Flatt and Scruggs at Carnegie Hall

Columbia – CS 8845

Format: Vinyl, LP, Album, Reissue, Stereo
Country: US
Released: 1963
Genre: Folk, World, & Country
Style: Country, Bluegrass
[Tracklist]
A1 Salty Dog Blues (1:57)
A2 Durham's Reel (1:04)
A3 Hot Corn, Cold Corn (2:21)
A4 Footprints In The Snow (2:37)
A5 Flint Hill Special (2:23)
A6 Dig A Hole In The Meadow (2:00)
B1 The Martha White Theme (1:13)
B2 I Wonder Where You Are Tonight (1:39)
B3 Mama Blues (1:25)
B4 Take This Hammer (2:06)
B5 Fiddle And Banjo (1:26)
B6 Yonder Stands Little Maggie (1:48)
B7 Let The Church Roll On (2:01)
[Credits]
Lester Flatt (guitar/vocals) Earl Scruggs (banjo/guitar/vocals) Josh Graves (dobro) Paul Warren (fiddle) Billy Powers (guitar) Cousin Jake (bass)
[Notes]
Recorded live at Carnegie Hall, New York, New York on December 8, 1962. Originally released on Columbia (8845). Lester Flatt and Earl Scruggs were big news at the height of the late '50s/early '60s folk revival. New York City was essentially ground zero for a mania that extended to all things musical and Southern. So something of a love-fest occurred when Flatt and Scruggs and their polished bluegrass band rolled into town on one December night in 1962 to play no less a venue than Carnegie Hall. There are screams from the crowd for "Martha White" (the theme song from the band's radio sponsor), and Scruggs has no choice but to encore the banjo showpiece "Flint Hill Special." To know what the Foggy Mountain Boys sounded like in their natural habitat, you'd have to go to transcripts of the band playing a school auditorium or radio hour somewhere south of the Jersey Turnpike. CARNEGIE HALL still gives you a taste of how Flatt and Scruggs put together a show before their original band disintegrated under the weight of the revival itself. As you might expect from a live recording of this era, the sound favors the top end. Vocals, fiddle, and banjo breaks come through best, especially as the band performs with only two microphones among its six performers.