Sounds of the South --Blue Ridge Mountain music --Roots of the blues --White spirituals --American folk songs for children --Negro church music --The Blues roll on.
210 The Old Hickory Cane / Mountain Ramblers, Cullen Galyean. Banjo,Guitar.
208 Big Ball in Boston (Big Ball in Cowtown) / Mountain Ramblers, Cullen Galyean. Banjo,Guitar.
211 John Brown / Hobart Smith. Banjo.
212 Poor Ellen Smith / Hobart Smith. Banjo.
213 Liza Jane / Mountain Ramblers. Banjo,Guitar.
214 Shady Grove / Mountain Ramblers, Cullen Galyean. Banjo,Guitar.
301 Jim and John / Ed Young, Lonnie Young. Fife,Drum.
307 Chevrolet (Diamond Ring) / Ed Young, Lonnie Young. Fife,Drum.
308 Oree / Ed Young, Lonnie Young. Fife,Drum.
302 Wild Ox Moan, The (Black Woman) / Vera Hall.
303 Been Drinkin' Water Out of a Hollow Log / Fred McDowell. Guitar.
305 Shake 'Em on Down / Fred McDowell, Fannie Davis, Miles Pratcher. Guitar,Comb.
312 Freight Train Blues / Fred McDowell. Guitar.
304 All Nihgt Long / Miles Pratcher, Bob Pratcher. Guitar,Fiddle.
306 Levee Camp Reminiscience / Forest City Joe, Joe B. Pugh. Harmonica.
309 Levee Camp Holler / Johnny Moore.
310 Eighteen Hammers / Johnny Moore.
311 Train Time / Forest City Joe, Joe B. Pugh. Harmonica.
313 Drink on Little Girl / Forest City Joe, Joe B. Pugh. Harmonica.
401 Tribulations / E.C. Ball, Blair Reedy, Larry Richardson. Guitar.
402 When I Get Home / E.C. Ball, Blair Reedy, Larry Richardson. Guitar.
403 Wayfairing Stranger / E.C. Ball. Guitar.
408 Please Let Me Stay a Little Longer / E.C. Ball, Blair Reedy, Larry Richardson. Guitar.
409 Father, Jesus Loves You / E.C. Ball. Guitar.
410 Lonesome Valley / E.C. Ball, Orna Ball, Blair Reedy, Larry Richardson. Guitar.
411 Father Adieu / E.C. Ball. Guitar.
414 The Cabin on the Hill / E.C. Ball, Orna Ball, Blair Reedy, Larry Richardson. Guitar.
404 Baptizing Down by the Creek / Mountain Ramblers. Banjo,Guitar.
412 The Old Country Church / Mountain Ramblers. Banjo,Guitar.
405 Baptizing Down by the Creek / I.D. Beck.
406 Antioch / W.W. Kidd, Alabama Sacred Harp Singers.
407 Calvary / W.W. Kidd, Alabama Sacred Harp Singers.
413 Little Moses / Neil Morris. Guitar.
601 Death, Have Mercy (Oh Death) / Vera Hall.
602 I Want Jesus to Walk with Me / Fred McDowell, James Shorty.
603 Jesus is Real to Me / Lee, Mary and Congregation.
604 I Love the Lord / Chrenshaw, R.C. and Congregation.
605 A Sermon Fragment / G.I. Townsel.
606 I'm Going Home on the Morning Train / Chrenshaw, R.C. and Congregation.
607 Power / Wigley. Mattie & Congregation.
608 On That Rock / Ed Young, Lonnie Young, Viola James. Fife,Drum.
609 Jesus on the Main Line / James Shorty, Viola James.
610 This Little Light of Mine / James Shorty, Viola James.
611 I'm Gonna Sail Like a Ship on the Ocean / St. Simon's Island Singers, Henry Morrison.
612 Blow Gabriel / Bessie Jones, John Davis, St. Simon's Island Singers.
613 Motherless Children / Fred McDowell, Felix Dukes.
614 What Do You Think About Jesus (He's All Right) / Bernice MacClellan.
701 Boogie Children / Boy Blue, Joe Lee, Willie Jones. Guitar,Harmonica.
702 She Lived Her Life Too Fast / Forest City Joe, Sonny Boy Rogers, Thomas Martin. Guitar,Harmonica.
706 She Don't Love Me That Way / Forest City Joe, Sonny Boy Rogers, Thomas Martin. Guitar,Harmonica.
707 Stop Breaking Down / Forest City Joe, Sonny Boy Rogers, Thomas Martin. Guitar,Harmonica.
711 Red Cross Store / Forest City Joe. Piano.
712 Forest City Jump / Forest City Joe, Sonny Boy Rogers, Thomas Martin. Guitar,Harmonica.
708 Joe Lee's Rock / Boy Blue, Joe Lee, Willie Jones. Guitar,Harmonica.
703 Drop Down Mama / Fred McDowell. Guitar.
710 When You Get Home, Write Me a Few of Your Lines / Fred McDowell. Guitar.
704 Sitting on Top of the World / Ed Young, Lonnie Young. Fife,Drum.
