Old Time Mandolin
patrick mcginley
a mandolin class with Tom Sauber, and it was wonderful.
I would like any help/information on Old Time mando, as much as anyone
has! I was in a band class with the great Paul Brown, and
he suggested listening to Verlin Clifton, and I bought every CD I
could find with Verlin on it. So if there are other mando players that
anyone can suggest (other than the obvious B.M.) please do.
Thanks,
Patrick
Lyle & Elizabeth Lofgren
As far as I'm concerned, definitive old-time mandolin is that played
by Gid Tanner and Ted Hawkins (playing in unison) on "Tanners Rag",
"Hawkins Rag", "Back Up and Push" and probably another piece I can't
remember. Document or someone else has reissued this stuff on CD.
The most important thing to learn while listening to this material is:
don't get too fancy. Don't practice too much. There's some Zen
message buried in old time music, but if I could explain it, it
wouldn't be true anymore.
Joel Shimberg
I'd like to add the mandolin playing of Harry West. Not string-band stuff,
but wonderful; crisp, clean, and inventive. Unfortunately, you have to look
hard to find much of it.
Whichever Lilly Brother it was ain't bad either.
Joel
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Joan Halloran
banjo player Don Stover or with Flatt & Scruggs at various times in the
50's, is about all anyone needs to know about old-time mandolin. And it
still is Everett Lilly as far as I know. Unless something has happened
recently, both Everett and Mitchell B. Lilly are still with us, although,
sadly, Donnie Stover died a couple of years ago after suffering several
strokes. I don't know if County still has the Lilly Bros. albums in print,
but there's at least one available from Smithsonian/Folkways. There were two
others on Prestige/Folklore in the 60's that Rounder reissued on vinyl some
years back, but I'm sure they are no longer available. Hope this helps a
little.
John Currie (using my wife's computer)
"Now, suppose we add up a little tune, here . . ." Charlie Poole, 1930
Joel Shimberg wrote in message <3b803...@corp.newsgroups.com>...
Paul
Classics Vol 1' Rounder CD 1050. This was first issued in 1989 and, as far
as I know, is still available. Unfortunately, there has been no sign of a
volume 2. It includes 'Tanner's Rag' mentioned elswhere in this thread.
paulS.
Darwin, Australia.
patrick mcginley <mcgi...@earthlink.net> wrote in message
news:c88601bc.01081...@posting.google.com...
Emil Faug
time player (and great singer) although nominally a bluegrass musician. I
would say (and he would too I'm sure) that a lot or most of his style
(except his trademark *slow* tremelo) is based on the playing of Bill Monroe
as the latter played when he was a Monroe Brother. I'm surprised no one's
mentioned Monroe, a sterling old time mandolin stylist and a great player of
old time fiddle tunes in a mandolin style. Some other fine old time mandolin
players that have not been mentioned yet are Bill Bolick of the Blue Sky
Boys, Mike Seeger, and four players living in California: Kenny Hall, Terry
Barrett, Jody Stecher and Eric Thompson. The latter two also play bluegrass
(on the oldtime side of the genre, as does Everett Lilly) but they each have
unique old time styles that make their inclusion on this list appropriate.
Don't forget Skip Gorman. These names came to mind right away. I don't mean
to exclude others.
Emil
Gail Gillespie
"note" style mandolin) is perfect with the Surry Co. big band sound.
Another person who played this way was Hoyle Jones, who can be heard with
the Smokey Valley Boys on their first recording (with the wonderful
Gilmer Woodruff on the banjo).
Gus Garelick
I'm not sure if Kenny Hall is well known outside of California, but he is
a phenomenal player who still uses the old round-back mandolins and never
uses picks (finger nails are just fine). He's 78 years old, totally
blind, and has been playing old time music since the mid-1930s. Vicki
Grey of San Diego transcribed a lot of his tunes and stories, and the
collection was published by Mel Bay. Kenny doesn't travel much anymore,
but two of his LPs from the early 70s (The Sweets Mill String Band) were
reissued on CD by Bay Records in Berkeley.
Another great old time mandolin player, but somewhat younger, is
Curtis Buckhannon, who plays with the Ill-Mo Boys in St. Louis. I've
never seen the band, but I really enjoy hearing him play fiddle tunes on
the band's two albums.
In West Virginia, one can check out Dave Bing, who usually plays
fiddle, but I think he's an excellent mandolin player and includes a few
mandolin tunes on some of his recordings..
Finally, there is a group in Charlottesville, Virginia, called Mando
Mafia, who do some very eclectic things on mandolins, mandolas, octave
mandolins etc. Basically old time fiddle tunes arranged for mandolins.
Great musicians.
GUS GARELICK
Joel Shimberg
"Gus Garelick" :
> I'm not sure if Kenny Hall is well known outside of California, but > he
For anybody who's curious, there's a pretty detailed write-up on Kenneth
Hall in Ray Lawless's 60s (I think) book on Folk [and folkie] Musicians.
