Why is it called "Travis Picking" and not "Mississippi John Hurt Picking?"

[Wade Hampton]

There's some good input in this thread regarding racism and racial relations in the South - which were not and are not always precisely the same thing, no matter how many feverish Hollywood movies about sweaty white racists with Southern accents you may have seen...

To my mind, there's an even simpler explanation, though Rick Ruskin already covered it: Merle Travis was the famous player who had the hit records and even appeared in a bit part in a classic Hollywood movie ("From Here To Eternity.") He was well known, and while he was current he certainly reached far more households than any of the others playing in this style, white or black.

It's kind of ironic that in many acoustic guitar-oriented circles today performers who were unknown to the general public at the time are referred to in hushed, reverential terms as the truly important players, while someone like Travis is almost an afterthought.

I guess life just ain't fair, during one's lifetime OR after death!!


whm

[Glennwillow]

Originally Posted by tpbiii

These are all variations of country ragtime, which was very widespread in the last quarter of the 19th century. I think the roots of the music are clearly in the African American tradition, but it had mostly died out before recording era came along. Almost everyone in the black community played in that style, and Scott Joplin tried to make it a classical (scripted) form. It was "old time" because by the time people like Gary Davis played it, it was being supplanted in the African American community by blues and later jazz.

Merle Travis' influences are well documented. For the white musicians, the well spring seems to have been a black hillbilly musician named Arnold Shultz -- a neighbor of Bill Monroe. Shultz was never recorded, but he played a lot with Bill Monroe when both were young. Monroe credits him as the source of the blues influence in bluegrass.

Shultz also had a big influence on Kentucky musicians Kennedy Jones, Mose Rager, Ike Everly (the father of Don and Phil Everly a/k/a the Everly Brothers), and eventually Merle Travis. You can read the story here.

Maybelle Carter also played in that style (among many) -- e.g. "Solid Gone". She apparently learned it from Leslie Riddle, a one legged black musician that traveled widely with A. P. Carter on his "song catching" trips. Riddle could remember lyrics very well -- he was sort of like A. P.'s human recorder. A. P. would later write down the songs and "fix them up."

Racial prejudice was endemic in the lowland south, but the highland south was entirely different. The black populations were much smaller, and the white residents were largely Scots Irish, which had very different traditions the the "Cavalier" hegemonic culture of the lowland south. Racial prejudice was not really much of an issue in the mountains. If you are interested in these cultural issues, here is an article I wrote for Bluegrass Unlimited Magazine in 1999.

Best,

-Tom

Tom,

Thanks for that history lesson -- that was extremely interesting!

Best Regards, Glenn

[oldrocker]

Originally Posted by tpbiii

These are all variations of country ragtime, which was very widespread in the last quarter of the 19th century. I think the roots of the music are clearly in the African American tradition, but it had mostly died out before recording era came along. Almost everyone in the black community played in that style, and Scott Joplin tried to make it a classical (scripted) form. It was "old time" because by the time people like Gary Davis played it, it was being supplanted in the African American community by blues and later jazz.

Merle Travis' influences are well documented. For the white musicians, the well spring seems to have been a black hillbilly musician named Arnold Shultz -- a neighbor of Bill Monroe. Shultz was never recorded, but he played a lot with Bill Monroe when both were young. Monroe credits him as the source of the blues influence in bluegrass.

Shultz also had a big influence on Kentucky musicians Kennedy Jones, Mose Rager, Ike Everly (the father of Don and Phil Everly a/k/a the Everly Brothers), and eventually Merle Travis. You can read the story here.

Maybelle Carter also played in that style (among many) -- e.g. "Solid Gone". She apparently learned it from Leslie Riddle, a one legged black musician that traveled widely with A. P. Carter on his "song catching" trips. Riddle could remember lyrics very well -- he was sort of like A. P.'s human recorder. A. P. would later write down the songs and "fix them up."

Racial prejudice was endemic in the lowland south, but the highland south was entirely different. The black populations were much smaller, and the white residents were largely Scots Irish, which had very different traditions the the "Cavalier" hegemonic culture of the lowland south. Racial prejudice was not really much of an issue in the mountains. If you are interested in these cultural issues, here is an article I wrote for Bluegrass Unlimited Magazine in 1999.

