 48 states and into Canada. Visit my previous blog post, The Carter Family on the Border Radio, to learn more about that story.

*Carter Sisters and Maybelle September 1944. Left to right: Anita, June, Maybelle, and Helen*

A new generation traveled with the Carters to the Mexican border. A.P. and Sara brought their two children, Janette and Joe. Maybelle and Eck brought their three daughters, Helen, June, and Anita. The children sang on the radio show (but not on records). The original group continued to perform for several years, but that ended when Sara moved to California in 1943.

Maybelle and her daughters continued to perform after the original Carter Family disbanded, performing as “the Carter Sisters and Maybelle Carter” on local radio stations in Richmond, Knoxville, and Springfield, Missouri. They became local celebrities in each city with big crowds as the stars of local “barn dance” radio shows, and they took their act to every town within range of the local radio signal. They were eventually signed by the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville in 1950.

With that extended introduction, and with today being National Daughter’s Day, let’s take a look at the radio transcriptions of the Carter Sisters. Years ago, radio shows were often recorded on “transcription discs,” special high-quality recordings that would be distributed to radio station affiliates. These disks had pauses in them so that the affiliated stations could insert their own commercials. The disks were never intended to be distributed to the public, but thousands of them have survived, later archived to tape and digital recordings by “old time radio” enthusiasts. These include recordings of a dozen Carter Sisters shows from 1949 and 1950 (just before they were signed by the Grand Ole Opry) that can be listened to today via YouTube.

*Carter Family circa 1939. Standing A. P., Janette, announcer Harry Steele, Sara, Maybelle. Seated Helen, Anita, June.*

By the 1950’s, The Carter Sisters lineup included Helen, then age 22, playing the accordion and guitar; June, age 20, playing autoharp and ukulele; and Anita, age 16, playing upright bass. By this time June, a natural comedienne, introduced the songs and pitched sponsored products. Maybelle anchored the group playing her 1928 L5 guitar, which she bought with royalties from the 1927 Bristol Session recordings. What makes these recordings extraordinary is that the costar of the show was a then-unknown guitar player, Chet Atkins. Think about it; here we have recordings of perhaps the two most influential country guitar players of all time playing together just before they joined the Grand Ole Opry.

Why were Maybelle and Chet influential? Let’s start with Maybelle, the inventor of the “Carter scratch.” She would play the melody of songs such as “Wildwood Flower” and “Keep on the Sunny Side” on the bass strings of the guitar using a thumb pick, while rhythmically brushing the other strings with her fingernails or finger picks. Essentially, she played rhythm and lead guitar at the same time. This was revolutionary, because country guitar players didn’t see the guitar as a lead instrument before that.

Maybelle, an extraordinary musician, mastered other styles of playing. She can be seen on videos playing rhythm guitar up and down the neck like a jazz guitarist on some songs, and Mexican-inspired fills on others. She also played something the Carter family called the “blues.” Years later, in a wonderful documentary, Mother Maybelle’s Carter Scratch, Helen explains that Maybelle learned to play the “blues” around 1930 from Leslie Riddle, an African-American man in Kingsport. Riddle taught Maybelle guitar, and therefore played a direct impact on the early styles of country music, but due to race and discrimination was never able to reach the success the Carter Family achieved. This guitar style featured an alternating bass played with the thumb, with the melody played on the top strings (the reverse of the Carter scratch, where the melody was played on the bottom strings). Most people today call this style “Travis picking” because it was popularized by Merle Travis.

*Carter Sisters with Chet Atkins circa 1950*

If you look closely at videos of Merle Travis playing this style, you’ll see that he used a thumb pick and just one finger for the melody. He got a miraculously full sound with this technique, but Chet Atkins, using all of his fingers, took Travis picking to another level. He went on to have a long and successful career, with best-selling instrumental hits like “Mr. Sandman” and “Yakety Axe”.

The shows starts with thirty seconds of their theme song, the “Columbus Stockade Blues,” just enough for one chorus and a sizzling Chet Atkins guitar break. They close each show with “In the Pines.” In between, different sisters are featured vocals, and Chet played instrumentals (check out, for example, Peach Pickin’ Time on show 17 and Humoresque on show 39). He also sings a bit, and plays the fiddle, something he’s not known for. Check out his version of Shortnin’ Bread in show 17.

Maybelle shows off her Carter Scratch on show 17, playing and singing the old Carter Family standard, “You Will Miss Me When I’m Gone”. We sure do, but these old radio shows bring them all back to life.

East Tennessee Fiddlers and Their Fiddles

1927 and 1928 Bristol Sessions Collections History Instruments

September 14, 2023

Posted on September 14, 2023December 6, 2023 by Julia Underkoffler

By Julia Underkoffler, Collection Specialist at the Birthplace of Country Music Museum

Fiddle me this: What’s the difference between a violin and a fiddle? One has strings, and the other has strangs!

East Tennessee is known for its music, and in particular, it was home to several well-known and influential old-time and bluegrass fiddlers. The museum is fortunate to have three fiddles on loan that were owned and played by Charlie Bowman, Edd Vance, and Benny Sims, all of which are currently on special display in our permanent exhibits. Instruments – and other objects – like these help us to tell the stories of the music, people, and cultural heritage that make our region so special.

Fiddlin’ Charlie Bowman was born on July 30, 1889 in Gray Station, Tennessee. Bowman started playing music from a young age – he started recording as early as 1908 on a neighbor’s Edison Cylinder phonograph, and by the early 1920s, he was regularly being hired to play at square dances and political rallies. When Bowman started to enter fiddling contests around the area, other local fiddlers got quite mad because Bowman just kept on winning!

A black and white image of Charlie Bowman. He is seated on a small bench and holding a fiddle in his lap. He is wearing a collared shirt. The image is old and not completely clear, his face is slightly fuzzy. — *Charlie Bowman, from the Lewis Deneumoustier Collection, Archives of Appalachia, East Tennessee State University*

In 1928, when the Columbia record label came to Johnson City, Tennessee, to do a location recording session, Bowman and several other musicians, including his daughters, recorded six songs. He also traveled the East Coast vaudeville circuit with his daughters and his band – in 1931 alone, they played 249 days of the year. Bowman was later hired to perform by B. Carroll Reece, who served as representative for the first district of Tennessee. They stayed lifelong friends, and Bowman even wrote “Reece Rag” for Congressman Reece. Alongside his solo career, Bowman was also a member of the Hill Billies and the Blue Ridge Ramblers.

The museum has two Bowman family instruments on loan: Charlie’s fiddle and his daughter Jenny’s accordion, which is currently on display in the museum’s special exhibit, I’ve Endured Women in Old-Time Music.

Edd Vance – more commonly known as Red – was born on November 19, 1923 in Sullivan County, Tennessee. Red became recognized in East Tennessee for his old-time fiddling skill, and he performed at The Down Home, a well-known musical hub in Johnson City, Tennessee.