Kerry Blech
Lots of good suggestions in this thread already. Let me add Chester
McMillian to the list, though he probably is now better known as
Nick's Dad and for his stellar and solid backup guitar work. He was
the mandolin player in Earnest East's Pine Ridge Boys for years.
Though he often played similarly to Verlin Clifton, as a rhythm
instrument, Chester and I had a long talk back in the early
1970s about Blue Ridge string band styles for mandolin and he
told me that he had often doubled the fiddle line on the mandolin
until it became more en vogue to just be a rhythm instrument,
probably (in my opinion) owing to the local preferances based
on bluegrass rhythm chops.
Jim Watson, who I believe came from a more bluegrassy
background, has some fine mandolin playing on early
Red Clay Rambler recordings, again, usually doubling
Bill Hicks' fiddling.
I think it is hard to beat R.O. Moseley's mandolin
(and banjo-mandolin) work on Leake County Reveler 78s
(reissued completely on Document and partially on County
CDs).
Chirps Smith is a great mandolinist, too, so don't
overlook him. He played mandolin, behind Garry Harrison's
fiddling, on the earlier recordings of the Indian Creek
Delta Boys. Chirps still trots it out on occasion.
These are all I can come up with at the moment
and off the top of my head (haven't had coffee yet,
sorry).
Best,
Kerry
Phil G-E
> Another great old time mandolin player, but somewhat younger, is
> Curtis Buckhannon, who plays with the Ill-Mo Boys in St. Louis. I've
> never seen the band, but I really enjoy hearing him play fiddle tunes on
> the band's two albums.
Also check out the Buchkannon Bros. "Little River Stomp". That
features Curtis and his brother playing lots of great old-time. Curtis
plays mando and his brother plays guitar. Curtis also plays/played
with his own contradance bands: "Cousin Curtis and the Cash Rebates"
and "Mahatma Gumbo and the Mandy Stompers" are two I remember. Curtis
was the person who inspired me to begin learning mandolin.
Sorry I don't have more detailed identifying info on the CD, it's
packed away somewhere - we just moved. I believe it was recorded and
produced in St. Louis by Paul Stammler about 10 years ago.
-Phil
Tribe
lively, almost ragtime tune called "High Sheriff" by the Aiken County String
Band. It features an incredibly hell-bent mandolin. Nothing in the liner
notes other than that they recorded in Winston-Salem in September of 1927.
Anyone know anything about them?
Tribe
Steve Goldfield
original recording (first Volo Bogtrotter's tape) of
his original and widely played tune, "Nail That
Catfish to a Tree." I guess that makes it a mandolin
tune. Similarly, "Waiting for Nancy" and "Nixon's
Farewell" are banjo tunes, though I think many people
think they are fiddle tunes. Both were written for fretless
banjo in C. I think "Needlecase" was also originally a
banjo tune (Sam McGee?).
That raises the interesting question of how many of
what are now commonly considered to be fiddle
tunes originate on the fiddle as opposed to other instruments
such as pipes and so forth.
Steve
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-------------------------------------------------------------
Steve Goldfield <stev...@best.com> * Oakland, California
* Home Page--<http://www.best.com/~stevesag/stevesag.html> *
I'm not over the hill. I am the hill.
Paul
of Tony Russell's vignettes on little-known old-time musicians 'Southern
Echoes' in an early edition of the spasmodically published '78 Quarterly' -
someone has suggested the quarterly refers to '4 times a century'.
Unfortunately I did not keep the exact reference. Anyhow this is what
Russell knows:
"This lively group recorded 6 sides for Okeh in Winston-Salem NC, September
19, 1927. In its lineup of banjo-mandolin and guitars and its predominantly
ragtime repertoire, it echoed the approach of Georgia's Scottsdale String
Band (also on Okeh), but from across the state line in South Carolina -
Aiken County is halfway down the western edge of that state, on the other
side of the Savannah River from Augusta, GA. Several of the groups tunes
have local titles: 'Carolina Stompdown' (OK 45153), Charleston Rag (OK
45219), 'Savanah River Stride' (OK 45294). Interpolations on harmonica and
bones suggest the band may have been bigger than a string trio, but research
in the area has so far failed to uncover anyone with more than a vague
recollection of it. Curiously, 'Charlston Rag' and its reverse, 'High
Sheriff', were issued in Britain on Parlophone - one of that label's very
few experiments with old-time music and a considerable rarity.
"The Emmett & Aiken String Band that recorded a single issued side for Okeh,
'Dance in the Light of the Moon' (OK 45022) was almost certainly a different
group, possibly to be identified with the Hoschton String Band mentioned
about that time in Atlanta newspapers (see Wayne Daniel's 'Pickin' on
Peachtree')".
paulS.
Darwin, Australia.
Tribe <johnc...@sprynet.com> wrote in message
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Paul
Artists 'Mandolin Blues' TCD 6004. These are 1960s recordings from Yank
Rachell, Carl Martin, Willie Hatcher, Ted Bogan and Johnny Young. It is a
good introduction to the use of the mandolin as a blues instrument and the
booklet has an excellent short essay by Frank Scott.
--paulS.
patrick mcginley <mcgi...@earthlink.net> wrote in message
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