Jimmy Martin
Encyclopedia
Jimmy Martin was an American
bluegrass
musician
, known as the "King of Bluegrass".
. Jimmy Martin was born into the hard farming life of rural East Tennessee
. He grew up near Sneedville, singing in church and with friends from surrounding farms. His mother and stepfather who used to sing gospel were his first influences. When he was in his teens he bought a guitar. Martin told The Big Book of Bluegrass: "I learned the basic chords from an old hillbilly named Reuben Gibson, who lived in the hills around Sneedville, and I taught myself how to play. I heard Lester Flatt and Charlie Monroe both play runs, but I didn't try to top them. I mostly just developed them how I felt, when it came natural for a song."
In his teens, he played guitar in a local string band and later appeared with "Tex Climer and the Blue Band Coffee Boys" on radio.
had just left Bill Monroe's "Bluegrass Boys". Martin, who wanted to apply for the vacant post as guitarist, rode the bus into Nashville
. He sneaked in backstage at the Grand Ole Opry
. While picking his guitar, he was overheard by "Bluegrass Boys" banjo player Rudy Lyle who brought him forward and presented him to Monroe. Martin sang two songs with Monroe and was hired instantly.
Beginning in 1949 Martin was lead vocalist for Bill Monroe
's "Bluegrass Boys,". Martin's high voice mixed with Monroe's tenor came to be known as the "high lonesome" sound. His influence radically changed Monroe's music from the fast-paced but smooth style of the "original" 1945 band with Flatt and Scruggs. Martin challenged Monroe to raise the pitch on many of his classics and to write new, "lonesome" songs. This band with Rudy Lyle
(banjo) and Charlie Cline
(fiddle) was one of the many high points of Monroe's career. Martin's lead was defining in "lonesome" songs such as "Sitting Alone in the Moonlight", "Memories of Mother and Dad" and "I'm Blue, I'm Lonesome".
Martin had a famously high-strung and exuberant personality, and inevitably clashed with Monroe's equally stubborn temperament.
He left Monroe and worked briefly with the Osborne Brothers
until he formed his own band, "The Sunny Mountain Boys" in 1955. The classic lineup of this band, with J. D. Crowe
and "Big" Paul Williams (stage name for Paul Humphrey) defined his "Good 'n Country" style, a commercially-oriented, crowd-pleasing bluegrass with simple harmonies, catchy melodies, and a strong rhythm propelled by Martin's effective guitar playing. He credited himself with inventing the "G" run- a guitar lick used widely in the bluegrass genre. However, aural evidence from the period before Martin began performing professionally clearly shows Lester Flatt
using this run when backing Bill Monroe
.
Three important components of Martin's unique sound, besides his cutting tenor voice, were tight trio singing, sometimes a female high-baritone fourth part, and the use of a snare drum in place of mandolin to keep the back-beat.
Among Martin's biggest hits of the 1960s were "Hit Parade of Love", "Sophronie", "Stepping Stones", "Tennessee", and "Widow Maker" (a popular truck driver's song). His instrumentals (with the Sunny Mountain Boys) such as "Theme Time", "Bear Tracks" and "Red Rooster" featured ultra-crisp playing by a series of banjo players including Sam "Porky" Hutchins, J.D. Crowe, Vernon McIntyre Jr. and Bill Emerson
, and powered by Martin's guitar runs, set a standard for bluegrass instrumentals that was highly influential.
Martin was famous as a dangerously unpredictable but highly entertaining stage presence. He freely acknowledged his problems with drinking and volatile mood swings, which kept him from realizing his life-long dream of joining the Grand Ole Opry.
He made frequent appearances on the Louisiana Hayride
and Wheeling, West Virginia
's WWVA Jamboree
(renamed Jamboree U.S.A. in the 1960s), as well as the Grand Ole Opry, but was never invited to join the latter.
He performed on the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band
's 1971 album, Will the Circle be Unbroken.
He joined producers Randall Franks
and Alan Autry
for the In the Heat of the Night (TV Series)
cast CD “Christmas Time’s A Comin’” performing "Christmas Time's A Comin'" with the cast on the CD released on Sonlite and MGM/UA for one of the most popular Christmas releases of 1991 and 1992 with Southern retailers.
after having been diagnosed with bladder cancer
more than a year earlier. He is interred in the Spring Hill Cemetery
in Madison, Tennessee
.
. A documentary on his life, King of Bluegrass: The Life and Times of Jimmy Martin, was released in 2003. Martin is also featured in the documentary film High Lonesome.
Martin's hobby was raccoon-hunting with dogs; he famously featured his hunting dogs on the covers of several LP albums and wrote songs celebrating their prowess.