Red followed in the footsteps of his father, Dudley Vance, who was born on March 12, 1880 in Bluff City, Tennessee. During the second week of May 1925, Dudley played at the first Mountain City Fiddlers’ Convention, held at a local high school. This event featured famous fiddlers Charlie Bowman, Fiddlin’ John Carson, Fiddlin’ Cowan Powers, Charlie Powers, and G. B. Grayson. Dudley famously beat everyone with his rendition of “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star.” Two years later, Dudley and his brother traveled to Winston-Salem, North Carolina, to record three records for Okeh Records, under the band name Vance’s Tennessee Breakdowners. These were the last professional recordings done by Dudley. The museum has Edd Vance’s fiddle and several other items related to Dudley and Edd Vance on loan from their descendants.

*Edd “Red” Vance’s fiddle shows the wear of a lifetime of skilled fiddling. On loan from the descendants of Edd and Dudley Vance. © Birthplace of Country Music; photographer: Ashli Linkous*

Benny Sims was born on August 4, 1924 in Sevier County, Tennessee. Sims was drafted into the U.S. Army Air Corps and was stationed in Foggia, Italy during World War II. While in Italy, Sims played with the U.S. Air Force Orchestra. He played fiddle with the Morris Brothers, but he is best known for his time performing with Lester Flatt and Earl Scruggs. Sims recorded with Flatt & Scruggs over 25 times as part of the Bluegrass Boys, including on their famous “Foggy Mountain Breakdown.”

*The cover of a music book, “Fiddle Favorite” by Benny Sims, pictured.*

After Sims left Flatt & Scruggs, he went to work for WNOX in Knoxville and WJHL-TV in Johnson City until he retired in the early 1960s. When he retired from the music industry he worked at Life & Casualty Insurance Company and gave private fiddle lessons. Just months before Sims’ death in 1995, the Birthplace of Country Music Alliance held a tribute to him at the Paramount Center for the Arts. Today, East Tennessee State University awards the Benny Sims Scholarship to one Bluegrass, Old-Time, and Roots Music Student each year.

This fiddle is on loan from Benny Sims’ family and is believed to be the one that he played on the “Foggy Mountain Breakdown” recording. On loan from the descendants of Benny Sims; © Birthplace of Country Music Museum; photographer: Ashli Linkous

The Carter Family on the Border Radio

History Museum

September 1, 2023

Posted on September 1, 2023December 6, 2023 by Guest Blogger

By Ed Hagen, volunteer gallery assistant and guest blogger at the Birthplace of Country Music Museum.

Here at the Birthplace of Country Music Museum, we celebrate the 1927 Bristol Sessions that launched the recording careers of a number of traditional music acts, notably Country Music Hall of Fame artists Jimmie Rodgers and the Carter Family.

Three members of the Carter Family pose for a promotion photo taken in black and white. Maybelle Carter is seated holding a guitar and facing the camera. She is wearing a unique coat with a wooden clasp at the collar. Seated beside her is Sara Carter - she is holding an auto harp instrument in her lap and pressing the keys. She is wearing the same outfit as Maybelle, a unique coat with a wooden clasp at the collar. Leaning behind them is A.P. Carter, he is wearing a dark suit jacket and tie. — *The original Carter Family: Maybelle, A. P., and Sara Carter*

The Carter Family is now considered to be the “First Family of Country Music” after gaining commercial success and stardom from their 1927 Bristol Sessions recordings. The original group was a trio made up of A. P. Carter, his wife Sara Dougherty Carter, and Sara’s cousin Maybelle Addington Carter, who was married to A. P.’s brother Ezra “Eck” Carter. All three members of the Carter Family were born and raised in SouthWest, Virginia in an area called Poor Valley, Virginia (also known as Maces Springs) and were steeped in mountain musical traditions. Sara was the lead singer of the group – unusual for the time period – singing and playing guitar and autoharp, with Maybelle singing, playing lead guitar, and creating her own style of guitar playing known as the “Carter scratch”. A.P. Carter acted as songcatcher and band leader singing harmony vocals. In November 1927 and following months, the Victor record label released all six songs from the Carter Family’s Bristol Session recordings, and by the end of the 1930’s the group had sold over 300,000 records. As their popularity grew due to the success of the 1927 recordings, for years the group then recorded over 250 songs under the RCA Victor label, Decca and the American Record Corporation, had regular performances and saw great commercial success. But business slowed a bit during the 1930s as the Depression badly hurt consumer spending for things like record players and records. In addition to a collapsing economy, the Carters’ ability to tour was also hampered by the breakup of A. P. and Sara’s marriage, which was finalized in 1936, but the group still continued to record and perform together, even after Sara’s marriage to Coy Bays (A.P.’s cousin).

During the mid- late 1930’s, the Carter Family had a unique opportunity to take a job on the border of the U.S. and Mexico on the XERA radio station in Del Rio, Texas. The Consolidate Royal Chemical Corporation had contacted them with an offer to perform on their border radio station XERA daily. XERA was a 500 kilowatt border blaster, and the station’s location in Mexico had a powerful broadcasting signal with the ability to reach much of the U.S. with its broadcasting ability. With the possibility of reaching a national audience through XERA’s station, the Carter’s took the gig, which led to their next surge in popularity. This opportunity took them from their quiet country home in Southwest Virginia to living just across the Mexican border in Texas.

This is where this story gets odd: John Romulus Brinkley was the station manager at border radio station XERA and also the infamous “goat-gland doctor.” A “doctor” with specious credentials, Brinkley achieved fame and fortune in Kansas in the early days of radio by advertising surgical clinics where he performed xenotransplantations of goat testicles into humans. This supposed cure for male impotence was the foundation of a medical quackery empire worth millions of dollars. Chased out of Kansas and other states by outraged medical boards, he set up business across the border in Mexico, where the American limits on radio station power did not apply. Brinkley’s million-watt station XERA could be heard all the way to Canada and in 48 U.S. states.

a black and white image of a women and a man looking directly at the camera performing surgery on a person laying on a table with a white sheet placed over their body. The women is wearing a surgical hat, and round glasses. The man is to her right and also wearing a surgical hat and round glasses, and is holding a surgical tool in his hand and gloves — *“Doctor” John Romulus Brinkley performing a surgical procedure, date unknown. Image via LegendsofAmerica.com.*

In 1938, Brinkley’s Mexican based border radio station XERA featured obscure hillbilly acts who played on the Good Neighbors Get Together show. That show aired for four hours every night, and again the following morning. For six months out of the year in 1938 and 1939, the Carter Family and their children lived in Del Rio, Texas performing regular spots on the radio with the sessions being recorded. They were offered $75 a week – serious money at the time. The Carters agreed and took the opportunity despite A. P. and Sara’s uncomfortable domestic situation. During a radio segment in February of 1939, Sara dedicated a song, “I’m Thinking Tonight of My Blues Eyes” to Coy Bays who was living in California – shortly afterwards the two were married and Sara moved to California. Brinkley’s empire was eventually brought down by a series of lawsuits and a federal mail fraud prosecution. He died bankrupt and penniless in 1942.

