Old Time Ensemble (Weds) – Week 5

If you haven’t listened to Alexander Campbell “Eck” Robertson, what are you waiting for? There’s a CD out from County Records that contains all of his 1920′s recordings. It’s called Old Time Texas Fiddler (1922-1929). It was in 1922, that Eck Robertson and Henry Gilliland made what were arguably the very first recordings of real country fiddling. In the mid-1980s, County issued an LP from later in Eck’s life and billed it as perhaps the last vinyl recording by an authentic old-time fiddler. It’s worth finding and adding both of these recordings to your collection.

Here’s Eck playing Great Big Taters [link to iTunes store]

And here’s a slower version, by Steve & Paul of Great Big Taters in the Sandy Land.

Eck may have played the tune in cross tuning (GDGD or AEAE). I taught it in standard tuning with fingering in the key of G. That may have been Eck’s way as well.

Filed under: Old Time Ensemble,Paul Tyler,Uncategorized by Paul | July 23, 2009 | Comments (0)


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