His trials and tribulations with the Nashville music industry establishment are memorialized in "The Death of Jimmy Martin", a song by Tom Russell
on "The Wounded Heart of America" album.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
bluegrass
Bluegrass music
Bluegrass music is a form of American roots music, and a sub-genre of country music. It has mixed roots in Scottish, English, Welsh and Irish traditional music...
musician
Musician
A musician is an artist who plays a musical instrument. It may or may not be the person's profession. Musicians can be classified by their roles in performing music and writing music.Also....* A person who makes music a profession....
, known as the "King of Bluegrass".
Early years
Born James H. Martin in Sneedville, TennesseeSneedville, Tennessee
Sneedville is a town in Hancock County, Tennessee, United States. The population was 1,387 at the 2010 census. It is the county seat of Hancock County.- History :...
. Jimmy Martin was born into the hard farming life of rural East Tennessee
East Tennessee
East Tennessee is a name given to approximately the eastern third of the U.S. state of Tennessee, one of the three Grand Divisions of Tennessee defined in state law. East Tennessee consists of 33 counties, 30 located within the Eastern Time Zone and three counties in the Central Time Zone, namely...
. He grew up near Sneedville, singing in church and with friends from surrounding farms. His mother and stepfather who used to sing gospel were his first influences. When he was in his teens he bought a guitar. Martin told The Big Book of Bluegrass: "I learned the basic chords from an old hillbilly named Reuben Gibson, who lived in the hills around Sneedville, and I taught myself how to play. I heard Lester Flatt and Charlie Monroe both play runs, but I didn't try to top them. I mostly just developed them how I felt, when it came natural for a song."
In his teens, he played guitar in a local string band and later appeared with "Tex Climer and the Blue Band Coffee Boys" on radio.
Music career
In the winter of 1949, Mac WisemanMac Wiseman
Malcolm B. Wiseman , better known as Mac Wiseman, is an American bluegrass singer, nicknamed The Voice with a Heart. The bearded singer is one of the cult figures of bluegrass....
had just left Bill Monroe's "Bluegrass Boys". Martin, who wanted to apply for the vacant post as guitarist, rode the bus into Nashville
Nashville, Tennessee
Nashville is the capital of the U.S. state of Tennessee and the county seat of Davidson County. It is located on the Cumberland River in Davidson County, in the north-central part of the state. The city is a center for the health care, publishing, banking and transportation industries, and is home...
. He sneaked in backstage at the Grand Ole Opry
Grand Ole Opry
The Grand Ole Opry is a weekly country music stage concert in Nashville, Tennessee, that has presented the biggest stars of that genre since 1925. It is also among the longest-running broadcasts in history since its beginnings as a one-hour radio "barn dance" on WSM-AM...
. While picking his guitar, he was overheard by "Bluegrass Boys" banjo player Rudy Lyle who brought him forward and presented him to Monroe. Martin sang two songs with Monroe and was hired instantly.
Beginning in 1949 Martin was lead vocalist for Bill Monroe
Bill Monroe
William Smith Monroe was an American musician who created the style of music known as bluegrass, which takes its name from his band, the "Blue Grass Boys," named for Monroe's home state of Kentucky. Monroe's performing career spanned 60 years as a singer, instrumentalist, composer and bandleader...
's "Bluegrass Boys,". Martin's high voice mixed with Monroe's tenor came to be known as the "high lonesome" sound. His influence radically changed Monroe's music from the fast-paced but smooth style of the "original" 1945 band with Flatt and Scruggs. Martin challenged Monroe to raise the pitch on many of his classics and to write new, "lonesome" songs. This band with Rudy Lyle
Rudy Lyle
Rudy R. Lyle was an American bluegrass banjo player, mostly known for being a member of Bill Monroe's Blue Grass Boys in the early 1950's.-Biography:...
(banjo) and Charlie Cline
Charlie Cline
Charles "Charlie" Cline , was an American bluegrass fiddler and multi-instrumentalist, known for being the sideman of several legendary bluegrass groups from the 1950s and well into the 1980s....
(fiddle) was one of the many high points of Monroe's career. Martin's lead was defining in "lonesome" songs such as "Sitting Alone in the Moonlight", "Memories of Mother and Dad" and "I'm Blue, I'm Lonesome".
Martin had a famously high-strung and exuberant personality, and inevitably clashed with Monroe's equally stubborn temperament.
