Charlie Poole

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Charlie Poole and the North Carolina Ramblers in 1923

Charlie Poole (born March 22, 1892 in Randolph County , North Carolina , † March 21, 1931 in Eden , North Carolina) was an American old-time musician who with his band, the North Carolina Ramblers , from 1925 to 1930 recorded more than 70 records. He is considered one of the most influential old-time musicians, as he created a unique mix with his mix of old fiddle music, minstrel songs and ragtime .

Life

Life before the music career

Charlie Poole was the grandson of an Irish immigrant and grew up in Haw River . As a child he was influenced by blues guitarist Blind Blake and the vaudevilles that roamed the country. His first banjo was an Orpheum No.3 special . His later three-finger style came about as a result of a baseball accident in his youth. The ball hit his thumb, which remained bent until the end of his life. Before his time as a musician, Poole worked in various textile factories. As a teenager he moved through the country and got by with badly paid odd jobs. To improve his finances, he performed as a singer and banjo player. In 1918 he settled in his hometown of Spray, North Carolina, and met his future wife, whom he married two years later. With his brother-in-law Posey Rorer , who played fiddle, he performed with other local musicians. In the early 1920s, guitarist Norman Woodlieff , a work colleague from the textile factory, joined the band, which from then on was called the North Carolina Ramblers and excelled at fiddle competitions, in dance halls and at private parties.

Career

Poole's professional musician career began in 1925. With Rorer and Woodlieff he went to his supervisor's office and put the resignation on the table for him, then they sat down in the production hall of the factory and played their last song for their ex-colleagues. After the song was over, Poole is said to have shoutedGoodbye boys, we're gone! “(Goodbye guys, we're going!). The trio traveled to New York and auditioned for Frank Walker, Columbia Records ' repertoire and performer manager .

Leaving Home , 1926

Walker was taken with the three young men and got them a record deal with Columbia. Their first record, Don't Let Your Deal Go Down on the A-side and Can I Sleep In Your Barn Tonight, Mister? on the B-side was a great success; a total of 100,000 records were sold. On that first session for Columbia, Poole and the North Carolina Ramblers made exactly $ 75. The continued success of other songs such as White House Blues , If The River Was Whiskey and Sweet Sweet Sunny South enabled Poole and his North Carolina Ramblers to tour, at first only through Virginia and North Carolina , later they also performed their show based on vaudeville entertainment Montana and even Canada . According to many people who attended the show, Poole was an extremely talented entertainer. He played the banjo behind his head, hit the wheel on the stage and rolls in the air, all with the instrument.

During a tour Poole met the guitarist Roy Harvey know. This one soon replaced Poole's original guitarist, Norman Woodlieff, entirely.

While Poole only played with two accompanying musicians (mostly Rorer and Harvey) until the mid-1920s, he later expanded his band by five to seven members, including Lonnie Austin (fiddle), Odell Smith (fiddle), Hamon Newman (tenor banjo ), Earl Shirkey ( ukulele ) and Roy Harvey's sister Lucy Terry ( piano ), who worked as a pianist in a silent movie theater . Poole usually opened his shows with the gospel Beautiful Crown and closed them with another religious number, The Great Reaping Day . In this way he made sure to address all groups of his audience. In between, quick breakdowns, tricks and comic pieces were played. Poole's performances in the south turned out to be hugely successful, and although he was known as a drinking festival, the workers who attended his concerts often brought wives and children with them. With such family occasions Poole failed obscene songs like Take Your Leg Off Mine ( Take your bone of my bones ) and filled his whiskey discreetly into a Coca-Cola bottle.

In 1929 Poole made parallel recordings for Brunswick Records and Paramount Records . Together with the Allegheny Highlanders, he recorded a number of pieces that were given a light jazz sound by adding a piano . Poole had been dissatisfied with Columbia for a long time, he wanted to experiment with other styles of music and, above all, to add more jazz to his repertoire. But Frank Walker forbade him to do so because he was afraid the sales would collapse.

In contrast to many other old-time stars of his time, Poole also achieved great fame in his homeland, as newspaper reports show. The Burlington Daily Times wrote in its February 3, 1927 edition: “ Charlie Poole, Burlington's native son, makes another hit for Columbia Records - The boy we all know made a popular flash [...] to hear his latest records is to recall those childhood days when many of us knew him "down on the farm" “. It is interesting that the newspaper describes Poole as a "native son" (in English: son of the city), even if Poole neither lived, nor grew up or lived in Burlington. The record the article mentioned was Leavin 'Home with B-side There'll Come A Time , at the time of Poole's latest release. The sales figures for his singles were exemplary of Poole's fame in his home country: shopkeeper MB Smith reported that one hundred copies of Poole's new single were sold out after eight days.

Today Poole is known as "North Carolina Rambler": Rambler means something like "Wanderer" or "Tramp" in German and Poole traveled around the country a lot. Often times he would disappear for weeks without anyone knowing where he was. He traveled extensively through North Carolina and its neighboring states, where he financed his alcohol consumption with music. According to statements from people who saw Poole on these tours, he did not avoid arguments.

