Here's to Mother Maybelle Carter and All the Mothers Everywhere!

Happy Mother's Day!

My own mother has traipsed off this mortal coil, lo nearly a decade ago, that's her above posed proudly with her brood about 1965 or so. Mom, Dad and seven offspring at my big sister's marryin' off day. Your friendly blogger can be seen in the lower left, horizontally striped cardigan and all...probably eyeing the room searching out the buffet table.

Even though Mom's no longer with us, the great thing about mothers is...if you listen closely...you can hear their voice in the back of your head all day long every day telling you what NOT to do.

Here's to all those mothers still out there though, whether it's your 1st Mother's Day or your 70th, tip a mimosa at brunch for me!


Tomorrow is the birthday of the mother of The First Family of Country Music. Mother Maybelle Carter was born 101 years ago on May 10, 1909.

I've spoken at length about The Carter Family here before, see those posts here, and I've also directed you all to a couple of creative folks who are working diligently on a graphic novelization of the story of The Carter Family and have done more research than I can even fathom and can tell you a lot more than I ever could. Find their blog here to follow the progress. They're deeply entrenched in legal clearance of music and such...but I am anxiously awaiting the fruition of their labor of love.

Since I've already covered this ground before, and since we're all ankle deep in the afore-mentioned Mother's Day mimosas, let's just sit back and revel in some of Mother Maybelle's music! Her self-taught guitar style has been an influence on country and folk guitar scratchers for almost a century now, in fact her strumming is sometimes called "The Carter Scratch". Playing the rhythm with the bass strings with her thumb and picking out melody simultaneously on the treble strings with her fingers, the sound is unmistakable.

"Gold Watch and Chain" with The Foggy Mountain Boys:



As she grew older, guitar became a problem for arthritic fingers and she would often play the auto harp like her cousin Sara had in the Carter Family days. Here's "Black Mountain Rag" being introduced by her son in law Johnny Cash:



Here she is reunited with her cousin Sara just after being inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame with Johnny Cash singing A.P.'s part and June Carter adding additional harmonies. Beautiful stuff!:



Finishing up, a treacly, saccharine, over-the-top tribute to Maybelle by her daughters Helen, June and Anita with Johnny Cash kicking right in with a Tex Ritter type soliloquy. But Hey...if you can't be treacly, saccharine and over-the-top about mom, then you're in pretty bad shape!:



Happy Mother's Day! There's more mimosas to be had!

"The Carter Fold" part 2 of 3

For part one of this planned trilogy of posts about The Carter Family, click here.

Alvin Pleasant "A.P." Carter was born this date in 1891. The Pater Familias of the "First Family of Country Music" would have been 118 years old today.

Below is the "Original Carter Family", Maybelle, Sara and A.P. himself:

A.P. was a "nervous" soul, by all accounts. A restless body with a restless mind that seemed unable to sit still or take on any one task long enough to stay put and do any good on the family farm.

His wandering feet took him up and down the railroad tracks of Virginia and his curious mind drew him to the music being sung by the people he met.

He collected scores of old hill and folk songs and hymnals from his rural surroundings, some that were 100's of years old and untouched by the centuries. Songs that had traveled from Ireland, England and other parts of Europe and settled into the back-woods and mountains of the America's. Parts of America which were cut-off from the rest of the country and world as the Industrial Revolution had happened.

These songs, the people who preserved them and their traditions would have been lost forever with the 20th Century's encroachment of their territory. They were like a time-capsule of 100's of years of, not just musical, but anthropological history.

Yes, it's true (and a little controversial) that A.P. copyrighted these songs he gathered under his own name and gained financially from them. But we would be without them altogether without him rounding them up. He exposed the value of what songs could tell, and in doing so, pioneered the work of Alan and John Lomax and others in preserving a people and lifestyle.

A.P. did write some of these songs himself however, though it's hard to be sure totally of which. Some are so autobiographical and modern, they had to come from his shaky hands.

I don't think it's possible to be exposed and as open to music as he was without glomming some ability at matching what it can do.

Allot of these songs had a religious undertone or ever an overtone. I am an atheist from waaaaay back, but I hold this type of song dear. While I have my doubts about a higher power or any value the organized church can bring to someone, there's a true beauty in one person singing something comforting to another person which transcends anything I can explain. There's something that's more than the sum of a simple melody and a few rhyming couplets that adds up here.

Here's me doing a Carter Family song which I believe was ALL A.P.:



I got the line at the end wrong. It's supposed to be "The diamonds will be shining" not "gathered". It must be something from the back of my mind, that I'm unsure of my shininess, but hope I'll still be included in the harvest.

Oh, and be sure to check in on this great project that I mentioned in the first post. A graphic storytelling of Our Favorite Family that seems to be a true labor of love.

"The Carter Fold" part 1 of 3

Today would be Sara Carter's 118th birthday, she was born in 1891. That's her on your left in the pic below with Maybelle Carter and A.P. Carter, The Carter Family.


The Carter Family were the hottest ticket in rural music of the 1930's. They recorded for the RCA Victor label and during the depression, they and Jimmie Rodgers sold more records than anyone else in any kind of music. If it wasn't for the hard work and ramblings of A.P. and the appealing sounds they cut, we would have lost hundreds of years of Irish and English and American folk music. I'll get into more on A.P.'s birthday and Maybelle's too. You can read lots more about The Carter Family on your own. A book I'm particularly fond of is "Will You Miss Me When I'm Gone?" by Mark Zwonitzer and Charles Hirshberg. Their music is still avaliable on CD, you can find them all over the internet too, and a blog I'm watching with bated breath is "Dont' Forget This Blog" a blog by a couple of guys writing and drawing a graphic novel all about our favorite first family of country music. It's definitely worth a read.

A.P. was the mind and researcher (song finder), arranger and writer of the group. He was also in love with his wife Sara.


His drive to do this music was all he had and Sara was his muse that kept him doing it, so when Sara divorced him and decided to retire from music, he stopped too.


Many years after their retirement in the early 40's, the 60's folk revival rediscovered their music. They were voted into the Country Music Hall of Fame. A.P. had already passed away, but Maybelle was still performing with her daughters (Helen, June and Anita) and Sara came out of retirement to accept the award and perform on The Johnny Cash Show (Johnny and June had by this time married).


There doesn't seem to be any film footage of the Carter's performing in their heyday or of A.P. at all. Here's a couple clips though from the 60's, I believe in Johnny Cash's back yard, of Sara and Maybelle. Sara's a bit long in the tooth, and her voice is wavering, but you can really hear the cohesiveness of the Carter harmonies and the way her harpsichord blends so well with Maybelle's guitar.








Here's me doing a Carter Family song too. One A.P. might have sung with Sara in mind...the key line for me being, "All I want is your love, darling...won't you take me back...AGAIN."




Thanks Sara.

Part Two of "The Carter Fold" can be found here.