OHR Presents: Stringband!

Ozark Highlands Radio

This week, a collection of stringbands and stringband music both traditional and modern recorded live at Ozark Folk Center State Park. Also, commentary by musicians from these solely stringed outfits. A stringband is an old-time music ensemble made up solely of string instruments. Stringbands were extremely popular in 1920s and 30s America and were the forerunners of modern country and bluegrass bands. Early old-time stringbands were comprised mainly of a fiddle, a banjo and acoustic guitar. They may have also been joined by other instruments including spoons, washboard, jug, harmonica, mountain or hammered dulcimer, autoharp and bones. Eventually, other stringed instruments began to be added to the fiddle-banjo duo that was essential to dance music of the early United States. These other instruments included mandolin and double bass or washtub bass. Such an assemblage of instrumentation became known simply as a “stringband.” Featured on this stringband show are Ozark originals The Lazy Goat Stringband, Possum Juice, The Leatherwoods, The Upjumpers, and Harmony. Also featured are Shenandoah Valley old-time supergroup, The Steel Wheels and Minnesota stringband sensation, The Roe Family Singers. In this week’s “From the Vault” segment, OHR producer Jeff Glover offers a 1981 archival recording of Ozark originals Lloyd & Floyd Armstrong performing the song “Dust on the Bible,” from the Ozark Folk Center State Park archives. In his segment “Back in the Hills,” writer, professor, and historian Dr. Brooks Blevins explores how to speak Ozarkian and the origins of Ozark vernacular.