The Best of 1920s Country Music
Contents
Take a trip back in time with this collection of the best country music from the 1920s. You’ll hear classics from the likes of Jimmie Rodgers, The Carter Family, and more.
The Best of 1920s Country Music
The 1920s saw the rise of Country Music as a popular genre. Artists like Jimmie Rodgers and The Carter Family became household names. The music of the 1920s was a reflection of the time period. It was a time of great optimism and change. The music reflected the feeling of the times.
The Carter Family
The Carter Family was a country music group that performed and recorded between 1927 and 1943. The group consisted of Alvie Carter (guitar), his wife Sara Carter (banjo, autoharp, and vocals), and Maybelle Carter (guitar, mandolin, banjo, and vocals). The group’s recordings included such classics as “Wildwood Flower,” “Keep on the Sunny Side,” and “Can the Circle Be Unbroken.” The Carter Family was inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame in 1970.
Jimmie Rodgers
Jimmie Rodgers was the first country star and is still one of the most beloved and influential musicians in country music history. He was born in 1897 in Meridian, Mississippi, and died tragically young at the age of 35 from tuberculosis. But in his short life, he had a huge impact on music. He was the first country artist to sell a million records, and his recordings were hugely popular in both the country and pop markets. He helped to pioneer the now-classic sound of country music, with his distinctive yodeling style and his wistful lyrics about love and loss. He also wrote many of his own songs, which were often covered by other artists. Some of his most famous songs include “Blue Yodel,” “Waiting for a Train,” and “T For Texas.”
The Bristol Sessions
The Bristol Sessions, also known as the “Big Bang of Country Music”, were recorded in 1927 and 1928 in Bristol, Tennessee. They are considered by many music historians to be the single most important event in the history of country music, and resulted in the first commercially-released country music recordings. The recordings were made by Victor Records, and featured such seminal artists as Jimmie Rodgers, the Carter Family, and Ernest Vornadore.
The Carter Family
The Carter Family was a country music group that came to prominence in the 1920s. The group consisted of A.P. Carter, his wife Sara Carter, and their daughter Maybelle Carter. The Carter Family was one of the first commercially successful country music groups, and their music had a major influence on the development of country music.
Maybelle Carter
Maybelle Addington Carter (May 10, 1909 – October 23, 1978) was an American country musician and member of the historic Carter Family act. She is best known for her distinctive guitar style, as well as her pioneering work as a member of the original Carter Family trio.
Born Maybelle Addington in Nickelsville, Virginia, she was one of three children born to Sara Dougherty and Ezra “Eck” Addington. Maybelle was mostly of English and Scottish descent. As a child she learned to play the banjo and guitar; in 1921 she wed A.P. Carter, with whom she soon began performing at square dances, fiddler’s conventions and other local events.
The couple had three children together: Gladys, Janette and Helen. Through the 1920s the family toured Virginia playing at blackface minstrel shows, medicine shows and local fairs; they became one of the most popular country music acts in the region. In 1927 they recorded their first sessions for Victor Records in Bristol, Tennessee; these recordings, which included such classics as “Wildwood Flower” and “Keep On The Sunny Side”, were tremendously influential on subsequent country music performers.
Maybelle’s guitar playing was hugely influential; her distinctive style – known as the “Carter Scratch” – became widely imitated by other artists. She continued to perform and record with the Carter Family until 1943, when she retired from music to raise her family. She made occasional solo appearances thereafter, but it was not until 1976 that she once again began performing regularly with her daughters Helen and Anita.
Maybelle Carter died in 1978 at the age of 69; she was inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame in 1970 and the International Bluegrass Music Hall of Fame in 1991.
A.P. Carter
A.P. Carter was born in Poor Valley, Virginia in 1891. He learned to play the fiddle from his father and began performing at local dances and fiddlers’ conventions. In 1926, he met Sara Dougherty, a musical saw player, and they married the following year. The couple began performing together as The Carter Family and soon became one of the most popular country music groups of the 1920s.
In 1927, The Carter Family made their first recordings for Victor Records. These recordings, which included such classic songs as “Keep on the Sunny Side” and “Will the Circle Be Unbroken,” helped to define the sound of country music for generations to come. The group continued to record and perform together until Sara’s death in 1953. A.P. Carter died in 1960.
Sara Carter
Sara Dougherty Carter (May 21, 1898 – October 8, 1979) was one of the original members of the legendary Carter Family trio. Sara played the autoharp and did most of the lead singing for the group. She was married to A.P. Carter, with whom she had three children: Gladys, June, and Janette.
Sara was born in Maces Spring, Virginia. She learned to play the autoharp as a child from her mother, Adeline Gollihue Douthat Dougherty. She met A.P. Carter at a music festival in 1916, and they were married in 1918. The following year, theyformed the Carter Family trio with A.P.’s cousin Maybelle Carter and her husband Ezra “Eck” Carter.
The Carter Family became one of the most influential groups in country music history. They were popular performers on radio and recorded some of the best-selling records of the 1920s and 1930s. Among their hits were “Wildwood Flower,” “Keep on the Sunny Side,” and “Can the Circle Be Unbroken.”
