1969 Joe Greene's Fiddle Album Bluegrass Vinyl LP Record

Description: Yes we combine shipping for multiple purchases.Add multiple items to your cart and the combined shipping total will automatically be calculated. 1969 Joe Greene's Fiddle Album Bluegrass Vinyl LP Record Vinyl / Jacket Grade Per Goldmine Standard: VG / VG SIDE 1 DALEY'S REEL CATTLE IN THE CORN KATY HILL BIG JOE PADDY ON THE TURNPIKE MONEY MUSK SIDE 2 DUSTY MILLER KINGSPORT GREY EAGLE TURKEY BUZZARD SALT RIVER ROAD TO JENKINS Since he took up fiddling seriously several years ago, Joe Greene has acquired some impressive credentials in becoming recognized as one of the top fiddlers in country music today. In 1966, after a period of musical inactivity, Joe started working on his fiddling in earnest, and in the next couple of years he won a number of important Southeastern fiddling contests, in- cluding those at Union Grove, N.C., and Galax, Va. During these years he was based in his home town of High Point, N.C., where he ran his own automobile business. In 1968, Joe made the big jump to Nashville, Tenn., re- locating his family there and devoting himself full-time to music. Since that time he has played regularly as a sideman on the Grand Ole Opry, and has toured extensively with Roy Acuff and with Jim & Jesse McReynolds. This album, cut in mid-1969, is the first Joe has recorded on his own, and features some of the finest musicians ever assem- bled for a Bluegrass album: Chubby Wise on guitar, J. D. Crowe on banjo, Roland White on mandolin, and Benny Williams on bass. We at COUNTY sincerely feel that this is one of the finest fiddle albums ever recorded, and we think that all fiddle music lovers will find it a delight to listen to. David Freeman JOE GREENE & HIS MUSIC There are four broad classifications of American fiddle styles: Southern, Western, Northern (actually this should be several categories-New England and the various Canadian & French Canadian styles), and bluegrass. Bluegrass fiddling is not a regional style. Indeed, people often judge bluegrass fiddling only on how closely it approximates the playing of the people who “invented” the music-people like Chubby Wise, Benny Martin, Tommy Magness, Art Wooten, etc. Joe Greene is a bluegrass fiddler, although his very individual style combines several regional styles and the best elements of straight Bluegrass fiddling, Joe exerts a personal and musical charisma. His unique combination of Southern drive and Western conception of melody would allow him to enter and take a prize at fiddle conventions almost anywhere in the United States. Joe Greene feels that all too often the average or poorer Southern fiddler will rely on the “Georgia bow”-heavy, repeti- tious shuffling patterns with the bow hand. In this style, the musician “fits” the tune to established bowing patterns. This shuffling technique aims to emphasize the beat at all times tnd provides a solid background for dancing. Common fiddlers often shuffle without varying the notes (so often heard in the ORANGE BLOSSOM SPECIAL) ; Joe feels that good fiddling must escape from the restrictions of the “Georgia bow”. In the Western styles of playing, the fiddle usually works against a solid rhythmic back-up provided by a “sock” style guitar (played with closed chords and no runs) and probably a piano. (See COUNTY 703 and 707 for Texas fiddling and back- up) . These fiddlers play with a long bow (several notes per stroke, as opposed to the Southern “saw stroke” or one note per stroke) and concentrate on melodic ornamentation. Generally, they play slower than Southern fiddlers, to let the melody come through. Western bow techniques lack the rhythmic authority and drive of Southern playing, although the rhythmic variations and syncopations may be fantastically complex. Joe Greene’s playing is very close to the Western styles in his choice of notes and rhythmic structure, but he has real drive and spirit in his playing, a drive one would hardly expect from a Western fiddler. Joe says that he plays with a “sharp, straight bow”. Here we can seethe merging of two styles: he plays “straight”-several notes per bow stroke, but the “sharpness” refers, I think, to