705 Cool Water Blues / John Dudley. Guitar.
709 Bullyin' Well / Rosa Lee Hill. Guitar.
Local Numbers:
FW-ASCH-LP-3601
Atlantic.1346-1352
Publication, Distribution, Etc. (Imprint):
New York Atlantic 1961
Date/Time and Place of an Event Note:
Recorded in: Tennessee, Kentucky, Alabama, Mississippi, Georgia, Virginia, Arkansas, North Carolina, United States.
General:
Program notes by Gary Kramer and the editor on containers ; discussion of the music and musicians by the editor ([4] p.) inserted in containers. Production notes: Recorded summer 1959.
Restrictions:
Restrictions on access. No duplication allowed listening and viewing for research purposes only.
Collection Rights:
Permission to publish materials from the collection must be requested from the Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives and Collections. Please visit our website to learn more about submitting a request. The Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives and Collections make no guarantees concerning copyright or other intellectual property restrictions. Other usage conditions may apply; please see the Smithsonian's Terms of Use for more information.
This collection contains 73 open reel tapes, made by Eric H. Davidson between 1958-1984, featuring the traditional music of Southern Appalachia.
Scope and Contents:
The Eric H. Davidson audio recordings consists of 73 open reel tapes dating from 1958-1984, featuring field recordings made by Davidson and his colleagues (including Caleb Ellicott Finch, Paul Newman, Lyn Davidson, and Jane Rigg) featuring the traditional music of Southern Appalachia. The recordings were collected primarily in Grayson and Carroll counties in Southwestern Virginia, and adjacent counties in North Carolina.
Arrangement:
The Eric H. Davidson audio recordings are arranged in chronological order. Each open reel tape was assigned a unique number by Eric Davidson.
Biographical / Historical:
Eric H. Davidson was born in 1937, in New York City. He was primarily known as a pioneering developmental biologist, who revolutionized the research of and theoretical framework behind "the gene regulatory networks that perform complex biological processes, such as the transformation of a single-celled egg into a complex organism. His work helped to reveal how the DNA sequences inherited in the genome are used to initiate and drive forward the sequence of steps that result in development." (1)
Davidson's work in biology began at the age of 16, when he began conducting research with cell physiologist L. V. Heilbrunn, a family friend, at the Marine Biological Laboratory (MBL) in Woods Hole, Massachusetts. He began as a dish washer at the MBL, but was informed by Heilbrunn that he was also expected to have a research project. This project resulted in a published abstract in the Biological Bulletin on clotting in sand dollars.
Davidson earned his bachelor of arts degree from the University of Pennsylvania in 1958 and his doctorate from Rockefeller University in 1963. After working as a postdoctoral researcher and faculty member at Rockefeller, he moved to Caltech, where he would spend the rest of his career, beginning as a visiting assistant professor. He was named Norman Chandler Professor of Cell Biology in 1982 and remained there until his death.
His interest in old time music arose at nearly the same time as his interest in biology. His father, a well-known abstract painter, and mother were connected to several people who were hired to do research for the Works Progress Administration (WPA) of the late 1930's and 40's. At 14, he began to play the 5-string banjo after being introduced to the instrument through his exposure to recordings of Southern Appalachian music recorded as a part of the WPA, held at the Library of Congress.
