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 DeFord
Bailey: A Legend Lost
This special was aired on PBS three years ago, but
the online biography and music clips are worth checking into.
DeFord Bailey was the most influential harmonica player in
the first half of the 20th century. Second to Dave Macon as the most
favorite performer on the Grand Ole Opry, he performed for 15 seasons from
1925 through 1940. Despite such acclaim, DeFord died quietly without
recognition of his place in American music history. Read about his life and
listen to some of his music at the PBS website:
http://www.pbs.org/deford/index.html
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 American
Memory From The Library Of Congress
The Library of Congress is not only the nation's oldest federal cultural institution,
it is also the largest library in the world, with millions of resource items
in its collections. An increasing number of these are becoming available for
experiencing online at the Library Of Congress website. One section of the
site called American Memory provides free and open access to historic
maps, photos, documents, audio and video. A subsection titled Culture,
Folklife includes 35 collections of articles, photographs, video,
and music recordings in that category. Among these is a collection titled Fiddle
Tunes of the Old Frontier: The Henry Reed Collection.
Henry Reed was a fiddler from Monroe County, West Virginia,
who lived from 1884 to 1968. He never performed as a professional musician,
or recorded commercially, but has become known for preserving the music
of his life and his culture through these archival recordings, now
accessible for everyone to hear online. Read articles, view photographs of
his life, listen to over 200 audio files of Henry playing his tunes recorded
by folklorist Alan Jabbour in 1966-67. Also view a video of Mr. Jabbour
demonstrating Henry's bowing technique.
Be sure to also explore the many other collections available
from the Library. Other topics include:
African-American
Music from Southern U.S. recorded 1938-1943
Northern California Folk Music from the Thirties Collected by Sidney Robertson Cowell
Folk Music from the Dust Bowl: 1940-1941
Folk Music about Life on the Ohio and Erie Canal
The John and Ruby Lomax 1939 Southern States Recording Trip
1940's Hispano Music & Culture from the Northern Rio Grande: The Juan B. Rael Collection.
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Slim Bryant,
Country Music Legend and Local TV Pioneer Celebrates 100th!
Slim Bryant is a country guitarist and songwriter with a
performance career stretching back over 75 years. He is known by
many Pittsburghers for having performed on the first television program to
air in this city, a musical variety show broadcast live on WDTV (later to
become KDKA TV) from the Syria Mosque in Oakland in 1949.
Thomas Hoyt "Slim" Bryant was born in Atlanta,
Georgia, on December 7, 1908. His father was an electrician who played
old-time fiddle, and his mother was an amateur poet who sang, played guitar
and piano. Slim's music career took off in 1931 when he joined up with
Clayton McMichen and the band that would soon become The Georgia
Wildcats.
Bryant and his band came to Pittsburgh's KDKA radio in August, 1940 and
played on "The Farm Show'' every morning until 1959. The group
harmonized, sometimes crooned and could play styles from ballads to polkas
to novelties. "We played, gave news and market reports for the
farmers,'' he explained. It was a time when the radio and record industry were
young, and automobiles were making it possible for itinerant musicians to
tour like never before. They were part of the first generation of country
music "professionals" who could earn a living in the recording and
performing business.
Bryant is also
best known for his recording days with the legendary
country singer Jimmie Rodgers, who died in 1933. Rodgers recorded Bryant's
song "Mother, the Queen of My Heart," on Oct. 21, 1932 with Bryant
accompanying him on guitar. The song has since been done by singers ranging
from George Gobel to Merle Haggard. In addition to the Georgia Wildcats and
Jimmie Rodgers, Bryant has performed with The Skillet Lickers, Gene Autry,
Eddy Arnold, Tex Ritter, Les Paul, Joe Negri, Burl Ives, Rosemary Clooney
and Snooky Lanson, many of them he still counts as friends.
 Slim Bryant
has written about 200 songs, including country western
standards, as well as jingles for ad agencies. With his Wildcats he recorded
hundreds of songs for a variety of labels, more than 180 of them at NBC in
New York. A CD recording featuring Slim's music was released in the Spring
of 2007. The CD contains 31 songs that were recorded more than a
half-century ago. Slim wrote music and or words for a number of them, among
the tunes are these titles: "Thunderstorm" "Penny Ante
Polka" and "My Saddle, My Bronco and You.''
When the music business slowed in the early 1960's Slim and his
wife Mary Jane opened a card shop and a basement studio on Potomac Avenue in
Dormont. Mrs. Bryant died of a
neurological disease in 1987. Slim currently resides in Dormont.