At this point the next generation of Carters appear in our story: A. P. and Sara’s children Gladys, Janette, and Joe, and Eck and Maybelle’s children, Helen, June, and Anita. The Carters did not want to disrupt their children’s schooling, so only the youngest child, five-year-old Anita, went with them the first year. Anita was part of the act and, as you can imagine, the other children, living with relatives in Virginia and listening to XERA at night, got very jealous. In subsequent years all of the children made the trip and sang on the radio shows.

A black and white image of three young girls, Anita, June and Helen Carter. The Girls are singing and dressed in the same overall dress outfit with bows at their necks. Helen is standing, singing and playing a guitar, June is in the middle touching an autoharp on a table in front of her, and Anita is smiling and singing. — *Maybelle’s daughters left to right: Anita, June and Helen during a 1941 photoshoot with Life Magazine that was never published. Image from Life.com*

The border radio shows were a great success. Young listeners to these radio programs included future country stars like Johnny Cash, Chet Atkins, Tom T. Hall, Waylon Jennings, and Buck Owens.

Each show was repeated the following morning. In those days, this was done by recording the evening show direct to “transcription disks”, a special phonograph record intended for, or recorded from, a radio broadcast. Nobody at the time thought much of the historical value of these disks. One story has it that they were sold to a Mexican contractor who used them as roofing tiles. Miraculously, seventeen disks with seventy-eight songs from the 1939 season were discovered in a San Antonio radio station in 1963 and were issued as LPs. The LPs are long out of print, but the recordings are available for purchase on the Internet in CD and mp3 formats, and are also posted on YouTube. Take a listen to these recordings here via this YouTube playlist.

The recordings are interesting alternate takes of previously recorded Carter Family songs, but also include previously unreleased songs. The border transcriptions are a bit shorter than the Carters’ commercial recordings on the Victor label, typically two minutes rather than three minutes long (perhaps shortened to save room for commercials), but the performances are flawless.

The original Carter Family disbanded in the 1940s, still performing together on occasions. Maybelle Carter and her daughters began performing as a separate act as “Mother Maybelle and the Carter Sisters” featuring Anita, Helen and June and also performed under the groups original name “The Carter Family”, after 1960. The musical legacy of the Carter Family is one that continues to play an impact on musicians and fans of music to this day.

This blog post is a condensation of a colorful story told at much greater length in the XERA chapter of the excellent book about the Carter Family by Mark Zwonitzer and Charles Hirschberg, Will You Miss Me While I’m Gone. Another source was Ed Kahn, The Carter Family on border radio (University of Illinois Press 1996).

Will the Circle Be Unbroken? History of a Song

History Museum Music & Songs

June 22, 2023

Posted on June 22, 2023June 21, 2023 by Guest Blogger

By Ed Hagen, Gallery Assistant and guest blogger

There is a dance floor inside of the Birthplace of Country Music Museum that features the song “Will the Circle Be Unbroken,” playing over and over and sung by a mix of modern and old-time country artists. Toward the end of the looping video, John Carter Cash explains that the “circle” is music itself. In that sense “Will the Circle Be Unbroken” is a homage to the pioneers of country music and a salute to current artists who honor these diverse roots. The circle is unbroken because the music is handed down from generation to generation.

The Nitty Gritty Dirt Band’s 1972 album “Will the Circle Be Unbroken” cover

The song has had that association for many years now, perhaps starting with the release in 1972 of the Will the Circle Be Unbroken album by the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band, a 1960s California jug band that had gone electric and was at that time best known for covering Jerry Jeff Walker’s Mr. Bojangles. Will the Circle Be Unbroken was their seventh album and came about when band member John McEuen asked bluegrass musician Earl Scruggs and legendary guitarist Doc Watson if they would record with the band. One thing led to another, and many of country music’s biggest stars – including Roy Acuff, Jimmy Martin, Maybelle Carter, Merle Travis, Vassar Clements, Randy Scruggs, Pete “Oswald” Kirby, and Norman Blake – signed up for the project. It was a collaboration of two culturally different generations of musicians, traditional Grand Ole Opry stars and a group of hippies that Acuff described as “a bunch of long-haired West Coast boys” (Maybelle called them – affectionately – the “dirty boys”). By all accounts, the generation gap was bridged and new friendships were made, not to mention the incredible music. The album was a crossover success, introducing many folks to traditional country music, and in 1997 the original album was certified platinum.

Since its release, the song has become an inspiration for intergenerational celebrity get-togethers. When the song is called at any local museum jam sessions, everyone sings the chorus, and the emotion in the room is palpable.

A black and white image of lyrics to the song "Will the Circle Be Unbroken". — *A hymnal page of the song “Will the Circle Be Unbroken” dated 1907 courtesy of hymnary.org*

The original version of “Will the Circle Be Unbroken” was a hymn written in 1907 by Ada R. Habershon, with music by Charles H. Gabriel. It is long out of copyright, and so we freely reproduce the sheet music here. According to hymnary.org, the song peaked in popularity just before World War II, when it appeared in about 20% of hymnals in use. It is down to about 7% today. Based on conversations I have had, the number is higher here in East Tennessee.

Note that the words and melody of the verses in the original hymn depart substantially from the way it is usually sung today (although the refrain is very close). That’s because A. P. Carter rewrote the song when The Carter Family recorded it in 1935.

Victor producer Ralph Peer used to tell A. P. and his other folk and country artists to avoid recording songs heard on the radio, but to collect traditional music that could be modified and copyrighted. A. P. may have thought it was a traditional song. Perhaps to differentiate it a bit more, the Carter version was retitled as “Can the Circle Be Unbroken” (though nobody uses that title anymore).

The sentiment conveyed in both versions is that we have all lost loved ones, but that they have gone to a better place where we will see them again. It is interesting to compare the two versions of the song. Habershon’s version admonishes the listener to take the Christian view of family loss:

A black and white image of The Carter Family. Three people are facing the camera, A.P. Carter is wearing a blazer and vest, looking toward the camera. Sarah Carter is to his left and is standing facing the camera. She is holding an autoharp and wearing a dress. Maybelle Carter is sitting holding an archtop guitar and looking into the lens. All three individuals have a slight smile to their faces. — *A promotional photo of The Carter Family taken by the Victor Talking Machine Company circa 1928. Left to right: A.P. Carter, Maybelle Carter, and Sarah Carter.*

You remember song of heaven
Which you sang with childish voice,
Do you love the hymns they taught you,
Or are songs of earth your choice?

The Carter version, recorded and released in 1935, focuses on the painfulness of the loss:

Oh, I followed close behind her
Tried to hold up and be brave
But I could not hide my sorrow
When they laid her in the grave

“Can the Circle Be Unbroken” also focuses on the death of a beloved mother rather than family members in general (as in the original hymn). In any event, it is not surprising that the more emotional Carter version won people’s hearts. Roy Acuff used the Carter lyrics when he recorded it in 1940, and that eventually became the standard version. You can listen to different versions of the song via the YouTube links below.