In college, he played music in cafes. He also got a hold of the log of WPA recordings that were so influential to him. He began to stick pins in maps wherever the recordings were made, and began to notice that most of the pins were clustered in two counties in Southwestern Virginia--Grayson and Carroll counties--and adjacent counties in North Carolina.
In 1956, he began to take trips down to these areas during breaks from school to record musicians that had learned songs and skills through oral tradition, as opposed to the radio or records. He continued to go every year for many years, until the last person he knew had learned by oral tradition passed away. He formed close relationships with many notable musicians during these trips, including Wade Ward (from whom he learned the clawhammer banjo playing technique), Tommy Jarrell, Paul Joines, Glen Neaves, Vester Jones, Ed Spencer, Glen Smith, Cullen Galyean, and Bobby Harrison. He often recorded with his longtime collaborators Caleb Ellicott Finch, Paul Newman, Lyn Davidson, and Jane Rigg. Many of these recordings were released by Moses Asch as Folkways Records albums, produced by Davidson and his collaborators between 1962-1986.
Davidson was interested in the personal, musical, structural, traditional, and historical aspects of Southern Appalachian music. His fieldwork style was to continue to record a musician until they got tired or he'd run out of tape. Then he'd come back the next day, and the next year, and the year after that, until he had recorded everything that musician knew. This gave his work the characteristic of what he described as, borrowing from his scientific background, a longitudinal study. He was able to observe changes in the musical tradition of the region: the transition of traditional ballad singing from a cappella to string band accompaniment, the incorporation of the guitar into the string band ensemble, and the shift from clawhammer to three-finger banjo picking. In an oral history interview with Davidson conducted by the Ralph Rinzler Folklife and Collections in 2015, Davidson said that in his research, he could see how "ballads combine and recombine like genetic organisms in biology."
Davidson was also an accomplished banjo musician in his own right. He formed the Iron Mountain String Band together with Caleb Finch (fiddle), and Peggy Haine (guitar), releasing an album (FA 2473) on Folkways Records in 1973 consisting of songs and tunes learned from his many recording trips into Grayson and Carroll counties.
Eric Davidson died on September 1, 2015 at the age of 78.
1. "Developmental Biologist Eric H. Davidson Passes Away," Caltech News, September 4, 2015, accessed January 5, 2016, http://www.caltech.edu/news/developmental-biologist-eric-h-davidson-passes-away-47772.
Disclaimer:
Please note that some language in this collection is culturally insensitive or offensive to viewers. It is presented as it exists in the original material for the benefit of research and the historical record. The material reflects the culture and context in which it was created and not the views of the Smithsonian Institution.
Shared Stewardship of Collections:
The Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage acknowledges and respects the right of artists, performers, Folklife Festival participants, community-based scholars, and knowledge-keepers to collaboratively steward representations of themselves and their intangible cultural heritage in media produced, curated, and distributed by the Center. Making this collection accessible to the public is an ongoing process grounded in the Center's commitment to connecting living people and cultures to the materials this collection represents. To view the Center's full shared stewardship policy, which defines our protocols for addressing collections-related inquiries and concerns, please visit https://doi.org/10.25573/data.21771155.
Related Materials:
An oral history with Eric H. Davidson was conducted by the Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives and Collections on April 26, 2015. Both the video and transcript is available for researchers. Contact archives staff for information.
Provenance:
Donated by Eric H. Davidson.
Restrictions:
Access to the Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives and Collections is by appointment only. Visit our website for more information on scheduling a visit or making a digitization request. Researchers interested in accessing born-digital records or audiovisual recordings in this collection must use access copies.
Rights:
Permission to publish materials from the collection must be requested from the Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives and Collections. Please visit our website to learn more about submitting a request. The Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives and Collections make no guarantees concerning copyright or other intellectual property restrictions. Other usage conditions may apply; please see the Smithsonian's Terms of Use for more information.
Topic:
Fiddle tunes -- Appalachian Region, Southern Search this
Folk music -- Appalachian Region, Southern Search this
Banjo music -- Appalachian Region, Southern Search this
