Wilf Carter

Wilfred Arthur Charles "Wilf" Carter (born December 18, 1904 in Port Hilford, Nova Scotia , † December 5, 1996 in Scottsdale , Arizona ) was a Canadian singer, songwriter and yodeler . In his home country he is considered the "father" of country music there and one of the most successful representatives of the genre. But he was also able to celebrate great success in the USA under the name Montana Slim .

In his long career he recorded numerous pieces in the old-time style, mainly cowboy-oriented tracks and is one of the pioneers of Western music . He also gained importance as a virtuoso yodeler, especially in the echo-yodeling or three-in-one style he developed.

Life

Childhood and youth

Wilf Carter was born in Port Hilford on December 18, 1904, one of nine children of a Swiss Baptist preacher and his English wife. Since the family was very poor, he had to work in various jobs on his parents' farm and neighboring ranches from the age of eight . When he was about 10 years old, he had an experience that would shape his future life: while driving cattle, he saw a performance by Uncle Tom's Hut , at which an unknown Swiss yodel called The Yodeling Fool appeared as an additional attraction . From this point on, the young Wilf had found his calling and did not let the strict upbringing methods of his father prevent him from practicing yodelling incessantly: “I yodeled upstairs and downstairs, in the parlor and in the apple orchard and in the lane . Dad couldn't stop me even though he wore out more than a dozen slippers on the seat of my pants. "

At the age of 16, due to an argument with his father, he finally left his hometown to work as a cowboy in the Canadian Rocky Mountains . There he entertained his colleagues with his singing performances and also performed on rodeos . Eventually he moved to Alberta , where he appeared on the radio station CFCN on The Old Timers from 1930 . Usually he accompanied his singing with an autoharp or sang unaccompanied.

Beginnings

Carter was also influenced by rising star Jimmie Rodgers , who also yodeled and added blues and jazz elements to his music . In contrast, Carter emphasized the original Alpine style, which he developed into his own style over time. Due to the popularity he gained during his appearances, he got a new job as a radio host at CFCN . His show The Voice Of The Prairies was broadcast once a week , in which Carter sang himself. Shortly afterwards he switched to the radio station CBC and on the side he signed a contract with the Toronto Publishing House . However, despite his jobs, he lived in modest circumstances. To improve his lifestyle, he worked for the Canadian Pacific Railway , which organized trips to the "Wild West of Canada". As he enjoyed increasing popularity, Carter was offered a recording contract by RCA Records , but he could not raise the financial means for the trip to New York , so RCA dropped the offer again.

Career

Raged But Right , 1956

In 1933 he finally got a contract with RCA. The ship that Carter was working on at the time made a stop in Montreal . He played there for the Canadian RCA management, which then got him a contract. He released his first record in 1934 with My Swiss Moonlight Lullaby on the A-side and The Capture Of Albert Johnson on the B-side. The single became a hit in Canada, but went largely unnoticed in the US. In 1935 he began to appear on the CBS radio station in New York as Montana Slim . A secretary came up with the name when it came time to publish the song A Cowboy's High Toned Dance composed by Carter . His records immediately achieved high sales in the USA. From then on, his records were released in Canada under the name Wilf Carter and in the USA under the name Montana Slim. A labor-intensive time began for Carter, during his long career he wrote almost 500 songs, which covered the most varied areas of the music of the time, but mainly dealt with the then very popular cowboy theme. In addition, he continued to appear regularly on the radio and at concerts.

In 1937 Carter married the former nurse Bobbie Bryan, with whom he bought a ranch in Alberta. In 1940 Carter suffered a serious car accident, from which he recovered completely, but he was not able to make records again until 1947 and only in 1949 to resume his work on the radio and go on tour. During this recovery period, he concentrated entirely on raising livestock and raising his two daughters, Sheila and Carol. Carter and his family had moved to New Jersey as early as 1947 due to commuting between Canada and the United States . In the same year he made his first and only appearance on the Grand Ole Opry , America's most famous radio show. His subsequent tour of the USA was a great success and in 1953 he began running the touring show The Family Show With The Folks You Know with his daughters . In 1952, RCA had canceled his contract and Carter switched to Decca Records , where he recorded records until 1957. His sessions were held in Nashville , Tennessee , and stars like Chet Atkins and Grady Martin were often present as background musicians .

In the late 1950s, Carter's popularity in America waned; in Canada, however, he was still consistently successful. Carter released records and toured Canada until the 1980s. In 1971 he was inducted into the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame . After the death of his wife in 1989, he gradually withdrew from the public.