He left Monroe and worked briefly with the Osborne Brothers
Osborne Brothers
The Osborne Brothers, Sonny Osborne and Bobby Osborne , were an influential and popular bluegrass act during the 1960s and 1970s...
until he formed his own band, "The Sunny Mountain Boys" in 1955. The classic lineup of this band, with J. D. Crowe
J. D. Crowe
James Dee Crowe is an American banjo player and bluegrass band leader. He first became known during his four year stint with Jimmy Martin in the 1950s.-Biography:...
and "Big" Paul Williams (stage name for Paul Humphrey) defined his "Good 'n Country" style, a commercially-oriented, crowd-pleasing bluegrass with simple harmonies, catchy melodies, and a strong rhythm propelled by Martin's effective guitar playing. He credited himself with inventing the "G" run- a guitar lick used widely in the bluegrass genre. However, aural evidence from the period before Martin began performing professionally clearly shows Lester Flatt
Lester Flatt
Lester Raymond Flatt was a bluegrass musician and guitarist and mandolinist, best known for his membership in the Bluegrass duo The Foggy Mountain Boys, also known as "Flatt and Scruggs," with banjo picker Earl Scruggs. Flatt's career spanned multiple decades; besides his work with Scruggs, he...
using this run when backing Bill Monroe
Bill Monroe
William Smith Monroe was an American musician who created the style of music known as bluegrass, which takes its name from his band, the "Blue Grass Boys," named for Monroe's home state of Kentucky. Monroe's performing career spanned 60 years as a singer, instrumentalist, composer and bandleader...
.
Three important components of Martin's unique sound, besides his cutting tenor voice, were tight trio singing, sometimes a female high-baritone fourth part, and the use of a snare drum in place of mandolin to keep the back-beat.
Among Martin's biggest hits of the 1960s were "Hit Parade of Love", "Sophronie", "Stepping Stones", "Tennessee", and "Widow Maker" (a popular truck driver's song). His instrumentals (with the Sunny Mountain Boys) such as "Theme Time", "Bear Tracks" and "Red Rooster" featured ultra-crisp playing by a series of banjo players including Sam "Porky" Hutchins, J.D. Crowe, Vernon McIntyre Jr. and Bill Emerson
Bill Emerson (musician)
William Hundley "Bill" Emerson, Jr. is an American five-string banjo player known for being one of the founding members of the original Country Gentlemen and Emerson & Waldron.-Career:...
, and powered by Martin's guitar runs, set a standard for bluegrass instrumentals that was highly influential.
Martin was famous as a dangerously unpredictable but highly entertaining stage presence. He freely acknowledged his problems with drinking and volatile mood swings, which kept him from realizing his life-long dream of joining the Grand Ole Opry.
He made frequent appearances on the Louisiana Hayride
Louisiana Hayride
Louisiana Hayride was a radio and later television country music show broadcast from the Shreveport Municipal Memorial Auditorium in Shreveport, Louisiana, that during its heyday from 1948 to 1960 helped to launch the careers of some of the greatest names in American music...
and Wheeling, West Virginia
Wheeling, West Virginia
Wheeling is a city in Ohio and Marshall counties in the U.S. state of West Virginia; it is the county seat of Ohio County. Wheeling is the principal city of the Wheeling Metropolitan Statistical Area...
's WWVA Jamboree
WWVA Jamboree
WWVA Jamboree, renamed Jamboree U.S.A. in the 1960s, and the Wheeling Jamboree in 2009, is a pioneering American radio show that featured country music from 1933–2008, and again since January 2009...
(renamed Jamboree U.S.A. in the 1960s), as well as the Grand Ole Opry, but was never invited to join the latter.
He performed on the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band
Nitty Gritty Dirt Band
The Nitty Gritty Dirt Band is an American country-folk-rock band that has existed in various forms since its founding in Long Beach, California in 1966. The group's membership has had at least a dozen changes over the years, including a period from 1976 to 1981 when the band performed and recorded...
's 1971 album, Will the Circle be Unbroken.
He joined producers Randall Franks
Randall Franks
Randall Franks is an award-winning bluegrass singer and musician who plays fiddle, mandolin, guitar and mountain dulcimer. He was recognized by the International Bluegrass Music Museum in 2010 as a Bluegrass Legend; inducted into the Atlanta Country Music Hall of Fame in 2004; and was designated...
and Alan Autry
Alan Autry
Carlos Alan Autry is an American actor, politician, and former National Football League football player. He is best known for his role as Captain Bubba Skinner on the television series In the Heat of the Night; he also has been in numerous movies and other television shows...
for the In the Heat of the Night (TV Series)
In the Heat of the Night (TV series)
In the Heat of the Night is a television series based on the motion picture and novel of the same name. It was broadcast on NBC from 1988 until 1992, and then on CBS until 1995...
cast CD “Christmas Time’s A Comin’” performing "Christmas Time's A Comin'" with the cast on the CD released on Sonlite and MGM/UA for one of the most popular Christmas releases of 1991 and 1992 with Southern retailers.