Best,

-Tom

Tom. This is great information. Merle Travis casually discusses the influence of some of these musicians during a back and forth discussion with Chet Atkins in their album "Atkins-Travis Traveling Show" which is one of my favorite albums exemplifying this type of fingerpicking. I learned how to do that (Chet style with 4 fingers) by listening to this album 30 or so years ago and its still one of my favorites. In this album you can clearly hear the difference between Merle's thumb and first finger and Chet's classical 4 finger style.

[dgrolem]

Originally Posted by Wade Hampton

Merle Travis was the famous player who had the hit records and even appeared in a bit part in a classic Hollywood movie ("From Here To Eternity.") He was well known, and while he was current he certainly reached far more households than any of the others playing in this style, white or black.

whm

As I understand it, Merle's influence reached far beyond his own picking. He was a mover and shaker at Capitol records in Hollywood in the late 1940s and 1950s as essentially an A&R person. His influence went well beyond his boom-chick bass. Merle appeared in a dozen or so films.

Did the Beatles or Elvis invent rock & roll? No. But they are the popular icons of the genre. Merle and Chet are the popular icons of thumbstyle guitar. Neither unfairly grabbed that position from anyone.

One other trivia point. A friend reminded me that Glen Campbell's parents gave him the middle name of Travis in honor of Merle.

[Squeezebox]

I have not read thru all the posts here so maybe this had already been said, but I've always thought Travis Picking was more about "pattern picking"....Right hand plays a pattern, alternating thumb, and left hand fingers do not really move too much except for chord changes

When I think of Mississippi John Hurt or The Rev, Right hand does alternating thumb, but other fingers pick notes in sync with what the left hand is doing to create a true Melody...Many times this Melody mirrors the Melody that is being sung by the picker...

The latter, ie: playing a bass line and dropping a melody on top of it, is waaaaay more difficult than pattern picking (but sounds soooooo cool)

I think I read somewhere that the Rev envisioned Miss Gibson as a piano strapped around his neck.....Thumb (plus fretting fingers) handles what the left hand does when playing piano (bassline), other picking digits handles the right hand piano parts (melody)

VERY Fun stuff!!!

[Christian Reno]

Originally Posted by dgrolem

And don't forget that Chet Atkins named his daughter Merle as well.

Chet did name his daughter Merle, but she was named after a family member, a female family member by the way, not after Merle Travis.

[Christian Reno]

Originally Posted by Christian Reno

Chet did name his daughter Merle, but she was named after a family member, a female family member by the way, not after Merle Travis.

This is off topic, but after I posted this, I realized there may be a couple of people who would want to know who the family member was. It was Leona's (Chet's wife) mother, Merle Johnson.

[dgrolem]

Originally Posted by Squeezebox

I have not read thru all the posts here so maybe this had already been said, but I've always thought Travis Picking was more about "pattern picking"....Right hand plays a pattern, alternating thumb, and left hand fingers do not really move too much except for chord changes

When I think of Mississippi John Hurt or The Rev, Right hand does alternating thumb, but other fingers pick notes in sync with what the left hand is doing to create a true Melody...Many times this Melody mirrors the Melody that is being sung by the picker...

The latter, ie: playing a bass line and dropping a melody on top of it, is waaaaay more difficult than pattern picking (but sounds soooooo cool)

I think I read somewhere that the Rev envisioned Miss Gibson as a piano strapped around his neck.....

Thumb (plus fretting fingers) handles what the left hand does when playing piano (bassline), other picking digits handles the right hand piano parts (melody)

VERY Fun stuff!!!

Merle's thumb plays a bass pattern like 6-4-5-4 while the syncopated melody and rhythm is played with the other fingers. Merle rarely used anything but his index finger. Youtube him and you'll see that he planted middle, ring, and pinky on the pick guard. He also selectively used his thumb pick to brush downward during the bass picking to bring in more of the chord notes when playing bass. Merle's style is anything but just a picking pattern.