Nitty Gritty Dirt Band – Will The Circle Be Unbroken

The Carter Family – Will The Circle Be Unbroken

Will The Circle Be Unbroken Vol.2／Nitty Gritty Dirt Band／Johnny Cash／Ricky Skaggs

Ed Hagen is a volunteer gallery assistant and guest blogger at the Birthplace of Country Music Museum. His earlier post, Celebrating Jimmie Rodgers: A Short Lesson in His Guitar Style, appeared here last year.

The World of Marty Stuart: Country Music’s Legacy in Mississippi

Collections History Museum

December 10, 2022

Posted on December 10, 2022December 10, 2022 by Guest Blogger

Today we welcome guest writer Miriam Meeks to the BCM Blog as she shares stories and objects from a wonderful special exhibit currently on display at the Mississippi Department of Archives and History (MDAH) in Jackson until December 31. Focused on Bristol Rhythm & Roots Reunion favorite Marty Stuart and his collection of country music artifacts, this exhibit is sure to be of interest to Birthplace of Country Music fans and friends! Enjoy!

As the year begins to wind down, many people are feeling nostalgic for the past. Until December 31, fans of country music will be able to take a walk down memory lane through the golden age of country music at The World of Marty Stuart, a collaboration between Grammy-winning musician Marty Stuart and MDAH to tell the story of country music with emphasis on its lasting role within Mississippi. The World of Marty Stuart exhibit covers his life and legacy of preserving country music’s stories, photographs, instruments, costumes, and more.

Marty Stuart with his electric guitar. Photo by Alysse Gafken; courtesy of Mississippi Department of Archives and History

As a young boy, Stuart began playing music in his hometown of Philadelphia, Mississippi. He joined The Sullivans, a family bluegrass gospel group based in Alabama, after being drawn to bluegrass and gospel music. He played guitar and mandolin with them until eventually meeting bluegrass musician Roland White, who invited Stuart to back Lester Flatt’s band.

After touring with Flatt, Stuart recorded his first solo album, With a Little Help from My Friends, and performed with various artists like Vassar Clements and Doc Watson before joining Johnny Cash’s band in 1980. Stuart collected memorabilia from shows played by fellow musicians, many of whom were friends and mentors of Stuart. His greatest passion to safeguard the legacy of country music strengthened as he continued to produce solo albums.

Over the years, Stuart’s trove of treasures grew as he recognized the importance of preservation. “Somewhere along the way, about the early ‘80s, those artifacts were being discarded,” said Stuart. “So it became a self-appointed mission to curate, protect, and preserve that end of country music: authentic, traditional country music. The people and their treasures.” Hundreds of these priceless artifacts are currently housed at the Two Mississippi Museums in Jackson as part of The World of Marty Stuart exhibit.

Drum set used by Marty Stuart & His Fabulous Superlatives. Artifacts courtesy of Marty Stuart; photography by Mark Geil

Stuart and the MDAH worked together to curate a truly timeless exhibit, one that gives a small glimpse into Stuart’s dedicated collection. A plethora of pieces from the golden age of country music are on display, including Stuart’s first guitar; original manuscripts from Hank Williams; guitars that belonged to Merle Haggard and Pops Staples; and costumes worn by Porter Wagoner, Dolly Parton, and Johnny Cash, including Cash’s “Walk the Line” performance suit.

Eagle-eyed visitors will recognize the connection to the namesake for Stuart’s second solo album from 1982. Stuart first experienced rhythm and blues as a young boy at the Busy Bee Café, now the Busy Bee Suites, in Philadelphia. Virgil Griffin and the Rhythm Kings frequently played there, and now the group’s original bass drum head rests at the Two Mississippi Museums. A school essay also hangs in the halls of the exhibit. A young Stuart was asked by his teacher, “What do you want to be when you grow up?” to which Stuart wrote, “a musician.” Now his answer has come full circle. The exhibit is the living embodiment of Stuart’s musical journey resting in the state that raised him.

Various performance costumes featured in The World of Marty Stuart exhibit. Photo courtesy of Mississippi Department of Archives and History.

What you see in the exhibit is only the tip of the iceberg – in actuality, Stuart has collected over 20,000 pieces of country music memorabilia and historic items, which will settle in the future home of Marty Stuart’s Congress of Country Music in Philadelphia. This Congress will be a celebration of country music and a culmination of the musician’s ultimate goals.

The World of Marty Stuart exhibit is brought to you by the title sponsor, Blue Cross & Blue Shield of Mississippi, as well as by AT&T and Visit Mississippi. The World of Marty Stuart runs through December 31, 2022, with regular exhibit hours: Tuesday—Saturday, 9:00am—5:00pm and Sunday, 11:00am—5:00pm. For more information, visit www.mdah.ms.gov. You can also check out Stuart’s memoir, The World of Marty Stuart. The book covers his life with photographs and artifact reproductions straight from his collection. It was published by MDAH and distributed by the University Press of Mississippi.

Finally, check out the interview with Nan Prince, Director of Collections at MDAH, that we conducted last week on the Birthplace of Country Music Museum’s Museum Talk radio show.

Image at top of page: Marty Stuart and his acoustic guitar. Photo by Alysse Gafken; courtesy of Mississippi Department of Archives and History

Miriam Meeks is the Content Writer of Moore Media Group in Jackson, Mississippi.

A Celebration of Tennessee Music Pathways!

History

October 26, 2022

Posted on October 26, 2022October 24, 2022 by Erika Barker

October 26 is National Tennessee Day, and we want to share one of the many things that we think makes this state so great – its connection to music! As the “home” to seven genres of music – country, blues, bluegrass, gospel, soul, rockabilly, and rock ‘n’ roll – Tennessee’s music heritage is as diverse as its landscape. Beyond the lights of “Music City, USA,” the sounds of country music echo from the mountains of east Tennessee while the blues wails from the west. With so many musical points of interest – including our very own Birthplace of Country Music Museum in Bristol, Tennessee/VA – the music heritage of this state runs deep.

In 2018 the Tennessee Department of Tourist Development launched Tennessee Music Pathways to help tourists and locals alike recognize the state’s significant musical history. Over 500 landmarks, attractions, and points of interest from all seven genres of music that call Tennessee home were identified, marked, and compiled into an online interactive guide. Using this guide, you can put together a driving tour across the state based on your own musical interests. You can search for sites related to a specific person or genre of music; search by type of venue or site such as a museum, recording studio, concert hall, historic marker, or festival; or by location if you have a destination already in mind and just want to turn up the volume on your trip by adding a few extra stops to your itinerary. The Pathway makes it easy to find music destinations to break up – and enhance – your drive.

Here are a few lesser known stops along the pathway you may want to visit on your way to or from the Birthplace of Country Music Museum in Bristol, Dollywood in Pigeon Forge, the Grand Ole Opry and Country Music Hall of Fame in Nashville, and Sun Studios, Graceland, or the Blues Hall of Fame in Memphis.