the little tugs and rolls he gives to the bow for rhythmic and dynamic emphasis. The melody, rhythm and syncopations are all Western or Texas style, but unlike the Texas players, Joe varies the strength of his syncopations over a wide range and “comes down heavy” at the end of phrases. This variation in dynamics is worked against the bluegrass band sound, and produces a highly ornamented melody line AND a powerfully accented tune suitable for a dance or hoe down. Joe’s favorite fiddlers and influences explain this unique combination: he cites Howdy Forester and Major Franklin (see County 707) as his favorite fiddlers; he calls Benny Margin “Mr. Bluegrass.” Joe admires the good Canadian players, and his respect for Oklahoma fiddling is revealing-he learned a great deal of his music, when he started, from Oklahoma players. And finally he thinks that Kenny Baker is the best bluegrass fiddler playing today. In the choices above we can see joe’s concern for melodic interpretation as well as rhythmic style. This is especially clear when joe talks about the quality that makes Kenny Baker great- “he plays from the heart..he is a soul fiddler.” Playing what you feel is Bill Monroe’s great concern for bluegrass and is evidenced in Baker’s playing and, here, in Joe's. This record is a good survey of how Joe brings these qualities together in his own playing. BIC JOE, a tune he put together, is very similar to SALLY GOODIN in its melody. Joe starts out with a “Western” choice of notes but this often recedes into the background when he starts to-“play from the heart.” His accenting of the rhythm is not Western-it is good bluegrass. And he comes down heavy on the off-beat brushes giving a solid dance flavor. Joe composed two other pieces on this record: KINGSPORT and ROAD TO JENKINS--------an inspired breakdown number, and, to me, one of the best fiddle numbers recorded in some years. In KATY HILL we can detect the influence of bluegrass fid- dlers on Joe—just compare this version with the one recorded by Tommy Magness with Bill Monroe. Although we have been stressing the heavy accents that Joe sometimes gives to phrases or syncopations, this is mostly to contrast his playing with that of Western fiddlers. Southern players often accent so much (in shuffling) that the value of the accent for the tune is lost. In KATY HILL we hear a sensitive use of these accents, while the continual punch is brought out by the insistent drive of J D. Crowe's superb banjo playing. In such tunes as GREY EAGLE, DUSTY MILLER, and SALT RIVER, Joe has all the spirit of a Southern fiddler and all the melodic and rhythmic complexity of a Texas player. It is in- teresting to note here that Joe’s favorite Texas fiddler is Major Franklin, an older style player who differs from modern Western musicians in that a concern for melody hasn’t overshadowed his sense of the vibrancy and vitality of the music as a whole. DALEY'S REEL and MONEY MUSK are both Northern pieces. DALEY’S REEL is a traditional Canadian tune, while MONEY MUSK is played throughout New England and Canada and is derived from an English tune of the same name. MONEY MUSK is usually played as a “lilting” number, but Joe transforms it into a solid dance tune. Joe and J. D. play the Southern song TURKEY BUZZARD as a fiddle-banjo duet, and their version here is a classic cut in this style. The playing on this tune is unique among the others in that Joe hardly varies the melody here. The absence of variation is to a degree necessary for the duet because the banjo must know exactly what the fiddle is going to do. Also, though, TUR- KEY BUZZARD is one of about a dozen numbers that Joe learned from Roy Acuff in his stay with the Smoky Mountain Boys. When he plays any of the Acuff tunes, Joe seldom adds variations, perhaps because he considers these tunes strictly “old-time”, which for him do not require variation. Robert C. Fleder July, 1969 CHUBBY WISE - Guitar J. D CROWE - Banjo ROLAND WHITE - Mandolin BENNY WILLIAMS - Bass Thank you for your business. Gallimoresgoods

Price: 7.96 USD

Location: Kingsport, Tennessee

End Time: 2024-11-12T02:01:47.000Z

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