Tuesday, September 13, 2011

James Pendleton Vandiver (1869-1932)

Today's the centennial of the birth of bluegrass legend Bill Monroe. One of Monroe's best-known songs, "Uncle Pen," was about the disabled uncle who looked after him and taught him to play all the old tunes.

Pendleton Vandiver (1869- 1932) was born in rural Kentucky, the second-youngest of ten children. Somewhere along the way, he married and had two children, but the marriage broke up and he moved into a small cabin near his younger sister Malissa Monroe. There he got to know his nephew, Bill Monroe, and taught him early how to play mandolin accompaniment to Uncle Pen's fiddling. They'd play at square dances, or just for at-home entertainment.

Bill's parents had both died by the time Bill was 16, and he found himself living with Uncle Pen. By then, Vandiver was in his late fifties and using crutches, after a bad fall from a mule. Said Monroe years later:
He done the cooking for the two of us. We had fat back, sorghum molasses, and hot cakes for breakfast followed by blackeyed peas with fat back and corn bread and sorghum for dinner and supper....A man that old, and crippled, that would cook for you and see that you had a bed and a place to stay and something for breakfast and dinner and supper, and you know it come hard for him to get ...
Here's Bill Monroe performing "Uncle Pen" in 1956:



Video description: Grainy black-and-white television footage of a bluegrass band performing live.

Lyrics:

Oh, the people would come from faraway
They'd dance all night till the break of day
When the caller hollered, "Do-se-do"
He knew uncle Pen was ready to go

Late in the evenin' about sundown
High on the hill and above the town
Uncle Pen played the fiddle, oh, how it would ring
You can hear it talk, you can hear it sing

He played an old tune he called, "Soldier's joy"
And the one he wrote called, "The Boston boy"
But the greatest of all was, "Jenny Lynn"
To me that's where the fiddle begins

Late in the evenin' about sundown
High on the hill and above the town
Uncle Pen played the fiddle, oh, how it would ring
You can hear it talk, you can hear it sing

But I'll never forget that mournful day
When uncle Pen was called away
They hung up his fiddle and they hung up his bow
I knew it was time for him to go

Late in the evenin' about sundown
High on the hill and above the town
Uncle Pen played the fiddle, oh, how it would ring
You can hear it talk, you can hear it sing

Late in the evenin' about sundown
High on the hill and above the town
Uncle Pen played the fiddle, oh, how it would ring
You can hear it talk, you can hear it sing

2 comments:

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Jeff Swenson said...

Monroe presents the style, edge and the speed which is simply never tried or heard before. This is almost an awe-inspiring feel of the song that perfectly captures each listener. Although it is often wrongly linked with the style of the country, after listening to the best of bluegrass has to offer, we can understand why it is a very particular characteristic sound, and there are years in 1950, best examples one can only find in Bill Monroe song “Uncle Pen”. This is the way the band combines perfectly beautiful harmony of their instruments that is the perhaps definition of bluegrass, and there is simplicity in the sound that is both captivating and classic.