Image from the Tennessee Music Pathways website

Lesley Riddle Marker

Pathway markers have been popping up all over the state to highlight locations where significant musical events took place, such as this marker for Lesley Riddle in Kingsport, Tennessee, the city where he and A. P. Carter met in the 1920s. Riddle was a musician and friend of The Carter Family who taught them many songs and influenced Maybelle Carter’s iconic “Carter Scratch” guitar style. Riddle also travelled extensively through the segregated south with A. P. as one half of an interracial song collecting duo. You can learn more about him by reading In Search of Lesley Riddle, one of our blog posts from 2017.

DeFord Bailey family with his Tennessee Pathways Marker. Image is from Smith County Insider

DeFord Bailey Marker

Another marker you won’t want to miss is located in Carthage, Tennessee. This marker honors DeFord Bailey, the first African American star of the Grand Ole Opry and the first performer introduced on the show under the name “Grand Ole Opry.” Bailey appeared on the show twice as often as any other artist in 1928 and remained a regular performer on the show through 1941.

Image from Casey Jones Home and Railroad Museum website

Casey Jones Home and Railroad Museum

In Jackson, Tennessee, you can visit the Casey Jones Home and Railroad Museum. This is the original 1870s home of the railroad engineer who sacrificed himself to save his coworkers and passengers from a potentially catastrophic crash. Jones has been immortalized in country music with over 40 versions of the “The Ballad of Casey Jones,” giving him a nearly mythical status.

Image from Tina Turner Museum website

Tina Turner Museum

In Brownsville, Tennessee, stop in to see the Tina Turner Museum, which is housed in the Flagg Grove School – a one-room school building Turner attended as a child. The school was built on grounds donated by Turner’s great-uncle, Benjamin Flagg, in 1889. The school was moved from Nutbush and renovated in 2012 to house a collection of the “Queen of Rock’s” memorabilia, from stage outfits to gold records to yearbooks, as well as interpreting what education and school life would have been like for African American children in a small rural community in the 1940s through the 1960s.

Minnie Pearl statue image from Kelly Kazek’s (ODD)YSSEY blog; microphone bike rack image from nashvillepublicart.com

Public Art

If you don’t have time for a museum, maybe photo ops with public art pieces are more your speed! If so, check out Centerville, Tennessee’s larger-than-life statue of Minnie Pearl made entirely of chicken wire. And if you need a break while biking around Nashville, you can park your bike next to a giant microphone bike rack.

Photographs by Tony Stogsdill

In Musical Memoriam

You can even curate a personalized graveyard tour to honor and offer tribute to your favorite musical stars of the past. See the list below for just a few places where some of country music’s most beloved stars are resting in Tennessee. If you want to expand your trip outside the state, check out our blog post From Rhinestones to Tombstones: Memorial Monuments of Country Music’s Dearly Departed to learn more about the gravesites of some of country music’s dearly departed stars.

Hope Cemetery, Franklin, Tennessee – Minnie Pearl
Williamson Memorial Garden, Franklin, Tennessee – Sam McGee, Kirk McGee, Carl Smith, Goldie Hill, Skeeter Davis
Hendersonville Memory Gardens, Hendersonville, Tennessee – Mother Maybelle Carter, Helen Carter, Anita Carter, June Carter Cash, Johnny Cash, Luther Perkins
Ridgecrest Cemetery, Jackson, Tennessee – Carl Perkins
Spring Hill Funeral Home and Cemetery, Madison, Tennessee – Roy Acuff, Earl Scruggs, Louise Scruggs, John Hartford, Hank Snow, Kitty Wells, Jimmy Martin
Memorial Park Cemetery, Memphis, Tennessee – Sam Phillips, Marshall Grant
Greenwood Cemetery, Nashville, Tennessee – DeFord Bailey
Harpeth Hills Memory Garden, Nashville, Tennessee – Chet Atkins, Charlie Louvin, Ira Louvin, Eddie Miller
Mount Olivet Cemetery, Nashville, Tennessee – Ernest “Pop” Stoneman, Hattie Stoneman
Woodlawn Memorial Gardens, Nashville, Tennessee – Eddy Arnold, George Jones, Porter Wagoner, Tammy Wynette
Oaklawn Memorial Cemetery, Sparta, Tennessee – Lester Flatt

Photograph by Lane Owens White

Erika Barker is the museum’s Curatorial Manager.

Celebrating Jimmie Rodgers: A Short Lesson in His Guitar Style

1927 and 1928 Bristol Sessions History Music & Songs

May 26, 2022

Posted on May 26, 2022 by Guest Blogger

Today is the anniversary of Jimmie Rodgers’ passing on May 26, 1933, and therefore we wanted to celebrate him with this blog post by volunteer Ed Hagen – including a short lesson in Rodgers’ iconic guitar style! Ed moved to Bristol last summer, and he soon joined us at the Birthplace of Country Music Museum as a Gallery Assistant. He has played guitar for many years, mostly jazz, but he has been working hard on the rudiments of country and bluegrass since moving to Tennessee. As Ed says, “There is no better place to start than with the guitar style of Jimmie Rodgers!”

Jimmie Rodgers

Jimmie Rodgers was born in 1897 in Meridian, Mississippi, and he learned to play guitar while working on the railroad as a water boy and brakeman. He was influenced by the music played and the songs sung by the African American railway workers he met at the railway yard and around town – their call-and-response singing style during work and the blues songs they sang made a distinctive mark on Rodgers’ sound. He also spent time in Meridian’s opera house, vaudeville theaters, and hotels where he heard jazz, parlor music, and popular tunes, all of which also provided inspiration.

In 1927 he moved to Ashville, North Carolina, where he started playing on the local radio station with a small band made up of three musicians from Bristol, Tennessee-Virginia. Later that year they heard about recording sessions that were going to be held in Bristol conducted by the Victor Talking Machine Company, and so they traveled up to audition. These were the famous “1927 Bristol Sessions” that we celebrate at the Birthplace of Country Music Museum today. After arriving in Bristol for their audition, Rodgers and the band ended up recording separately, with speculation attributing this to an internal squabble or a change made by producer Ralph Peer. For Rodgers, this led to a recording contract and huge success as a recording and performing artist – though for only six short years before his death from tuberculosis in 1933 – and he is now celebrated as the “Father of Country Music.”

Promotional portrait of Jimmie Rodgers. From the John Edwards Memorial Foundation Records, #20001, Southern Folklife Collection, Wilson Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

Jimmie’s Guitar Style

Jimmie Rodgers’ guitar style is iconic and made a huge impact on country music musicians and beyond – numerous artists have copied and embellished it for their own music playing throughout the years. It is based within a traditional style of guitar playing, but he is one of the most successful and well-known performing and recording artists to play in this style, and he certainly knew how to make it his own!

For guitar players, it’s a great style to learn because it is so versatile. As the bartender in the Blues Brothers would put it, the style works for both kinds of music, country and western. You can slow it down for a Hank Williams’ ballad, or swing it hard for a Bob Wills’ two-step. You can use it to play Gene Autry cowboy tunes or just about any Merle Haggard or Buck Owens tune. And once you master it, the style gives you the foundation to play the related but more challenging guitar styles of Maybelle Carter, Merle Travis, and Chet Atkins.

