The Roots of Country, Part 5--Will My Mother Know Me There?

Johnson Oatman, Jr., writer of Will My Mother Know Me There?

Going-to-meet-my-mother-in-Heaven gospel songs were a dime a dozen in the late 1800s and early 1900s. The tradition might have faded quietly away had country (and, later, bluegrass gospel) not picked it up. But, once the genre became a country staple, new titles piled upon old faster than dust on dear old Mother's Bible--titles so memorable that I can think of three or four, at the most (O Mother, How We Miss You; Shake Hands with Mother Again; I Miss Mother and Dad; That Silver-Haired Mother of Mine). Now, I'm not singling out the Carter Family for blame--any number of early country artists recorded such songs. But they sure didn't help things. In fact, the "mother" title we're about to hear--Will My Mother Know Me There?--is associated with the Carter Family, though it was written in 1906 by Johnson Oatman, Jr. and William M. Golden and recorded four years earlier, in 1929, by the Old Southern Sacred Singers, whom we are about to hear:

http://box.net/public/lee/files/492555.html Will My Mother Know Me There? (Oatman-Golden), Old Southern Sacred Singers, 1929 (from Brunswick 78).

A very nice song, really, but the mother-in-Heaven theme was getting old even by 1906. It's possible that it would have joined Mother in the skies had the Carters, et al, not extended its time on this world below. Of course, what would Carl Story, Jim and Jesse, and countless other bluegrass gospel acts have used for album filler?

Lee

The Roots of Country, Part 4--Will the Circle Be Unbroken?

As I was starting this entry, I came across a transcript of "The Carter Family: Will the Circle Be Unbroken" segment of PBS' American Experience in which Bill Clifton is quoted as saying, "When he (A.P. Carter) fixed them up he fixed them up right. Everybody who sings Will the Circle Be Unbroken sings the way A.P. fixed it up. And they don't sing it the original way."

Which isn't close to being true--the "original" Circle has, in fact, co-existed for decades with the Carter steal. It has been recorded by the likes of The Blue Ridge Quartet, Burl Ives, The Pathfinders Quartet, and Pat Boone. And, prior to 1935, it appears to have been the only version that appeared on disc. It's been around longer than its copycat version, it has far more meaningful and elegant words, and its writers came up with the lyrics and melody the old-fashioned way: from scratch. So, naturally, PBS prefers A.P.'s fixed-up version.

But we're about to hear the song sung the original way, courtesy of Bud Billings (aka Frank Luther) and Carson Robison, from a 1928 Victor recording. Well, not entirely the original way--here, the meter has been changed from 4/4 to 3/4 for reasons not known to this blogger. It works, so no reason for me to get broken up over it, I suppose.

http://box.net/public/lee/files/492398.html Will the Circle Be Unbroken (Ada R. Habershon-Charles H. Gabriel), Bud Billings-Carson Robison (1928), from Victor 78.

Circling around to the back of the 78, we encounter You'll Never Miss Your Mother Till She's Gone--an O.K. number, but pretty thin manna compared to its flip.

http://box.net/public/lee/files/492526.html You'll Never Miss Your Mother Till She's Gone, as above.

My eBay feedback for this 78 should have included, "The record was unbroken." But that didn't occur to me. The best lines always come too late.

Lee

The Roots of Elvis, Part 8

(Count Bingula commands you: "You vill rock vis ze Ames Brothers und Don Cherry!!")

By now, I'm so used to finding pre-Elvis rock and roll by "pop" artists, I can usually predict whether or not a given title will be rock and roll or something else. For example, when I spotted Candy Bar Boogie (Eight Bites to the Bar) on a Vocalion reissue of The Ames Brothers, I thought, "I'll bet this is rock and roll (as opposed to something else)." And I was right.

I can think of a couple of reasons why I was right. First of all, "boogie" was a codeword for r&r in the late 1940s and early 1950s, and even moreso when inserted into a title by a pop artist. Consequently, the word stands out. Also, the early 1950s was the time when Bill Haley and like-minded Western Swing guys were adopting the rocking shuffle beat of R&B in undiluted fashion, turning out records that sounded, as a rule, like big band charts made funky. Not that there were no Swing Era records that rocked--quite the reverse--but they were the exception to the rule. By 1952, however, a rocking beat was there to stay. And, so, four years before Elvis made his first pop-chart showing, the Ames Brothers were rocking, and rocking well (their ultra-smooth vocal mix aside):

http://box.net/public/lee/files/337776.html Candy Bar Boogie (Eight Bites to the Bar), The Ames Brothers, 1953.

No doubt, Elv-ologists will continue to insist that Elvis had to search in far, obscure corners for anything that sounded like rock and roll, but something tells me the Ames Brothers were all over the record stores in 1953.

www.doncherry.us/ features this Ed Sullivan quote: "Elvis Presley considered Don Cherry and Jerry Vale his two favorite singers." Neither would surprise me; Cherry's aggressive singing style, in particular, could easily have inspired the Pelv. And, on the flip side of his 1955 hit Band of Gold, Cherry rocked out in Bill Haley fashion with a number called Rumble Boogie. Gee, I wonder if the songwriter (one E. Curtis) was familiar with Rock Around the Clock?

http://box.net/public/lee/files/209858.html Rumble Boogie, Don Cherry, w. Ray Conniff and His Orch., 1955.

Please save, rather than open, files for the most player-friendly results. Thanks!

Lee

Life before the ragtime revival of 1973, Part One

As we've all been told any number of times, the 1973 hit The Sting reintroduced ragtime to the public. ("Public, ragtime. Ragtime, public."--Host. "Nice to meet you."--Ragtime. "Likewise. Er, have we met before?"--Public. "A long time ago."--Ragtime.)

The question we've all asked ourselves, many times, is, how did the public get along for decades and decades without ragtime? After all, the ragtime era ended in... 1920? Or thereabouts. So, we're talking 53 years between the end of ragtime and The Sting. Just what the heck did people listen to?

Wonder no more: MYPWHAE has located some of the records in question--tie-over sides, we might call them. Recordings that bridged the historical gap between ragtime, lack of ragtime, and the return of ragtime. We'll start with two:

http://box.net/public/lee/files/449078.html Maple Leaf Rag (Joplin), Lester Lanin and His Orchestra (1964). The public wouldn't meet Scott Joplin for another nine years; until then, they had Scott Joplin.

http://box.net/public/lee/files/457324.html Georgia Camp Meeting Cakewalk (Kerry Mills), Paul Whiteman and His Orchestra, 1959. Better-known as At a Georgia Campmeeting, this 1897 rag was one of the first ever published. It would do, until 1973 and the reintroduction of ragtime to the public.


















Lester Lanin (above), who presented Maple Leaf Rag to the public while it was waiting for the return of Scott Joplin.

To be continued....

(Please save, rather than open, files for best results. Thanks!)


Lee