In the Summer of 1927

by Dave Winship

In the summer of 1927, the Bristol newspapers were still heralding the flight of Charles Lindbergh across the Atlantic. New technological developments were having impacts on this part of the southern region. Musicians from the region had been recording mountain music since 1923, but they had to travel to New York and New Jersey studios to do it. The Fiddlin' Powers Family from Scott County had already recorded several records. Henry Whitter, from Fries, VA, along with fiddler G.B. Grayson, had produced notable recordings, such as "The Wreck of the Old Southern 97." Ernest Stoneman of Galax, VA had become very popular with the enterprising record producer Ralph Peer as a musician who could bring the music of the southern mountain region to the studios of the north.

Peer recognized the possibilities of this mountain music sound. Record playing machines were becoming popular, both with electricity in the urban regions and with hand-cranks in the non-electrified areas of the country, and the technology of recording this music had developed so that portable recording studios were possible. Peer decided to pack the recording equipment into a car and travel to the southern Appalachian region and find new talent. He knew of the region and decided that Bristol, a thriving town on the Tennessee-Virginia border, was to be the first stop on the recording tour.

The mountains clearly held musical talent, and Peer simply had to find a way of drawing it off the front porches. He arranged to set up the studio on the second floor of the Taylor-Christian Hat Company warehouse at 410 State Street. He then placed advertisements in local newspapers that announced the Victor Recording Company was coming to town. These notices were also inserted in the advertisements for the local dealer of the Victrola company, the Clark-Jones-Sheeley Co. at 621 State Street. Accompanying these notices were news articles stating that "In no other section of the south have the pre-war melodies and old mountaineer songs been better preserved than in the mountains of East Tennessee and Southwest Virginia...and it is primarily for this reason that the Victrola Company chose Bristol as its operating base..." The news articles also mention that in the previous year, Ernest Stoneman had received $3,600 in royalties from the records which he had made. In 1927, like today, money talked, and musicians who had struggled to make a living on the hillside farms and the coal mines decided that they were quite capable of making music like Stoneman, and they came to record in Bristol.

The recording sessions began with Ernest Stoneman and some of his friends on July 25, 1927. Stoneman recorded with various combinations of these friends, including Eck Dunford, Mooney Brewer, under the name of the Dixie Mountaineers which included, among others, his wife Hattie. They recorded gospel and traditional songs, such as "Are You Washed in the Blood" and "Skip to Ma Lou." They also recorded more comical ones like "Mountain Courtship" and "Corn Shuckin'," which required the fluid lubrication of a good jug of whisky which was passed around. Succeeding days of recording included Henry Whitter, gospel preacher and singer Albert Karnes, Ernest Phillips and His Holiness Quartet, B.F. Shelton, El Watson, Blind Alfred Reed from West Virginia, the vaudeville duo the Johnson Brothers, J.P. Nextor and Norman Edmonds, a group of Coeburn musicians which included Charles McReynolds, the grandfather of contemporary bluegrass musicians Jim and Jesse McReynolds, Dad Blackard and the Shelors, the Alcoa Quartet, Mr. & Mrs. J.W. Baker, Red Snodgrass, the West Virginia Coonhunters, and a church choir from the Bluff City area.

The word of the recording sessions spread westward from Bristol a short distance to Maces Spring, Virginia, where A.P. Carter periodically ran a country store and sometimes sold fruit trees. He also sang music with his wife Sara and his sister-in-law Maybelle. Responding to the lure of recording, Carter and his family made the 30 mile journey to Bristol, fording the Holston River and fixing several flat tires on his old Essex automobile before arriving in Bristol. The Carter Family recorded on August 1 & 2 for Peer, including "Bury me Beneath the Willow," "The Storm is on the Ocean," and "Single Girl, Married Girl."

Word of the recording sessions also reached the Asheville, North Carolina area, where the Jimmie Rodgers Entertainers were playing on radio stations and in clubs. Rodgers, along with Bristolians Claude and Jack Grant and Jack Pierce, decided to come to record in Bristol. They were able to stay in a hotel on State Street across from the converted warehouse studio, because it was run by one of the band member's relatives. But on the night before the schedule recording session August 4, the band members disagreed about how the group would be called and finally they decided that Rodgers would record solo and the other band members, with some help from Claude Slagle, would record as the Tenneva Ramblers. Rodgers' recordings for the sessions included a song from World War I and a lullaby, which included a haunting yodel that Peer recognized as unique.

From these recording sessions came the discovery of the first country music "stars" and these "Bristol Sessions" mark the beginning of what became country music. Jimmie Rodgers and The Carter Family both had successful careers as well as influenced future generations of musicians. This influence has been felt from State Street in Bristol around the globe and many points in between. Tennessee Ernie Ford, who grew up in Bristol and started his career at WOPI radio, carried his roots with him to California. The radio shows of the 1940's and 1950's, such as Farm and Fun Time and Barrel of Fun, launched many careers of regional musicians such as the Stanley Brothers, Mac Wiseman and others, which led to the development of bluegrass and contemporary country music.

And the influence continues. Each Saturday night, The Carter Fold, located at the old AP Carter Store in Hiltons, Virginia, hosts family-style, old-time music. Many other local venues have regular old-time, bluegrass and country music events. At East Tennessee State University, the unique bluegrass and country music program has nurtured contemporary talent such as Kenny Chesney, and band members for Allison Krauss' Union Station and Blue Highway. Innumerable informal pickin' sessions year-round, as well as summer-time fiddlers conventions and contests, provide support training and opportunities for the music which grew from the mountains and spread around the globe like mountain laurel.