Playing Guitar Jimmie Rodgers-Style

Before we can play this guitar style, we need to begin with short introduction on how to play traditional country bass, because that is the foundation of the style. For the most part, traditional country bass players play the root note of the chord on the first beat of the measure, and the fifth note of the chord’s major scale on the third beat. The fifth can either be played above or below the root. Playing behind a C chord, these notes would be C and G. This is called playing “one five.”

A triplet (that is, three notes played where a quarter note would ordinarily be played) can be played on the fourth beat of a measure, especially before a chord change. This triplet anticipates the chord that is played in the next measure, either ascending or descending to the root of the target chord. The three notes in the triplet are the three tones just above or below the root of the target chord. For example, if ascending from a measure of C to a measure of F, the triplet at the end of the C measure would be the fifth, sixth, and seventh tones of the F major scale.

If descending from a C measure to a G measure, the notes of the triplet would be the fourth, third and second tones of the G major scale.

Alternatively, a bass player will sometimes play a third on the third beat, especially if that note is a seventh of the target chord (the chord to be played in the next measure). If moving from a C to an F, for example, the third in C (E) is the seventh in F. Or sometimes, just to keep it simple, the bass player will play the root on the third beat.

Rodgers does all of this on the guitar rather than on a bass. He plays a bass line on his guitar by fingering a first-position chord with his left hand, which will typically have the first and fifth notes of the major scale on the bottom three (EAD) strings. Just like any country bass player, he’ll “one five” it, playing the first and fifth tones on the first and third beats of the measure, mix in triplets, and occasionally drop in a root or third on the third beat. While doing this, he’ll strum the treble strings on the other beats. This allows him to effectively play bass and guitar at the same time.

This is sometimes called a “boom chuck” rhythm, similar to a military band’s “oom pah” or a stride piano player’s left hand. The “boom” is the bass note, and the “chuck” is the strum. Sometimes, to spice it up, a down-up strum is added to the chuck, creating a “boom chucka” (sometimes called a “church lick”). So the last beat of a measure might be a “chuck,” a church lick, or a triplet.

A brief note about the strum: These first position chords typically include open strings, and no particular effort is made to dampen them. It is not essential to play every string on every chord; the treble top notes (the B and E string) are often omitted.

There are no strict rules about any of this, except that it all has to done with confidence and a swing feel. You should be able to sing, play the bass and chords, and drop in a triplet or church lick as the mood strikes you. This all comes with practice.

The exercise below will get you used to playing ascending and descending triplets. Start slow and play it until it becomes second nature.

Providentially, Rodgers made The Singing Brakeman, a short sound film released in 1930 where he plays guitar and sings three songs, so you can see exactly how he plays. The film is available on YouTube. You’ll need to take one precaution if you are playing along with the video. The guitar in the film is tuned a half step high, so to play along you’ll have to tune your guitar up a half step or put a capo on the first fret. When we talk about these tunes below, we’ll do so as if the recording was in standard tuning, that is, when he fingers something that looks like a C chord in the film, we’ll call it that, even though we are hearing a C# chord on the soundtrack.

With all this in mind, let’s take a look at the first song in The Singing Brakeman, “Waiting on a Train.” Rodgers begins by imitating a train whistle, and then sings some nonsense syllables over this short guitar opening:

The partial F chords in the first bar are played as four simple down strokes on the four beats. The second bar is a boom chuck, playing the root instead of the fifth on the third beat. The third bar is two church licks. He ends the fourth bar as a triplet leading into the first bar of the chorus, which is played “one five.”

I’m not going to tab out the rest of the song. It goes against the spirit of how these songs are played. Players are free to sprinkle triplets and church licks wherever they like. Jimmie Rodgers likely never played the same song the same way twice. But to get you started, the chords for the first verse go like this:

This is just a start for aspiring Jimmie Rodgers-inspired players, but it should give you a good place to begin as you explore the wonderful musical world of “America’s Blue Yodeler,” “The Singing Brakeman,” and the “Father of Country Music”!

Instrument Interview: The Jug

History Instruments

October 13, 2021

Posted on October 13, 2021October 19, 2021 by Guest Blogger

“Instrument Interview” posts are a chance to sit down with the instruments of traditional, country, bluegrass, and roots music – from different types of instruments to specific ones related to artists, luthiers, and songwriters – and learn more about them. Ten questions are posed, and the instruments answer! Today we caught up with the jug, a very interesting instrument who had a lot to say about what it’s like to be in a jug band.

1. Tell me a little bit about yourself.

I’m a jug that is used as an instrument. I play in a type of band that is called a jug band, but there are lots of other interesting instruments in these types of bands other than me. I’m a household object that was converted into a musical instrument.

2. Jugs are made to be containers, so how did you become an instrument?

I come from a long line of innovators. These are the type of creative people that make things from what they’ve got in their surroundings. Many early jug bands were made up of African American musicians from the world of vaudeville, musicians who performed in traveling medicine shows, and sometimes just people at home creating their own instruments. And jugs like me first started being recorded in jug bands in places like Kentucky and Tennessee in the 1920s and 1930s.

For some jug band musicians, perhaps they didn’t have the money for or access to instruments, and so they decided to pick up and modify things like jugs, washboards, spoons, and other things to make music to entertain themselves and their community. People have been making music out of everyday items and things they find just lying around for centuries.

Three Black musicians pose with their instruments. They all wear suits, the men to the left and right with bow ties and the middle man with either a normal tie or just his collar buttoned up. The man to the left wears a fedora-style hat, holds a banjo, and has a jug held towards his face by a "rack" around his neck. The middle man is seated and wears a fedora-style hat; he holds a guitar. The man to the right wears a flat cap and holds a harmonica. — Cannon’s Jug Stompers, a band formed by Gus Cannon with Noah Lewis and Ashley Thompson in the late 1920s. Supposedly Cannon first learned to play the banjo on an instrument he made from a frying pan and a racoon skin when he was a child. Image from Wikimedia Commons

3. Can any old jug be an instrument?

Sure! You can make music with any old milk jug or even something like a Snapple bottle, and I definitely encourage you to make music with anything you can find. Next time you find yourself with an empty bottle or jug, see how many ways you can make music with it. I promise it will brighten your day, and you won’t regret having a little fun making music. However, a jug is not much without the other instruments in the jug band.

4. How are you played?

There are multiple ways to play a jug. Since it wasn’t originally intended to be an instrument, there are far fewer rules on how to do it right so feel free to improvise! Lots of people think that to play a jug, you blow across the top of the opening like you’d play a flute, but there’s actually a lot more spit involved than that. You could do it that way, but normally in a jug band, players will buzz into a jug with their lips like you’d do to play the trumpet.

5. What do you sound like? And what about the band as a whole?

I make a sound that is kind of like a trombone-like tone, and it is often low on the musical scale. And the sound I make is also influenced by the material I am made of and my size. As a whole, a jug band typically plays music that sounds like a blend of blues, jazz, rag-time, and rock-and-roll. This is because jug bands were a precursor to all of these genres of music. Jug band music is a community and joy-based type of music, and since the instruments are so versatile and unique, it’s a great medium for innovation and creating new sound. This is how jug bands influenced the music from a variety of genres.