On his 100th birthday, Slim will be honored at an open
celebration at his church,
Dormont Presbyterian Church
Sunday, Dec 7 at 12 noon
2865 Espy Ave Pittsburgh, PA 15216 (412) 531-1555
or you can send birthday greetings to:
Slim Bryant
3053 Earlsmere Ave
Pittsburgh, PA 15216-1818
Follow these links for more about the life of Hoyt "Slim" Bryant:
WQED Multimedia TV OnQ
Pittsburgh
Tribune-Review, May 19, 2007
Vintage country recordings released on CD
Pittsburgh
Post Gazette, May 10, 2007
Slim Bryant, 98, returning to country music with CD
Pittsburgh Magazine December 2006
Our Own Country Music Legend Turns 98 This Month
Pittsburgh
Post Gazette, August 11, 2002
A Life in tune The real Slim's heyday
(This site has some audio clips of Slim's songs, and interview)
The
Old Time Herald Vol. 8, No. 5
The Varied Musical Career of Slim Bryant—93 Years Young
Thomas Hoyt Slim Bryant -
Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Clayton McMichen and his Georgia Wildcats on their
first visit to KDKA in 1931.
From left: Pat Berryman, Clayton McMichen, Johnny Barfield and Slim Bryant.
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 Websites
provide great resource for old time tunes
Here are just a few of a growing
number of sites where you can find old time tunes online.
Jehile
Kirkhuff.com Jehile
Kirkhuff from Susquehanna County (Northeast Pa.) was 1954 World
Champion Old-Time Fiddler (Crockett, Texas contest) About
270 of his tunes are available here as mp3 downloads, with more details of
his life. Posted by old time musicians Ed and Geraldine Berbaum.
The
Jim Bryner Tapes Background information on Dunbar, Pa.
fiddler Jim "Ike" Bryner and mp3 files, posted by Ken Mort, the
grandson of a close friend of Jim's.
Hetzler's
Fakebook presents hundreds of fiddle tunes in MIDI format, a
file system that can easily be played by computers with synthesized sound.
Unlike mp3s, which are compressed versions of live recordings, MIDI uses a
much smaller amount of file space, but the sound is computer generated,
like listening to an old fashioned music box. However, I find the versions
of tunes on this site to be very well done, capturing a fun spirit that
makes the tunes work. At the very least, it is a fine resource for helping
to remember how a tune goes, or motivating you to find a live version of
tunes that you find interesting. Another advantage of MIDI is that it can
be converted to sheet music, the software for this is also available for
download here.
http://www.live365.com/stations/68948?play
Live 365 is an online radio site that
provides individuals with the means to upload their favorite music
collections for the rest of us to share. For a number of years Dale Walter
has been running an Old Time broadcast he calls "Rats Won't Stay
Where There's Music" It's a great mix of old and new
recordings featuring selections like: Birmingham
- Pope's
Arkansas Mountaineers, Hawk Shot a Buzzard - Dave Bing
, Jenny
on the Railroad - Bob Carlin and John Hartford, Old Molly
Hare - Franklin George, and
many many more great classics. Just follow the link and enjoy. It's free
to listen to, just requires some sign up.
Do you know any other
great websites with Old Time music broadcasts or MP3's? Send them to mail@newoldtimes.com
and we'll post them on this page. If you would like to include your
personal reviews that would be even better!
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 Charlie
Poole reviewed on NPR's "Fresh Air"
WHYY, May 16, 2005
- Rock historian Ed Ward reviews a three-disc release of a Charlie
Poole recording from the 1930s. The record, You Ain't Talkin' To Me,
is from the Columbia Legacy label.
Listen to the broadcast stored on NPR's website http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4653453
YOU AIN’T TALKIN’ TO ME was compiled and produced for
reissue by Henry Sapoznik, who brings to the project his expertise as a
professional musician (adept at banjo and guitar) in the old time and
klezmer fields. As an award-winning author, producer, archivist, historian
and radio producer he also wrote the definitive 6,000 word liner note
essay that completes the package. Additionally, Sapoznik commissioned
noted illustrator R. Crumb to create the cover art for the box set.
"Charlie Poole (1892-1931) was the prototypical
rough-and-tumble, hard-living – and prematurely dying – country
performer," Sapoznik writes. "Like Jimmie Rodgers and Hank
Williams, he sang his life, and his fans idolized him for it. But the
recordings collected here reveal something far more profound: Charlie
Poole’s role as the patron saint of modern country music."