Wilf Carter aka Montana Slim died on December 5, 1996 at the age of 91, shortly after his doctors diagnosed him with cancer. He was inducted into both the Canadian Music Hall of Fame and the Canadian Country Music Hall of Fame for his services to country music in Canada .

legacy

Alongside Hank Snow, Wilf Carter is considered to be the most successful Canadian country musician, and he is also regarded as the "father" of Canadian country music, which before him had barely emerged from the shadow of its southern sister. However, he made the most lasting impression in the field of yodelling and western music . With the echo-yodeling or three-in-one-yodeling he developed , he differed significantly from the style previously practiced in vaudeville , from which the blue yodeling was ultimately to emerge. In a way, he anticipated the more sophisticated yoders that would later become common with the Singing Cowboys . But also the so-called voice-break singing , i.e. H. the breaking of the voice while singing parts of the text remains associated with his name, e.g. with the song A little Log Shack I can alway call my Home . His recordings of traditional and his own cowboy titles, which make up the majority of his oeuvre, mark the transition from the realistic ballads of Carl T. Sprague to the romantic and transfigured titles that artists like Gene Autry or Roy Rogers used in Hollywood in the mid-1930s should conquer. Despite his hobo and hillbilly numbers, he is widely recognized as one of the great pioneers of the western genre, "one of the all-time great western singers."

Well-known titles

Catalog number	title	Record company
20-2364	Too Many Blues / Singing on Borrowed Time	RCA Victor
20-3038	The Midnight Train / The Tramp's Mother	RCA Victor
20-4846	Man Hunt / Alabama Saturday Nite	RCA Victor
27786	My Brown-Eyed Prairie Rose / I'm Hitting the Trail	RCA Victor
29585	Dynamite Trail / The Strawberry Roan	Decca Records
30907	My French Canadian Girl / My Prairie Rose	Decca Records

Further awards

• Induction into the Western Music Association Hall of Fame (1991)
• Induction into the Nova Scotia Country Music Hall of Fame (1997)

literature

• Douglas B. Green: Singing in the Saddle: The History of the Singing Cowboy . Vanderbilt University Press, 2002, ISBN 0-8265-1412-X , pp. 66 ff.
• Tony Russell: Country Music Originals: The Legends and the Lost . Oxford University Press, 2007, ISBN 978-0-19-532509-6 , pp. 175 ff.
• Paul Kingsbury: The Encyclopedia of Country Music: The Ultimate Guide to the Music . Oxford University Press, 2004, ISBN 978-0-19-517608-7 , pp. 83 f.
• Francesca Peppiatt: Country Music's Most Wanted: The Top 10 Book of Cheating Hearts, Honky Tonk Tragedies, and Music City Oddities . Potomac Books, 2004, ISBN 978-1-57488-593-4 , p. 126 f.

Web links

• Wilf Carter in the Alberta Online Encyclopedia
• Bio on Answers.com
• as Wilf Carter and as Montana Slim on Hillbilly Music.com
• Extensive discography from the Wilf Carter Center in Canning, Nova Scotia
• Wilf Carter at Allmusic (English)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ In the 1939 Deluxe Edition of his Song of the Plains and Rockies , Carter states that he was "around ten years old"; see. Rudy Robbins, Shirley Field: How To Yodel The Cowboy Way . Centerstream Publishing, 1997, ISBN 978-1-57424-035-1 , p. 33.
2. ^ Quote from Carter's first songbook Cowboy Songs with yodels ; pictured in Douglas B. Green: Singing in the Saddle: The History of the Singing Cowboy . Vanderbilt University Press, 2002, ISBN 0-8265-1412-X , p. 66.
3. ↑ Francesca Peppiatt: Country Music's Most Wanted: The Top 10 Book of Cheating Hearts, Honky Tonk Tragedies, and Music City Oddities . Potomac Books, 2004, ISBN 978-1-57488-593-4 , p. 126 f.
4. ^ Canadian Music Hall of Fame - Inductees. Canadian Music Hall of Fame , accessed August 6, 2017 . 
5. ^ Bill C. Malone: Country Music, USA 2nd edition. University of Texas Press, 2002, ISBN 978-0-292-75262-7 , p. 90.
6. ^ Paul Kingsbury: The Encyclopedia of Country Music: The Ultimate Guide to the Music . Oxford University Press, 2004, ISBN 978-0-19-517608-7 , pp. 83 f.
7. ^ Ivan Tribe: Country: A Regional Exploration , Greenwood Publishing Group. 2006, ISBN 978-0-313-33026-1 , p. 71.