Three instruments hang on the back of a museum display case. The backing is blue. The top instrument is a small guitar made from a cigar box with a wooden neck. The middle instrument is a guitar made out of a circular ice bucket with a wooden neck. The bottom instrument is a large jug with a brown neck and shoulders and a cream body. — Various handmade and every day object instruments on display at the Musical Instrument Museum in Phoenix, Arizona. These include two guitars, one made from a cigar box and the other from an ice bucket, along with a jug used to make music. Photograph by Frank Kovalchek via Wikimedia Commons

6. What are the roles of the different instruments in a jug band?

The washboard, the bones, and the spoons provide percussion and rhythm for a jug band. The washtub base, the jaw harp, comb and tissue paper, some other modified stringed instruments, as well as the jug take the other places in a jug band. Some bands have just a few of these instruments, but others have many more depending on the sound that the band is trying to achieve. And often more “typical” instruments like the guitar or banjo are also included in the band. It’s a bit of a mix-and-match situation.

7. Why did people start making music with jugs?

People started to make music with jugs for the same reason everybody starts to make music – because they love it and wanted to come up with a way to entertain themselves and the people around them. This motivation based on love comes into the origin stories of just about all instruments. Even the simple ones like me. Throughout history, it has taken innovation and the creative use of ordinary objects and different materials to make music.

8. When instruments are more accessible today, why do people still play the jug? Why are you and other homemade instruments still relevant?

One reason that jug bands are still relevant is that the history of music is something that should be remembered and celebrated, and playing the music is one of the best ways to learn about it. Another way jug bands stay relevant is through modern music. Folk musicians and other musicians take inspiration from the unique sound of a jug band and adapt it to contemporary music. This brings a historical element to their music as well as a new and interesting sound. The main reason overall that a jug band and its instruments are still relevant is that the instruments are fun to play and listen to, and just about anyone can learn to play because a lot of the instruments are ones that you can find easily or make.

This photograph shows a band on a dark stage. The group is made up of six white musicians, including a woman with curly hair on guitar, a man with longish dark hair and a plaid shirt on harmonica, a man with a black shirt on washtub bass, a man in a tank top on drums, a man in a black shirt with the spoons, and a man wearing a hat and a plaid shirt on the washboard. — The Happy Fun Thyme Trouble Jug Band performing in 2019. At the far back left, you can see a washtub bass being played, while the two other musicians in the back of the group play the spoons and washboard. Image from Wikimedia Commons

9. How do homemade instruments like you fit into an Appalachian/Southern identity?

Both of these identities consist very much of holding things like community as a high priority. There’s not much people like to do more than get together and listen to music. Also, very important to a Southern and Appalachian identity is resilience in the face of adversity. In an area that struggles with poverty, the people are known for finding creative and innovative ways to do things like make music – and to produce wonderful instruments to help them do so!

10. Is there anything else you’d like to add about yourself?

Before I leave, I’d like to emphasize the importance of making music with whatever you find in your environment and doing it for fun. If it wasn’t for people looking around for ways to have a good time making music with things like jugs and seemingly silly household objects, we wouldn’t have the blues and rock music that we love today. So next time you feel like being silly and making music with a strange object, do it. You might just invent a new genre of music!

Gracie Osborne was an intern at the Birthplace of Country Music Museum this past summer, helping with curatorial work and visitor experience. She is an anthropology student at Radford University.

June Carter Cash: A Life in Country Music

History

June 23, 2021

Posted on June 23, 2021November 18, 2022 by Julia Underkoffler

Today – June 23 – is June Carter Cash’s birthday. At the age of 10, Valerie June Carter stepped in front of the mic for the first time with The Carter Family, and from there her role and legacy in the musical realm only grew stronger.

This image shows a senior class spread from a yearbook. June Carter is seen on the right-hand page in the bottom right of four student photographs. She is wearing a light colored top or dress. At the bottom of the picture is her autograph, which reads: "Luck, June Carter / Valerie June Carter Cash." To the left of the four photographs are the names of the students with their activities listed below their names. — Before she became a full-time performer and country music icon, June was your typical high school senior. This yearbook hinted at her musical career in the clubs and activities she participated in, including girls’ chorus and choir, but also in the later autograph she wrote on her senior portrait photograph after she was famous!

June Carter was born into the “first family of country music,” as one of three daughters of Ezra and Maybelle Carter, and she came into this world just two years after the famous 1927 Bristol Sessions, where The Carter Family recorded for the very first time. June lived the majority of her life in the spotlight – after the original Carter Family disbanded in 1943, she (at the age of 14), along with sisters Helen and Anita, began singing as part of the family’s professional act, Mother Maybelle and the Carter Sisters. Even though they gained a lot of popularity under that name, Maybelle changed the band’s name to The Carter Family two years after A. P. Carter died in 1960. They released their first album, The Carter Family Album, on Liberty Records soon after. June also got a solo deal while preforming with the Carter Sisters.

The Carter Family Album cover is a reddish-orange color with a leather bound, old photograph album shown in the center. The photograph album is labeled with the record's title "The Carter Family Album" and has an oval picture of Mother Maybelle, June, Anita, and Helen in the center. — The cover of *The Carter Family Album* has the look of an old family photograph album.

June played many instruments including the harmonica, banjo, guitar, and autoharp. Not only did she have a solo career and a career with her family group, but she also had a career with her third husband, Johnny Cash. Together they won a Grammy in 1967 and 1970, and June also won three Grammys of her own, two of which she won after she passed away in 2003. That same year Country Music Television (CMT) included June on their “40 Greatest Women of Country Music” list.

June’s marriages connected to important musical legacies. Her first marriage was to Carl Smith, one of the most successful male country artists in the 1950s. Before June and Carl got divorced, they had one daughter, Rebecca Carlene, together. Today Carlene Carter is a singer-songwriter who is continuing the county music family legacy – her most recent album Carter Girl, is filled with three generations of Carter Family music. Carlene performed at the grand opening of the museum in 2014 too! You can read Carlene’s tribute to her mother on the blog here.

June married Johnny Cash, the “man in black” himself, in 1968, and they were together until June’s death in May 2003. June and Johnny were introduced to each other backstage at the Grand Ole Opry in 1965, though each of them was aware of the other through their music. In the years before they got married, June and Johnny performed and recorded together several times. June co-wrote “Ring of Fire,” which became one of Johnny’s most famous songs and topped the charts for seven weeks. Together Johnny and June had one son, John Carter Cash, who is also continuing the country music legacy of his family as a record producer and singer-songwriter.

Unlike her first and last unions, June’s second marriage – to Edwin “Rip” Nix – was not a marriage of two musical stars. Nix was a football player, racecar driver, and police officer, but their daughter Rosie also became a singer-songwriter. Sadly, she passed away in 2003, the same year as her mother, from carbon monoxide poisoning.