The Carters parted ways in 1943, but reunited briefly in 1957 for a final recording session. Sara continued to perform as a solo artist until her retirement in 1965. She died in 1979 at the age of 81.
Jimmie Rodgers
Jimmie Rodgers was the most popular country singer of the 1920s. He was known as the “Singing Brakeman” and “The Blue Yodeler”. His music was a blend of blues, folk, and country. He recorded more than 100 songs and his records sold more than 10 million copies.
The Blue Yodeler
Jimmie Rodgers was one of the first country music superstars. He was nicknamed “The Blue Yodeler” because of his signature song, “Blue Yodel (Lonesome Road Blues).” He popularized the yodeling style of singing that was common in the mountains of Appalachia, but not widely known outside of that region. Rodgers had a string of hits in the 1920s, including “In the Jailhouse Now,” “T For Texas,” and “Waiting For a Train.” He died of tuberculosis at the age of 35, but his influence on country music was profound.
The Singing Brakeman
Jimmie Rodgers was born in 1897 in Meridian, Mississippi. The youngest of five children, Rodgers grew up on a cotton plantation near the Yazoo River. His father died when he was just nine years old, and his mother died two years later. Orphaned at eleven, Rodgers went to live with an older sister in Mississippi. He began working on the railroads when he was just twelve years old, and it was during this time that he began to develop his musical talents. He taught himself to play the guitar and sang while he worked on the trains. Rodgers soon became known as “The Singing Brakeman” for his habit of singing while he worked.
In 1927, Rodgers made his first recordings for Victor Records in Camden, New Jersey. These recordings, which included such songs as “Blue Yodel” and “T for Texas,” were an instant success. Over the next few years, Rodgers became one of the most popular country music performers in the United States. He toured extensively and made numerous recordings. His songs were frequently played on the radio, and his popularity continued to grow.
Rodgers’ career came to an abrupt end in 1933 when he was diagnosed with tuberculosis. He spent the next few years in and out of hospitals, but his health continued to decline. He died in 1933 at the age of 36. Despite his short career, Rodgers had a profound impact on country music. His innovative style influenced many later performers, and he is widely considered to be one of the fathers of country music.
The Mississippi Delta
In the early years of the twentieth century, a new style of music was born in the Mississippi Delta. This style would come to be known as country music. The man who is generally credited with creating this new genre is Jimmie Rodgers.
Jimmie Rodgers was born in Meridian, Mississippi, in 1897. He grew up on a farm and began playing the guitar at a young age. In his teens, he began performing at local dancehalls and honky-tonks. In 1927, he made his way to Memphis, Tennessee, where he auditioned for the Victor Talking Machine Company. Rodgers was signed to a recording contract and released his first single, “Blue Yodel,” in May of 1928.
“Blue Yodel” was an instant hit, and Rodgers became known as “The Singing Brakeman.” He went on to release a string of successful songs throughout the late 1920s and early 1930s, including “T for Texas,” “Waiting for a Train,” and “In the Jailhouse Now.” Jimmie Rodgers died of tuberculosis in 1933, but his music lives on. Today, he is considered one of the fathers of country music.
The Bristol Sessions
In 1927, the Victor Talking Machine Company and its new subsidiary, RCA Victor, set up a makeshift recording studio in the Appalachian town of Bristol, Tennessee. For the next few months, talent scouts Ralph Peer and Frank Walker scoured the hills and valleys of the region for the best country music performers they could find. The result was a series of recordings that would come to be known as the Bristol Sessions, widely considered the single most important event in the history of country music.
The Big Bang of Country Music
The Bristol Sessions – also known as the Big Bang of Country Music – were recorded in 1927 and 1928 in Bristol, Tennessee. The sessions were organized by music talent scout Ralph Peer, who was looking to record the sounds of the American south.
What he found in Bristol was a community of musicians who were influenced by a variety of genres, including old-time music, folk, blues, and gospel. The result was a new sound that would come to be known as country music.
The Bristol Sessions resulted in some of the most important recordings in country music history, including the first recordings of the Carter Family and Jimmie Rodgers. These recordings are credited with popularizing country music and helping to launch it as a commercial genre.
The Famous Recordings
The Bristol Sessions, also known as the Bristol Recording Sessions, were sessions in 1927 in Bristol, Tennessee, that led to the discovery of Jimmie Rodgers and the Carter Family. Those two traditional country music acts were among the first commercial successes from the rural southeastern region of the United States. The recordings of Rodgers and the Carters in Bristol mark a watershed moment in country music history. Prior to these sessions, country music was rarely heard outside of its original geographic areas of Appalachia and the Ozarks. The success of the recordings made in Bristol led to a regional and then national audience for country music.
The Legacy
The Bristol sessions, also known as the Bristol recordings or the Bristol sound, were a series of recording sessions conducted in 1927 that resulted in some of the most important recordings in country music and American popular music in general. They were held in Bristol, Tennessee, and organized by record producer Ralph Peer.
The performances by Jimmie Rodgers and the Carter Family at these sessions are generally considered to be the foundation of contemporary country music and influenced virtually all subsequent country performers. In 2001, they were selected for preservation in the National Recording Registry by the Library of Congress, which called them “the Big Bang of country music”.
