The bluegrass and old time country songs on this CD represent an interesting cross-section of the traditional music of the rural South. Some are time-honored folk songs; others are more recent compositions by country artists of the 1940s and 1950s. Some songs were taken from the early recordings of the Monroe Brothers and, subsequent to 1939, Bill Monroe and His Bluegrass Boys; others come from the Stanley Brothers, recorded in 1949-1950 in the classic Bluegrass style. We've also included a Jimmy Rodgers original and a train-imitation fiddle tune after an early recording of J.E. Mainer and Steve Ledford.

That oral tradition played such an important role in the development of early rural American music invites interesting speculation as to the sources and antecedents of some of these early recordings from whence we draw our material. On an old 78 rpm recording, Clarence 'Tom' Ashley frails the banjo and sings what he calls 'Dark Holler Blues'. The song was later recorded by the Stanley Brothers as 'East Virginia'. Ashley, who lived near Mountain City, Tennessee, started his musical career around 1911 with a travelling medicine show. In the 1930s he was a member of the Carolina Tar Heels, and ten years later he had occasion to travel as comedian with his favorite band, Charlie Monroe's Kentucky Partners, a group which at that time included Lester Flatt. And it was during this time period that Ashley claims to have had the opportunity to perform with the Stanley Brothers at several of their engagements on the Virginia-Tennessee state line.

Later, during the folk revival of the 1960s, Ashley was to renew his career in a group that included Doc Watson. Lester McFarland and Robert Gardner, better known as Mac and Bob, were a mandolin and guitar duet enrolled as students at the Kentucky School for the Blind in 1915. They were eventually to develop one of the more extensive repertoires in country music, including a ditty called 'What Does the Deep Sea Say?', recorded in 1926 by the Monroe Brothers as 'Where is My Sailor Boy?'. In a similar vein, the Monroe Brothers are said to have gleaned 'Feast Here Tonight' from another old time recording group, the Prairie Ramblers. This quintet, which in the 1930s included Patsy Montana on fiddle, was also part of the National Barn Dance, a Saturday night radio show on Chicago station WLS, where the Monroe Brothers worked part time as exhibition dancers.

Bill and Charlie Monroe hailed from Rosine, Kentucky. Their father, J.B. 'Buck' Monroe, had been a fine backstep dancer, and their mother, Melissa, played fiddle and accordion. But it was Bill Monroe's Uncle Pen Vandiver who was to influence the development of the young Monroe's fine mandolin style, so closely geared to the fiddle. Orphaned at the age of 16, Bill was taken under the wing of this crack Kentucky fiddler. "From Uncle Pen I learned to keep the timin' straight out right," recalled Monroe. At country dances during these formative years Bill was to spend time playing guitar behind a local Black coal miner named Arnold Schultz. It was most probably amidst these fiddle- saturated environs that the seed was planted for Bill to be able translate the bow technique and the left hand fingering from the fiddle to the mandolin. Today it is Monroe, more than any other traditional Bluegrass player, who continues to exude in his handling of the fiddle tunes the old time mountain style that stems from the earlier Celtic fiddle and pipe music. Throughout his long career it has always been of prime importance for Bill to "really play the old time notes that's in a fiddle number."

Leaving their oil refinery jobs and part-time square dancing positions, the Monroe Brothers began their professional careers in 1934, working at State WKFNF in Shenandoah, Iowa. Later in Omaha under the managerial skills of the shrewd salesman and honey-voiced announcer Byron Parker, who often sang bass on their Gospel numbers, the Monroes gained popularity as they moved from station to station, mostly in Georgia and the Carolinas. Their appeal was based on a drive and excitement which in no way compromised the rural roots of their music. In just two years, 1936- 1938, they recorded 60 songs for RCA Victor, 10 in each of six recording sessions.

When the Monroe Brothers parted company in 1939, Bill formed his famous Bluegrass Boys, a training ground for a group of Bluegrass musicians which was to include such greats as Lester Flatt, Earl Scruggs, Carter Stanley, and many more. It was during this pivotal year that Bill Monroe claims to have started the Bluegrass music. "These boys helped out, but I started Bluegrass in 1939." At the same time there is no question that Bill, along with brother Charlie, had for nearly a decade foreshadowed the phenomenon known today as Bluegrass music.

Shortly after the 'dawning of Blugrass', the Stanley Brothers began their professional careers, hot on Monroe's heels. Of the 22 songs they recorded for Columbia in the 1940s, most were composed by older brother Carter Stanley. Like much of Monroe's music, the theme of their material was pointed up by their high lonesome sound in the tradition of the often fatalistic Southern ballad. On these Stanley Brother recordings Pee Wee Lambert sang a third harmony and played a mandolin style heavily influenced by that of Monroe.

While focusing on the selections for this recording, we shouldn't neglect the obvious impact made by Jimmy Rodgers, the father of country music. He had a profound effect on Bluegrass as well as the country music field as a whole. By the time of this Mississippian's death at the age of 35 in 1933, he had recorded 111 titles for RCA Victor in just six years. Thirteen of these sides were his 'blue yodels', a genre that was to hold obvious appeal for the young Bill Monroe. Rodgers' immense popularity stemmed from the fact that his plaintive songs related to an extremely wide spectrum of the human condition, from railroad hobos to unrequited love to poolroom and barroom rowdies. Jimmie Rodgers was to become the first big commercial success in the country music field; he cut his first test records for RCA Victor in 1927, during the same week in which the Carter Family made their first recordings in Bristol, Tennessee.