The End

Milwaukee Blues , 1930

During the Great Depression, Poole lost a lot of its popularity and its record sales declined. He himself got into financial difficulties because of his fast-paced lifestyle. His alcohol consumption increased until he finally became totally addicted. In 1931 he got an offer as an actor from Hollywood, but couldn't even accept. Charlie Poole died of heart failure on March 21, 1931, at the age of only 39 in Eden, North Carolina, after a 12-week drinking spree. After Poole's death, Posey Rorer (who actually quit in 1929) and Roy Harvey directed the North Carolina Ramblers, which recorded a few more records. Poole's son Charlie Jr. formed a string band called The Swing Billies in 1937 , which broke up in 1938.

Kinney Rorrer published the biography Ramblin 'Blues: The Live and Songs Of Charlie Poole in 1982 and in 2005 Columbia released the three-CD box You Ain't Talkin' To Me: Charlie Poole and the Roots Of Country Music with a compilation of the most important title published. In 2007 the biographical documentary North Carolina Rambler , produced by George Goehl, was due to appear. However, to this day nothing has been seen or heard of. In 2007 Poole was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame . Folk singer Loudon Wainwright III dedicated an elaborate double CD album including a 70-page booklet called "High Wide & Handsome: The Charlie Poole Project" to the old-time legend in 2009.

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White House Blues , 1926

With his three-finger style that soon became standard across America, Poole influenced subsequent banjo players such as Snuffy Jenkins and Earl Scruggs . The bluegrass , which was to be developed by Bill Monroe in the early 1940s, is also influenced by Pooles. For this he was posthumously honored to be inducted into the Blue Ridge Music Hall of Fame in 2012. Some of his tracks became bluegrass standards, like White House Blues , which was covered by Bill Monroe.

During the folk revival of the 1960s, County Records released an LP with recordings by Poole from 1925 to 1930. A Collinsville record store owner said he sold more Poole LPs than Beatles' albums in late 1965 , which shows how deeply ingrained Poole's music still was back then.

Discography

Singles

The following discography lists all of the originally released 78rpm records Poole and the North Carolina Ramblers released between 1925 and 1930.

year title # Remarks
Columbia Records
1925 Don't Let Your Deal Go Down / Can I Sleep In Your Barn Tonight, Mister? 15038-D
1925 I'm The Man That Rode the Mule Around The World / The Girl I Left in Sunny Tennessee 15043-D
1926 Audio file / audio sample White House Blues ? / i / Monkey on a String 15099-D
1926 Flying Clouds / Forks of Sandy 15106-D
1926 Leaving Home / There'll Come a Time
1926 Too Young to Marry / Ragtime Annie
1926 Goodbye Booze / Budded Rose
1926 The Highwayman / Hungry Hash House
1927 Letter That Never Came / Falling By the Wayside
1927 Sunset March / Don't Let Your Deal Go Down
1927 You Ain't Talkin 'to Me / Take a Drink On Me
1927 If I Lose, I Don't Care / Coon from Tennessee
1928 Wild Horses / Mountain Reel as North Carolina Ramblers led by Posey Rorer
1928 Ramblin 'Blues / Shootin' Creek
1928 I Cannot Call Her Mother / What Is Home Without Babies?
1928 The Husband and Wife Were Angry One Night / Jealous Mary
1928 Old and Only in the Way / Took My Gal a Walking
1928 I Once Loved a Sailor / Hangman, Hangman, Slack the Rope
1928 (?) A Young Boy Left His Home One Day / My Wife Went Away and Left Me
1929 Bill Mason / He Rambled
1929 Leaving Dear Old Ireland / Sweet Sunny South
1929 Goodbye Mary Dear / The Wayward Boy
1929 Baltimore Fire / The Mother's Plea for Her Son
1930 Sweet Sixteen / My Gipsy Girl
1930 If the River Were Whiskey / It's Moving Day
1930 Goodbye Sweet Liza Jane / Look Before Your Leap
1930 Southern Medley / Honeysuckle Charlie Poole with Roy Harvey
1930 Just Keep Waiting Till the Good Times Come / Where the Whippoorwill is Whispering Tonight
1930 Audio file / audio sample Milwaukee Blues ? / i / One Moonlit Night
1930 The Only Girl I Ever Loved / Write Letter to My Mother

Albums

Since there were no long-playing records (LP) in Poole's time, only re-releases can be shown here.

  • 2005: The North Carolina Ramblers
  • 2005: You Ain't Talkin 'To Me
  • 2006: Old-Time Songs

Individual evidence

  1. a b Tony Russell: Country Music Originals pp. 19-20; ISBN 0195325095 , Oxford University Press
  2. ^ County LP 505: Charlie Poole & the North Carolina Ramblers - Old Time Songs

Web links