Tag: Bluegrass & Old-Time Music

Rural Black String Band Music

By Charles Wolfe

Originally published in Black Music Research Newsletter 4, No. 2 (Fall 1980). Used by permission of Mary Dean Wolfe.

“The first time I think I ever seen Arnold Schultz … this square dance was at Rosine, Kentucky, and Arnold and two more colored fellows come up there and played for the dance. They had a guitar, banjo, and fiddle. Ar­nold played the guitar but he could play the fiddle-numbers like Sally Goodin. People loved Arnold so well all through Kentucky there; if he was playing a guitar they’d go gang up around him till he would

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Industrial Strength Bluegrass from Ohio

By Neil V. Rosenberg

From an essay published in a booklet distributed at the Dayton Bluegrass Reunion (“An All-Star Salute to Dayton’s 40 Year Bluegrass Legacy”) on April 22, 1989. Performers included Paul “Moon” Mullins and Traditional Grass, Noah Crase, The Hotmud Family, The Allen Brothers, Red Allen, Porter Church, Red Spurlock, The Dry Branch Fire Squad, Larry Sparks, Frank Wakefield, David Harvey and the Osborne Brothers. Used by permission.

Tonight’s concert honors two generations of Dayton musicians who played major roles in creating and popularizing urban bluegrass music.  Cityfolk hopes that this evening, Daytonians will rediscover an important facet

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In Praise of Banjo Picking Women by Mike Seeger

When one thinks of the banjo today what generally comes to mind is a picture of a man in an ensemble playing serious, often jazz-like music based on a style initiated by the most influential and widely imitated banjoist of all time, Earl Scruggs. This style is barely 50 years old and has involved a long evolution since the gourd instrument that came here from Africa in the 17th and 18th centuries. That instrument was handmade from whatever organic materials would be available. The sound was quiet often solo but soon after Africans were brought here as slaves they no

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Footprints in the Snow Lyrics

Footprints in the Snow

Some folks like the summertime when they can walk about,
Strolling through the meadow green, it’s pleasant there’s no doubt,
But give me the wintertime when the snow is on the ground,
For I found her when the snow was on the ground.

Chorus:
I traced her little footprints in the snow,
I found her little footprints in the snow,
I bless that happy day, that Nelly lost her way,
For I found her when the snow was on the ground.

I dropped in to see her, there was a big round moon,
Her mother said

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“West Virginia, My Home” A Visit With Hazel Dickens Interview by John Lilly

hazelSongwriter and performer Hazel Dickens is among the most respected and celebrated folk or country music artists to come from West Virginia. She has recorded 11 albums, contributed to the soundtracks of nine feature films or videos – including such popular releases as Matewan and Songcatcher – and seen her songs recorded by artists such as Dolly Parton, Johnny Cash, New Riders of the Purple Sage, Hot Rize, and others. Among the many honors and awards she has received is the prestigious National Heritage Fellowship, presented to her by the National Endowment for the Arts in 2001.

Born in 1935

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“Keep a-Goin’” Musician Everett Lilly of Clear Creek, West Virginia by John Lilly. Photograph by Michael Keller

everett_lilly_089pBorn in 1924, musician Everett Lilly has been going strong for nearly 85 years, living just a stone’s throw from the Clear Creek property where he was born. A casual observer might not realize that Everett, together with his late brother “B,” traveled the world over, performing and promoting the music of his Raleigh County home.

The Lilly Brothers, playing with neighbor Don Stover, introduced countless new fans to the down-home music of southern West Virginia at the peak of their popularity during the mid- to late 1960’s. Singing tight, “brother” harmonies and playing at a breakneck tempo on guitar,

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Log Cabin Music: ‘Little Log Cabin in the Lane’ + Lyrics

By Wayne Erbsen

Now and then I write a column called “Log Cabin Music” for several bluegrass music magazines. I don’t call it that fer nuthin’. In fact, my wife Barbara and I own two log cabins. The one that sits next to our primary residence in Asheville, North Carolina, is home to our business, “Log Cabin Cooking & Music.” In the retro kitchen of this 1940s cabin, Barbara teaches workshops in old-timey Appalachian cooking on our 1928 Home Comfort wood cookstove. In some of the classes she uses our rock fireplace to teach hearth cooking skills.

The large and

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The Secret Signals of Musicians

By Wayne Erbsen

It’s Saturday night. Instead of relaxing safe at home plopped comfortably in front of your big screen TV, you’ve got your hind quarters parked squarely on a hard folding chair. If that’s the case, chances are you’re either at a festival watching your favorite bluegrass band, or perhaps you’re huddled under a tarp in the pouring rain jamming with friends or total strangers at a fiddlers convention. Either way, you often witness secret or not-so-secret signals or cues from one musician to the rest of the group to alert them that a song or tune is about

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“We Always Tried to Be Good People”: Respectability, Crazy Water Crystals, and Hillbilly Music on the Air, 1933-1935 by Pamela Grundy

If you are easily exhausted, or too nervous, you have headaches or backaches or can’t sleep as you should, if your complexion is sallow or your tongue coated; maybe you’re just being warned by Nature that the troubles with far more serious names may be on the way. Faulty elimination, the sluggish and delayed passage of waste throughout the system, causes many serious disorders, disorders with all kinds of names…. Don’t give up to pain and illness…. Why all you need is determination, ordinary drinking water, and Crazy Water Crystals. Won’t you try it? -Crazy Water Crystals radio advertisement.

From

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Mountains of Songs

By Wayne Erbsen

Hank Williams was once quoted as saying, “You got to have smelt a lot of mule manure before you can sing like a hillbilly.” If Hank was right, then what I did today puts me over the top into the ranks of genuine hillbillies.

It all started when I got back from a week of fiddling and singing at the Appalachian Stringband Festival in Clifftop, West Virginia. After I barely had a chance to settle into my normal routine at home, my wife, Barbara, said she had a “honey do” list for me. The good news was

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