Governor Al Smith For President
The Story of the Carolina Night Hawks
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Charles Miller and Family, Ashe County, North Carolina, circa 1928. Left to right: Ella Mae, Charles, Lillie, Hattie, Howard, Clifford (sitting). Charles and Howard were core members of the Carolina Night Hawks.
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On April 17, 1928, four musicians from Ashe County, North Carolina, stood before a microphone in Atlanta, Georgia to voice their support for presidential hopeful Alfred E. Smith, four-term governor of the state of New York. Recruited by the Columbia Phonograph Company, the band arrived in Atlanta prepared with an original song promoting Smith’s bid for the Democratic nomination.
Al Smith was a Yankee, a Catholic, and a candidate who advocated the repeal of the 18th Amendment. Initiated in 1920, the 18th Amendment ushered in the age of Prohibition, America’s attempt to outlaw alcoholic beverages. Most Southerners supported Prohibition, even though illicit distilleries flourished in the region, often with tacit approval by law enforcement officials. This irony did not escape the notice of humorist Will Rogers, who quipped: “Southerners will continue to vote dry as long as they can stagger to the polls.”
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“Every County Has Its Own Personality”
An Interview with County Records’ David Freeman
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“I wanted a name that would imply ‘rural,’ the rural aspect of music fascinated me, as opposed to the city music I grew up with. Every county has its own personality, its own musical tradition. You can go from one place to another and pick up the subtle differences.”
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David Freeman is a busy man. Over the years he has combined his love of music and a collector’s instinct with a keen business sense, carving his own distinctive niche in the recording industry. In 1964, while living in New York, he brought out his first LP anthology on the County label, beginning a string of reissues that showcased the great old-time string bands from the prewar era, records that drew heavily on Freeman’s own collection of 78s. County also began a series of live recordings by old-time musicians, including such luminaries as Kyle Creed and Tommy Jarrell. In 1965, Freeman quit his job with the railway post office and began selling country records as a full-time pursuit. In 1974, he left behind the bright lights of the big city and moved to Floyd, Virginia, population 400.
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Violin, Sing The Blues For Me
African-American Fiddlers on Early Phonograph Records
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Many black musicians active during the 1920s and ’30s came from a string-band tradition rooted in the 19th century, an era predating the blues when fiddles and banjos were the predominant instruments.
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When Lonnie Johnson exclaimed, “Violin, sing the blues for me!” during a recording session for Okeh Records in 1928, he was in top form, performing with passion and artistry on the instrument that was his first love—the fiddle. By the time Johnson recorded his Violin Blues, he was already one of the most prolific and influential musicians in the field of blues, an African-American musical form then dominated by guitar players, just as it is today. Johnson himself led a long and illustrious career as a guitarist, and is primarily remembered for his dazzling mastery of that instrument. But it was the violin that first captured his imagination, and his early career in New Orleans was spent honing his skills as a fiddler, first in his father’s string band, then as a young professional performing on excursion boats along the Mississippi.
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