[Squeezebox]

Originally Posted by dgrolem

Merle's thumb plays a bass pattern like 6-4-5-4 while the syncopated melody and rhythm is played with the other fingers. Merle rarely used anything but his index finger. Youtube him and you'll see that he planted middle, ring, and pinky on the pick guard. He also selectively used his thumb pick to brush downward during the bass picking to bring in more of the chord notes when playing bass. Merle's style is anything but just a picking pattern.

okey doke...I stand corrected

thanks

[Aaron Smith]

Originally Posted by oldrocker

Tom. This is great information. Merle Travis casually discusses the influence of some of these musicians during a back and forth discussion with Chet Atkins in their album "Atkins-Travis Traveling Show" which is one of my favorite albums exemplifying this type of fingerpicking. I learned how to do that (Chet style with 4 fingers) by listening to this album 30 or so years ago and its still one of my favorites. In this album you can clearly hear the difference between Merle's thumb and first finger and Chet's classical 4 finger style.

One of the all-time great fingerpicking albums. I have probably listened to that one a thousand times, and tried to learn the whole thing note for note. Hearing those two brilliant guitarists playing together is just wonderful- and the guitar tone is out of this world. I've never heard a steel-stringed guitar played more expressively than Chet's playing on that album!

[gitnoob]

Originally Posted by Squeezebox

When I think of Mississippi John Hurt or The Rev, Right hand does alternating thumb, but other fingers pick notes in sync with what the left hand is doing to create a true Melody...Many times this Melody mirrors the Melody that is being sung by the picker...

I'm still a noob, but I'm learning a couple of Hurt's pieces, and it seems that both styles apply. For example, Candy Man has a static picking pattern, while Spike Driver Blues has both a dynamic bass line and melody picking.

[tpbiii]

I have not read thru all the posts here so maybe this had already been said, but I've always thought Travis Picking was more about "pattern picking"....Right hand plays a pattern, alternating thumb, and left hand fingers do not really move too much except for chord changes

When I think of Mississippi John Hurt or The Rev, Right hand does alternating thumb, but other finger pick notes in sync with what the left hand is doing to create a true Melody...Many times this Melody mirrors the Melody that is being sung by the picker...

The belief that "Travis Picking" was pattern picking has some historical background, although it had very little to do with what he actually did. And therein lies another interesting story that relates to this topic.

Basically, all forms of country ragtime conform roughly to the description attributed to Gary Davis -- the alternating thumb providing the "boom-chuck" rhythm, and the finger(s) the melody/lead. With this context, however, there was, and are, a lot of individual variations and innovations.

Most of the traditional black ragtime players became known through the "race records" of the 1920s and 1930s, and through some later exposure in the "folk revival." As many have pointed out before, the folk revival was neither folk nor a revival, but largely the vision of one of the most influential musical and political characters of the 20th century -- Pete Seegar. Pete was the son of a Harvard musicologist. His father went in to the Appalachian with is then wife in order to expose those deprived people to "great", i.e classical, music. What is found blew him away -- these people already had a musical culture of their own that (in his viewed) rivaled the classical in virtuosity and power. Both his sons, Pete and his half brother Mike, picked up on this in a big way. Pete combined the idea of a powerful traditional music genre with his traditional Puritan world and political view and with the "campfire singalongs" of the upstate New York summer camps, and constructed something entirely new -- the folk revival.

To Pete, all traditional music was somehow the same (a viewed not shared by the actual traditional musicians and audiences) and was somehow political as well. The folk revival was mostly a movement of urban youth (my wife and I included), and although its existence was brief, it was a major force in the civil rights movement of the late 1950s and 1960s.

During the folk revival (about 1958-1965 or so), a number if iconic traditional folk musicians were identified, and had a new (if short lived) northern urban career. John Hurt was one of these, as was people like Woody Guthrie, Brownie McGee, Son Terry, and (although dead by then) Hubie Leadbetter (Leadbelly). You can still find followers of these styles in considerable numbers in big cities -- odd but true.

How pervasive country ragtime once was can be seen in the story of Libby Cotton. Libby had grown up around Raleigh NC -- a "hot bed" for country ragtime (there often called the Piedmont blues) in the first couple of decades of the 20th century. She had played as a child, but at 13 (I think) she quit because she got religion and got married. Many years later, she moved the the Washing DC area, and was working as a maid for the Seegar family -- Mike Seegar, his sisters and mother. One day, she picked up one of the family guitars and played a bit -- and got caught. She was playing a song she wrote more than 25 years before, and hadn't played since -- a song called "Freight Train."

