A type of country music ensemble that includes fiddle, banjo, acoustic guitar, mandolin, and upright bass. Emerged in the early 1900s and was an important precursor to bluegrass. During the late 1800s, the Carolina Piedmont provided fertile ground for the cultivation of a string band tradition that combined Scots-Irish fiddle and balladry with African instruments like banjo and European guitar and mandolin. String band music was social music, played at dances, contests, and other community occasions. String band musicians were storytellers, performing songs of tragedy and revenge, love and friendship. Much of this music, whether blues or string band, has deep roots in both sacred and secular themes, creating dynamic music with emotional and personal meaning.
Today it is played primarily in circles where old-time country music remains popular, such as family picnics, square dances, fiddle conventions, and jam sessions. Rooted in British ballads and folk songs originally played on the fiddle in Britain. Country music has been aggressively marketed since the 1920s, developing numerous traditions within genre – honky tonk, western swing, and early rock and roll.
Content is provided by McKissick Museum, University of South Carolina.
For further information about any of the artists featured on Digital Traditions, send your questions and comments to hallagan@mailbox.sc.edu.
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A tune that reflects the popularity of juke boxes in the 1930s. Songs like this would have been mainstays at clubs featuring juke boxes and a crowd willing to dance.
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From the album "On the Road to Prosperity" by Roger Bellow and the Drifting Troubadours, 1991. Bellow - guitar and Spanish Dobro, Gordon Terry - fiddle, Don Helms - steel guitar, Bob Sachs - mandolin...
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Song featured on the "Fiddle Traditions" recording produced by Hairy Toe Productions. Clarence Green on guitar.
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Ted Brackett was from Inman, South Carolina. His father, a farmer by trade, played an old time claw hammer banjo and Ted’s uncle played the fiddle. Growing up in a musical family, he soon showed...
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T.C. Foster learned the ways of the fiddle at a very young age, often listening to his father play on the front porch for hours at a time. Sneaking around with his father’s fiddle at first, by the age...
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Roger Bellow is a scholar, teacher and award-winning performer who has been a lifelong proponent of early country music traditions. He first learned about country music in Uptown, an area of Chicago...
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A multi-instrumentalist from the Piedmont, Nick Hallman is a life-long devotee of old-time country music indigenous to the South Carolina. As founding member of the Nickpickers, Hallman assembled one...
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Loyd “Slick” McGaha epitomized the essence of a traditional performer and nicely encapsulated the traditions of South Carolina as well. Slick learned to play “bones,” a traditional rhythmic technique...
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McCormick (McCormick County) realtor who was a musician prior to WWII. Interview conducted by Anne Kimzey.