 YOU
AIN’T TALKIN’ TO ME: CHARLIE POOLE AND THE ROOTS OF COUNTRY MUSIC (Columbia/Legacy
C3K 92780)
DISC 1
1. Shootin’ Creek 2. Baltimore Fire 3. Leaving Home 4.
There’ll Come a Time 5. White House Blues 6. The Highwayman 7. Hungry
Hash House 8. The Letter That Never Came 9. Take A Drink On Me 10. Husband
and Wife Were Angry One Night 11. Ramblin’ Blues 12. Took My Gal A-Walkin’
13. Old and Only In the Way 14. Don’t Let Your Deal Go Down Blues 15.
Bill Mason 16. A Kiss Waltz 17. Flop Eared Mule 18. A Trip to New York
Part 1 19. Sweet Sixteen 20. Write a Letter to My Mother 21. If the River
Was Whiskey 22. Mother’s Last Farewell Kiss 23. Milwaukee Blues 24.
Where the Whippoorwill is Whispering Good-night
DISC 2
1. The Girl I Left in Sunny Tennessee 2. Sunny Tennessee
3. The Bulldog Down in Sunny Tennessee 4. Moving Day 5. It’s Movin’
Day 6. Home Sweet, Home 7. I’m the Man That Rode the Mule ‘Round the
World 8. Man That Rode the Mule Around the World 9. Lynchburg Town 10.
Going Down to Lynchburg Town –Intro 11. Some One 12. Monkey on a String
13. Monkey on a String 14. Can I Sleep In Your Barn Tonight Mister 15. May
I Sleep In Your Barn Tonight, Mister 16. Married Life Blues 17. The
Infanta March 18. Sunset March 19. I’ll Roll In My Sweet Baby’s Arms
20. Goodbye Eliza Jane 21. Good-bye Sweet Liza Jane 22. Good-Bye Booze 23.
Goodbye Booze 24. You Ain’t Talking To Me 25. You Ain’t Talkin’ to
Me-
DISC 3
1. If I Lose, I Don’t Care 2. The Battleship of Maine 3.
Budded Rose 4. Standing By a Window 5. Uncle Dave’s Beloved Solo 6. Come
Take a Trip in My Airship 7. I Once Loved a Sailor 8. Dixie Medley from
"Spooning and Ballooning" 9. My Wife, She Has Gone And Left Me
10. My Wife Went Away and Left Me 11. Baby Rose 12. Just Keep Waiting Till
the Good Time Comes 13. Shuffle Feet, Shuffle 14. Coon From Tennessee 15.
Coon From Tennessee 16. On the Banks Of The Kaney 17. Dixie Medley 18.
Southern Medley 19. The Man Who Wrote Home Sweet Home Never Was a Married
Man 20. Sweet Sunny South 21. Take Me Back to the Sweet Sunny South 22.
Oh! Didn’t He Ramble 23. He Rambled
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 "The
Appalachians"
3 Part Documentary Aired on WQED
http://www.wnpt.net/about/news/appalachian_news.html
THE APPALACHIANS THE DRAMATIC HISTORY OF A LAND AND ITS
PEOPLE, TOLD IN STORY AND SONG
The story of the Appalachian Mountains is the story of
America: immigration, settlement, the Revolution and the Civil War, the
growth of industry and the use and abuse of land. Appalachia has also had
a great impact on American music, folklore and culture, giving birth to
what we know today as country music.
THE APPALACHIANS is a three-hour documentary which aired on
public television stations nationwide beginning April 1, 2005.
Following an historical chronology, the narrative thread features the
colorful writings of common people and historical figures. Personal
stories are told on camera by people whose families have lived in
Appalachia for generations. Along with comments from historians, artists
such as Johnny Cash, Ricky Skaggs, Loretta Lynn and a host of others help
to tell this remarkable story through word and song .
For a more detailed description of the series, visit http://www.wnpt.net/about/news/appalachian_news.html
To view a trailer online, or to buy the dvd, cd or book
visit http://www.wnpt.net/appalachians/
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 Carter
Family Documentary Aired on PBS: American Experience
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/carterfamily/index.html
One of the most influencial music groups in the early days
of American country music is the focus of a PBS documentary airing the
week of May 8, 2005. The Carter Family is responsible for writing many
well known songs such as Wabash Cannonball, and I'm Thinking Tonight Of My
Blue Eyes, and popularizing many others others such as Will The Circle Be
Unbroken, and Keep On The Sunnside. Their pre-bluegrass folk style created
an audience and set the stage for much of the bluegrass and country music
that would develop in the years following the depression of the 1930s.
The shows airs in the Pittsburgh area Monday night 5/9/05
at 9:00 PM, then again 5/11/05 at 2:00AM and 4:00AM (set your vcr.) An
online description of the program can be viewed at http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/carterfamily/index.html
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