From the beginnings of the original Carter Family with Maybelle, Sara, and A. P. to June’s career as a country music icon to June’s children following in her and their grandmother’s footsteps, the lineage of Carter country musicians has strong roots and branches – a family born into, raised by, and innovating country music.

Julia Underkoffler is a summer intern at the Birthplace of Country Music. She is a rising senior at Shepherd University in West Virginia, majoring in historic preservation and public history and minoring in gender and women’s studies.

The Root of It: J. P. Harris on Roscoe Holcomb

History Radio

June 18, 2021

Posted on June 18, 2021October 19, 2021 by Guest Blogger

Radio Bristol is excited to share “The Root of It,” a blog series connecting today’s influential musicians to often lesser known and sometimes obscure musicians of the early commercial recording era. The sounds and musicians we hear today on platforms like Radio Bristol can often be traced back to the sounds of earlier generations. What better way to discover these connections than to talk to the musicians themselves about some of the artists that have been integral in shaping their music? These influences, though generally not household names, continue to inspire those who dig deep to listen through the scratches and noise of old 78s, field recordings, and more, finding nuances and surprises that inevitably lead them on their own unique musical journeys.

For this installment of “The Root of It,” we spoke with prolific songwriter and banjo player J. P. Harris. For years Harris has travelled internationally performing his unique take on honky tonk-flavored country music. Harris is also well versed in old-time music, spending much of his early years at fiddlers conventions where he delved headfirst into traditional old-time fiddle tunes and songs. His latest release on Freedirt Records – Don’t You Marry No Railroad Man – is a testament to the old-time influences that have inspired his music through the years. One of those influences is the East Kentuckian Roscoe Holcomb. One of those voices you just don’t forget after hearing him for the first time, Holcomb was also an incredibly gifted guitar and banjo player. He experienced international acclaim during the folk revival in part due to the documentary High Lonesome, which was shot by renowned artist and musician John Cohen. Harris spoke with Radio Bristol about the influence and inspiration the music of Roscoe Holcomb has had upon his own music.

A white man with close-cropped dark hair and a large dark beard sits in front of a table covered in fruit, vegetables, bread, and wine bottles -- set up very much like a Renaissance still life. He is wearing a white long-sleeve shirt and brown pants. His sleeves are slightly pushed up to reveal lots of tattoos. — Portrait of J. P. Harris by Libby Danforth.

J.P Harris:

As most Americans my age had, I’d heard little snippets of traditional American folk music over the course of my lifetime, but grew up removed from direct exposure to any of its subsets. As a teenager living and traveling on my own, often to far-flung corners of the country via hitchhiking or freight trains, my affinity for folk music and the stories therein grew immensely. And at this time, my interaction with the internet was virtually nonexistent, and it didn’t yet contain the endless well of digitized recordings, downloadable music, or streaming platforms we are so familiar with today.

As a result, I feel I grew into my taste in music in what was to be the last era of “oral tradition.” Amongst my community of friends and travelers, people traded dubbed cassettes, often with little or no information about the recordings, or maybe the occasional burnt copy of a CD. Oftentimes the label would simply read “blues” or “banjo music,” and we relied on our memories to retain any detail about who was playing, where they were from, and when it was recorded.

This is essentially the story of my introduction to Roscoe Holcomb (born 1912 as Halcomb in Daisy, Kentucky). A mix tape made by a friend arrived in the mail unlabeled, and one track in particular raised the hair on my arms and made me shudder at each vocal turn – so much so that eventually the track became garbled and nearly unlistenable from the repeated rewinding of that section of tape. I would later learn that the tune was “Darling Cory,” a song that became entrenched in my own repertoire.

A white man standing in front of an old wooden shed and ladder. He wears a light-colored hat, shirt, and pants, along with glasses, and holds a big-head banjo in his hands ready to play. Dark trees can also be seen in the background. — Roscoe Holcomb with banjo in Daisy, Kentucky, 1959. Bob Dylan described Holcomb as an artist with “a certain untamed sense of control.” Photo by John Cohen

However, it wasn’t until a few years later, in a local record store, that I once again heard that utterly unmistakable tone of voice and rushed to the clerk to ask what was playing on the house speakers. I purchased the album in question right then and there – An Untamed Sense Of Control from Smithsonian Folkways – and, for months, became lost in the lush landscape painted by Holcomb’s songs, hardly listening to anything else in my pickup as I drove to and from job sites each day, soaking up his many styles of guitar and banjo playing on the record.

Before discovering Roscoe Holcomb, I’d never heard an artist of his era playing such a diverse catalog of songs and styles, veering from a hymnal to the blues to dark mountain ballads. The variation in song style never left one guessing if it was still Holcomb singing, his voice plaintive and unrestrained. Learning of his life story (Holcomb worked as a road builder, farmer, coal miner, and finally as a full-time musician in his final years), my affinity only grew deeper – at the time, I was primarily working as a carpenter, logger, and heavy equipment operator. My musical tastes were a mix of early blues, early country, old time, and bluegrass, all of which you could hear Holcomb playing on any given album, and he became a sort of one-stop-shop for me for many years.

There are endless early professional or field recordings I could reference for the influences that still prevail in my own music career. Each one’s unique regional style or era-specific sound is a part of the intrigue of traditional American music, but none did I find where the musician had so obviously melded what they heard in a wider sense. Holcomb would at one turn play “Fair Miss In The Garden,” a ballad with obvious roots in 18th or even 17th-century British Isles traditions and common in Appalachia, then he would pivot to the bluesy “Frankie and Johnny,” a song so widespread that it would’ve been thought of as “pop music” during Hocomb’s youth in the 1920s and 1930s. This melding of styles surely gave me a new perspective on traditional music; before this, I had viewed them as altogether separate genres, unable to combine into the singer’s own personal stylistic interpretations.

White couple -- the woman is to the left and man to the right. She has dark hair and is wearing a white frilly-edged sleeveless shirt and dark pants/skirt; he is wearing a light-colored button-down shirt, big glasses, and a hat. He has one arm across her shoulders. They are standing in front of a white house. — Roscoe and wife Ethel Holcomb captured by the brilliant artist and New Lost City Rambler John Cohen.

It can only be assumed that Holcomb’s exposure to these other kinds of music not native to his rural Kentucky home came through his work in the mines and on construction crews, where likely both white and Black laborers from across the southeast were crossing paths and inadvertently sharing musical cultures, as evidenced by Holcomb’s “Mississippi Heavy Water Blues” or the instrumental “Knife Guitar.”

Although his music is no secret to most traditional enthusiasts (Bob Dylan, Eric Clapton, and The Stanley Brothers have all cited him on many occasions), Roscoe Holcomb remains to this day the first “gateway artist” I recommend to anyone trying to discover this largely unknown, yet vibrant, world of American music.

* To learn more about J. P. Harris or to check out his latest record Don’t You Marry No Railroad Man, releasing on June 25, visit www.ilovehonkytonk.com.

J. P. Harris’ Dreadful Wind and Rain featuring Chance McCoy with a nice rendition of “Mole in the Ground.”