But back to the original topic. Folk revival music, as practiced by zillions of urban youths, was basically simple, inclusive music. Two of the mainstays of the genre were Pete Seegar's simple banjo style, which he had adapted after hanging out for a year with Kentucky banjo players, and a simple thumb and forefinger picking style that shared some of the simple elements of country ragtime -- think Tom Paxton, John Prine, etc.. It was this style, still widely used by singer songwriter sorts, that got dubbed "Travis Picking," just because (I think) that it shared some elements with the style of the then popular Travis.

A long story to make a small point.

Best,

-Tom

PS While I was typing, lots of posts happened -- so much of this was already said. Sorry.

[gitnoob]

Here's a great video of Seeger hosting a TV show featuring John Hurt. No racism here, but certainly an interesting mix of cultures.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BvRxA8gR7bw

[Squeezebox]

Originally Posted by tpbiii

How pervasive country ragtime once was can be seen in the story of Libby Cotton. Libby had grown up around Raleigh NC -- a "hot bed" for country ragtime (there often called the Piedmont blues) in the first couple of decades of the 20th century. She had played as a child, but at 13 (I think) she quit because she got religion and got married. Many years later, she moved the the Washing DC area, and was working as a maid for the Seegar family -- Mike Seegar, his sisters and mother. One day, she picked up one of the family guitars and played a bit -- and got caught. She was playing a song she wrote more than 25 years before, and hadn't played since -- a song called "Freight Train."


-Tom

Point of clarification on Libba Cotten (from Wikipedia):

Elizabeth Nevills was born in Carrboro, North Carolina, at the border of Chapel Hill, to a musical family. Her parents were George Nevills and Louise Price Nevills. Elizabeth was the youngest of five children. At age seven, Cotten began to play her older brother's banjo. By eight years old, she was playing songs. At 11, after scraping together some money, she bought her own guitar. She became very good at playing the instrument, which she named "Stella." By her early teens she was writing her own songs, one of which, Freight Train, would go on to be one of her most recognized. Cotten wrote Freight Train when she saw a train pass by her house on Lloyd Street in Carrboro, North Carolina.

I live just west of Carrboro and drive by those tracks all the time.

I also was very blessed to see Libba perform one night in Durham in the early '80's....I think Sweet Honey In the Rock was on the bill too that night....been a long time since I thought about that show

Lotsa Nevilles still around by they way

While I'm thinking about Chapel Hill / Carrboro music folks (no, not James Taylor) Floyd Council was from Chapel Hill....Pink Anderson + Floyd Council is where Pink Floyd got their name....Lotsa Councils still around the area too (Including Mama Dip..AKA Mildred Council)

Yup, must be something in the water around my neck of the woods.......(now if I could just find the right well to drink from)

[Squeezebox]

Originally Posted by tpbiii

These are all variations of country ragtime, which was very widespread in the last quarter of the 19th century. I think the roots of the music are clearly in the African American tradition, but it had mostly died out before recording era came along. Almost everyone in the black community played in that style, and Scott Joplin tried to make it a classical (scripted) form. It was "old time" because by the time people like Gary Davis played it, it was being supplanted in the African American community by blues and later jazz.

Merle Travis' influences are well documented. For the white musicians, the well spring seems to have been a black hillbilly musician named Arnold Shultz -- a neighbor of Bill Monroe. Shultz was never recorded, but he played a lot with Bill Monroe when both were young. Monroe credits him as the source of the blues influence in bluegrass.

Shultz also had a big influence on Kentucky musicians Kennedy Jones, Mose Rager, Ike Everly (the father of Don and Phil Everly a/k/a the Everly Brothers), and eventually Merle Travis. You can read the story here.

Maybelle Carter also played in that style (among many) -- e.g. "Solid Gone". She apparently learned it from Leslie Riddle, a one legged black musician that traveled widely with A. P. Carter on his "song catching" trips. Riddle could remember lyrics very well -- he was sort of like A. P.'s human recorder. A. P. would later write down the songs and "fix them up."

Racial prejudice was endemic in the lowland south, but the highland south was entirely different. The black populations were much smaller, and the white residents were largely Scots Irish, which had very different traditions the the "Cavalier" hegemonic culture of the lowland south. Racial prejudice was not really much of an issue in the mountains. If you are interested in these cultural issues, here is an article I wrote for Bluegrass Unlimited Magazine in 1999.

Best,

-Tom

Great info and great article...thanks!!!

I ALWAYS learn good stuff on this forum!!!