Ricky Skaggs in Wall Street Journal 11/16/13

The Review section of the Saturday Wall Street Journal has a column called, "Playlist," where a different person each week writes about a song that is meaningful to them.

Today's Playlist is written by Ricky Skaggs, about the Stanley Brothers' song, The Lonesome River. I don't know if this link will work because of the WJS paywall, but here are some excerpts.

"Their song, 'The Lonesome River,' inspired me to play the mandolin.

"The song broke my heart when I first heard it on the radio in the late '50s, and I cried. . . Pee Wee's mandolin kicks off the song, and when they hit the chorus, man that rocked my world.

"The story goes that in 1961, after a performance, Pee Wee accidentally broke the mandolin he had used on the recording. He threw it in the garbage bin out back before driving off. Two musician-fans fished it out and had it fixed. Over the years, the mandolin changed hands about five times.

"Then in 2010, mandolinist David Grisman called me and said he had Pee Wee's restored 1922 F-5 Lloyd Loar mandolin and wanted to sell it. I bought it. . . . That's a lot of history there."

The 'two musician fans' deserve a medal !. I wonder if Pee Wee threw it away in a bit of a huff & would have returned to fish it out of the garbage bin himself - we'll never know.
I have several recordings by the Stanley Brothers,but 'The Lonesome River' isn't on any of them. I'll have to have a search on the I'net,
Ivan;)

'The Lonesome River' is extremely similar to 'The Hills of Roan County'.

One of the old Columbia Recordings.

A more recent version with Ricky himself...and the awesome Roy Lee Centers

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PjTgaUvN2I4

:)

I just found this thread about it from last year.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Ivan Kelsall

The 'two musician fans' deserve a medal !. I wonder if Pee Wee threw it away in a bit of a huff & would have returned to fish it out of the garbage bin himself - we'll never know.
I have several recordings by the Stanley Brothers,but 'The Lonesome River' isn't on any of them. I'll have to have a search on the I'net,
Ivan;)

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And this one from a couple of years before that.

Thanks for sharing Josh; that's an important part of mandolin history.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by almeriastrings

'The Lonesome River' is extremely similar to 'The Hills of Roan County'.

One of the old Columbia Recordings.

A more recent version with Ricky himself...and the awesome Roy Lee Centers

:)

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That is John Duffey on mandolin and high baritone, not Ricky Skaggs

You're right. It was indeed Duffy on that cut.

Spine tingling harmony! Is Roy Lee channeling Carter? As you say, awesome.

Roy Lee was scary close to Carter.... I heard him live once - just once - with Ralph and it was just incredible. There is some amazing stuff from that period on the "Live in Japan" CD's. I heard them do "The White Dove" , "Choo Choo Coming" and other Carter-Ralph material and honestly, it was as if Carter himself was there. Never heard anything like it before or since. The accent, the timing... the harmonies, just mind blowing. It must have been quite strange for Ralph, especially.

I've always really liked this version of Lonesome River by Skaggs, Patty Loveless and Marty Stuart. And Ricky really puts lonesome into the mandolin part too. Pretty awesome.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EsoMaOLSpbg

very awesome Bernie, thanks for posting that. Ricky's using some kind of "Get Up John" tuning? very cool and lonesome.

The Skaggs/Loveless/Stuart clip above is a fine version, but it is still worth looking up the original (a Columbia record, I think 1951). I have it in a Stanley Brothers "The Columbia Years" 2 disc compilation. It is exactly like Ricky described it - the mandolin is powerful, and the harmonies in the chorus will raise the hair on your neck. I've never heard anything like it. :disbelief:

Ricky Wasson does a very soulful version as does Tim Shelton (of late) of Newfound Road.


Tom

Hard to beat the Roy Lee Centers version with Duffey on the high tenor. also loved the Vince Gill/Grissman/Pederson on Here Today ... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uN4c0Hrphfw

Ron Spears with James King .... What else can you say? ........

What tuning is Ricky's mandolin on that?