Passing
Jimmy Martin died May 14, 2005 in Nashville, TennesseeNashville, Tennessee
Nashville is the capital of the U.S. state of Tennessee and the county seat of Davidson County. It is located on the Cumberland River in Davidson County, in the north-central part of the state. The city is a center for the health care, publishing, banking and transportation industries, and is home...
after having been diagnosed with bladder cancer
Bladder cancer
Bladder cancer is any of several types of malignant growths of the urinary bladder. It is a disease in which abnormal cells multiply without control in the bladder. The bladder is a hollow, muscular organ that stores urine; it is located in the pelvis...
more than a year earlier. He is interred in the Spring Hill Cemetery
Spring Hill Cemetery
Spring Hill Cemetery on Gallatin Pike in the Nashville, Tennessee suburb of Madison is the final resting place for some of country music’s legendary performers including:*Roy Acuff, singer, songwriter, music publisher*Floyd Cramer, piano legend...
in Madison, Tennessee
Madison, Tennessee
Madison, Tennessee is a neighborhood in northeast Nashville, Tennessee in the United States. It is incorporated as part of the Metropolitan Government of Nashville and Davidson County....
.
Legacy
In 1995, Martin was inducted into the International Bluegrass Music Hall of HonorInternational Bluegrass Music Hall of Honor
Induction to the International Bluegrass Music Hall of Fame, called the International Bluegrass Music Hall of Honor from its creation in 1991 through 2006, is managed by the International Bluegrass Music Association, and the Hall itself is maintained at the International Bluegrass Music Museum in...
. A documentary on his life, King of Bluegrass: The Life and Times of Jimmy Martin, was released in 2003. Martin is also featured in the documentary film High Lonesome.
Martin's hobby was raccoon-hunting with dogs; he famously featured his hunting dogs on the covers of several LP albums and wrote songs celebrating their prowess.
His trials and tribulations with the Nashville music industry establishment are memorialized in "The Death of Jimmy Martin", a song by Tom Russell
Tom Russell
Thomas George "Tom" Russell is an American singer-songwriter. Although most strongly identified with the Texas Country music tradition, his music also incorporates elements of folk, Tex-Mex, and the cowboy music of the American West. Many of his songs have been recorded by other artists, including...
on "The Wounded Heart of America" album.
Albums
| Year | Album | US Country Hot Country Songs Hot Country Songs is a chart published weekly by Billboard magazine in the United States.This 60-position chart lists the most popular country music songs, calculated weekly mostly by airplay and occasionally commercial sales... |
Label |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1960 | Good'n Country | — | Decca |
| 1962 | Country Music Time | — | |
| 1963 | This World Is Not My Home | — | |
| 1964 | Widow Maker | — | |
| 1965 | Sunny Side of the Mountain | — | |
| 1966 | Good'n Country Music | — | |
| 1967 | Big and Country Instrumentals | — | |
| 1968 | Tennessee | 42 | |
| 1969 | Free Born Man | — | |
| 1970 | Singing All Day | — | |
| 1972 | I'd Like to Be Sixteen Again | — | |
| 1973 | Moonshine Hollow | — | Coral |
| 1974 | Fly Me to Frisco | — | MCA |
| 1978 | Greatest Bluegrass Hits | — | Gusto |
| 1980 | Will the Circle Be Unbroken | — | |
| Me'n Old Pete | — | ||
| To Mother at Christmas | — | ||
| First Time Together (with Ralph Stanley Ralph Stanley Ralph Stanley , also known as Dr. Ralph Stanley, is an American bluegrass artist, known for his distinctive singing and banjo playing.-Biography:... ) |
— | ||
| 1982 | One Woman Man | — |
Singles
| Year | Single | US Country Hot Country Songs Hot Country Songs is a chart published weekly by Billboard magazine in the United States.This 60-position chart lists the most popular country music songs, calculated weekly mostly by airplay and occasionally commercial sales... |
Album |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1958 | "Rock Hearts" | 14 | single only |
| 1959 | "Night" | 26 | Good'n Country |
| 1964 | "Widow Maker" | 19 | Widow Maker |
| 1966 | "I Can't Quit Cigarettes" | 49 | Good'n Country Music |
| 1968 | "Tennessee" | 72 | Tennessee |
Guest singles
| Year | Single | Artist | US Country | Album |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1973 | "Grand Ole Opry Song" | Nitty Gritty Dirt Band Nitty Gritty Dirt Band The Nitty Gritty Dirt Band is an American country-folk-rock band that has existed in various forms since its founding in Long Beach, California in 1966. The group's membership has had at least a dozen changes over the years, including a period from 1976 to 1981 when the band performed and recorded... |
97 | Will the Circle Be Unbroken Will the Circle Be Unbroken Will the Circle Be Unbroken is a 1972 album officially by the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band, but with collaboration from many famous Bluegrass and country-western players, including Roy Acuff, Mother Maybelle Carter, Doc Watson, Earl Scruggs, Merle Travis, Bashful Brother Oswald, Norman Blake, Jimmy... |
External links
- Discography at Discography of Bluegrass Sound Recordings
- And yet another Discography;