GARY B REID: The Music of the Stanley Brothers

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Gary B. Reid
The Music of the Stanley Brothers
University of Illinois Press 978-0-252-08033-3
From the Blue Sky Boys and Monroe Brothers down through the Everlys, brother duets have created some of country musicâs most thrilling work. Take southwestern Virginiaâs Stanley Brothers. Years of alcohol felled older brother Carter Stanley, age 41, in 1966. Then younger sibling Ralph (born in 1927) took the Stanley sound deep into the stark primitivism of the vocal styles theyâd heard as children. Still performing at age 88, heâs the grand old man of American roots music â along with Mac Wiseman, one of the last men standing of early bluegrass.
Over the years, Stanley devotee Gary B. Reid has made the brothersâ Shadows of the Past the first reissue on his own label, Copper Creek; written and acted in a play, A Life of Sorrow: The Life and Times of Carter Stanley; and produced and annotated four-CD The Stanley Brothers: The Early Starday King Years 1958-1961. His new book (part of University of Illinois Pressâs worthy Music in American Life series) emphasizes their music more than their life stories.
The discography and sessionography are extensive. We even find an entry for a 1965 Social Security Administration program, The World of Folk Music Starring Oscar Brand. The bulk of the recordings were on the Columbia, Mercury and King labels.
Similarly exhaustive research on songsâ histories reaches farther back than 20th-century recordings and copyrights. For the brothersâ third session (1947 or 1948) for the Rich-R-Tone label, Reid tells of ââOur Darlingâs Gone,â whose lyrics were written by a woman whose husband had been killed in a mining accident. She wrote a poem about her familyâs life since her husbandâs death and sent it to the Stanley Brothers, who composed a melody for it.â Among the reams of quotes, we find gospel songsmith Albert E. Brumleyâs description of penning âIâll Fly Awayâ (as previously quoted by the late Dorothy Horstman in Sing Your Heart Out, Country Boy).
So, among songsâ authors, who was Ruby Rakes, âwhose name appears on nearly all of Carter and Ralphâs compositions during their first few years at Kingâ? She was a half-sister. Reid continues, âRalph related that possible monetary damages from an auto accident threatened their income stream. âThat was one of the reasons me and Carter copyrighted some of songs in [her] name, to keep the royalties safe.ââ (Ralphâs quote within the quote from Reid comes from his 2009 autobiography, Man of Constant Sorrow, written with Eddie Dean.)
King Records, the most successful indie label of the late â40s and early â50s, is a story unto itself. (Check Jon Hartley Foxâs King of the Queen City: The Story of King Records, another entry in the Music in American Life series.) Ever seeking to maximize his income, its resourceful owner, Syd Nathan, published many of his actsâ songs and then boosted his publishing profits by having Kingâs country acts record its rhythm & blues songs and vice versa. Thus the Stanleysâ 1961 cover of âFinger Poppinâ Time.â The Stanleys must have felt OK about it since, amid all his info on their concerts, Reid reports that they then sang it on stage a few times.
Reidâs book is so penetrating that one footnote gives the Youtube citation for a long-unheard, incomplete 1944 home recording that Bill Monroe did of âOut in the Coldâ (also known as âThe Wandering Boyâ â See Below). Thus we can hear for ourselves how Monroeâs lyrics (more than the Carter Familyâs at 1927âs Bristol Sessions) influenced those of his former guitarist Carter Stanley on a 1952 disc. Reidâs dedication and musical sleuthing are amazing.
â Bruce Sylvester