Through brother Charlie's record collection and by attentive listening to the radio, Bill Monroe was able and careful to preserve these influences in his youthful memory. And although he was to become a prolific song writer, he has continued throughout his recording career to draw from some choice material written by others.

As the bridge of Bluegrass joining country and city has grown wider and wider over the last seventy-five years, too often have the roots of this great form of country music become obscured. For this reason we sincerely hope that while enjoying this musical spread we have prepared for you, you are also able to feast on some of the hints and glimpses of that old time musical style reminiscent of the early years of Bluegrass music. Those formative years were so important in the development of such a wonderful style of musical expression.

~Skip Gorman

1. 'Way Downtown (traditional). This song has been in my repertoire for quite some time. Doc Watson told me that he learned it from Fred Price; I've tried to recreate Doc's approach here. RS
2. Cindy (traditional). I learned this old song from an early recording of the great Blue Sky Boys. SG
3. Dark Hollow (Bill Browning; Fort Knox Music, Island Music, BMI). I've sometimes heard this song referred to as 'Dark Hollow Blues', on recordings of Bill Monroe with Pete Rowan, and also on a recording of the group Muleskinner with Clarence White, Bill Keith, Dave Grisman and Pete Rowan. RS
4. In the Pines (traditional). I was introduced to the early Bluegrass Boys' RCA Camden recording of this old folk song at about the same time I heard Joan Baez sing it at the Newport Folk Festival in the early 1960s. I especially like the way Rich puts his blues talents to work on this one. SG
5. New Camptown Races (Frank Wakefield). I learned this tune firsthand from its composer, Frank Wakefield, when I traveled with him as guitarist in 1969. Rich and I agree that one of the finest bluegrass albums ever assembled was the early Folkways album of Red Allen and Frank Wakefield with Bill Keith, on which they feature this tune.We've rearranged it with Rich adapting it for guitar. SG
6. Weeping Willow. I'm told that the author of this beautiful song is A.P. Carter, and it certainly sounds like it. I first heard the Monroe Brothers do this on an early RCA Camden release. SG
7. Sittin' on Top of the World (traditional). I've always heard this as sort of a blues number, and tried combining some of my own ideas with some of Doc Watson's. RS
8. East Tennessee Medley (traditional). In this mix you might hear fiddlin' Fred Price's 'East Tennessee Blues' with an extra beat. Or you might catch the 'East Tennessee Rag' of Chet Atkins, Homer and Jethro and Doc Watson, or Flatt, Scruggs and Doc's 'Nothin' To It'.
9. Who Will Sing? (traditional). From a recording of the Stanley Brothers.
10. Kentucky Waltz (Bill Monroe, Peer International, BMI). Bill Monroe recorded this in 1945 with Chubby Wise, String Bean and Wilene Forrester. One of my favorites. RS
11. Dallas Rag (traditional). This fine rag was learned from the New Lost City Ramblers.
12. Cora is Gone (traditional). I first heard Lester Flatt sing this song on a Mercury recording. SG
13. Feast Here Tonight (traditional). From the Monroe Brothers by way of the Prairie Ramblers.
14. Nine Pound Hammer (traditional). Recorded by the Monroe Brothers for RCA Victor, 1936.
15. Katy Hill (traditional). Fiddler Art Wooten's fine bow work on the early Bluegrass Boys' Camden recording of this number has always been dear to my heart. I've also been inspired more than once by Joe Green's fine fiddling of this tune at the festival in Berryville, Virginia. SG
16. I'm Blue and Lonesome (James B. Smith). Recorded by Bill Monroe for Decca in 1950.
17. East Virginia (traditional). Our version comes from the Stanley Brothers, which in turn most likely came from Clarence 'Tom' Ashley.
18. Rough and Rowdy Ways (Jimmie Rodgers). Recorded by Jimmie Rodgers in the 1930s.
19. Dixon County Blues (traditional). I learned this song from an early 78 rpm recording of Arthur Smith, who fiddled with Sam and Kirk McGee in the early days of the Grand Ole Opry. I have a hunch that the tune's origins are deep in the early Black string band repertoire. SG
20. Back to the Old Home (Jimmie Rodgers). Another gem from Jimmie Rodgers.
21. Where is My Sailor Boy? (traditional). From Lester McFarland and Robert Gardner, by way of Bill and Charlie Monroe.
22. Lonesome River (Carter Stanley). From a 1950 Columbia recording by the Stanley Brothers.
23. Tennessee Blues (Bill Monroe). The blues are dominant in this instrumental composition of Bill Monroe's, recorded for RCA Camden in 1940.
24. Alabama Waltz (Hank Williams). From a recording by Bill Monroe.
25. On Some Foggy Mountain Top (traditional). Recorded by the Monroe Brothers for RCA Victor in 1936.
26. New Lost Train Blues (traditional). From J.E. Mainer and His Mountaineers.

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