Grandad's Favorite: A Song History

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"Grandad's Favorite" is a quick reel in A, played on a fiddle tuned AEae, that comes from Ernie Carpenter of Braxton County, West Virginia.[1] Carpenter (1909–1997) was born near the Elk River into a family whose fiddling, and whose living on the river, went back several generations.[2][3] Sources differ slightly on his birth year: the Tune Archive gives both 1907 and 1909, while the other sources consulted here give 1909.[1] According to the West Virginia Encyclopedia, his grandfather William "Squirrelly Bill" Carpenter handed the family tunes down to his son Shelt and grandson Ernie, whose repertoire reached back five generations.[4] Introducing the tune at Berea College's Celebration of Traditional Music in October 1987, Carpenter told a story about that grandfather, who carried goods by dugout canoe up the Elk River from Charleston, and said these were the tunes his grandfather played.[1] An Augusta Heritage Center tape of a July 1987 visit by Carpenter lists "Granddad's Favorite" in a session that also included talk about his grandfather.[5]

An older man in a hat plays the fiddle outdoors while a crowd of children and adults gathers around him

Jack Delano, Mr. Ed Larkin, seventy-eight year old fiddler at the "World's Fair" in Tunbridge, Vermont, photograph, 1941. An old-time fiddler of the period; he has no known connection to this tune.

Carpenter's playing of the tune, recorded in 1986 and drawn from Gerry Milnes's collection, appeared on the Augusta Heritage album Old Time Fiddle Tunes from the Elk River Country.[1][6] A second performance, taped at the 1987 Brandywine Mountain Music Convention, is track 13 of the Field Recorders' Collective release FRC204.[2] Mark Gilston includes it in American Old Time Tunes For Dulcimer, Volume 1, a 51-page book of 40 classic old-time tunes he arranged for mountain dulcimer.[7]

Our book that contains the song "Grandad's Favorite"

Sources

  1. Traditional Tune Archive: "Grandad's Favorite".
  2. Field Recorders' Collective: "Ernie Carpenter - FRC204".
  3. West Virginia Culture (Vandalia Award, 1988): "Ernie Carpenter".
  4. e-WV: The West Virginia Encyclopedia: "Carpenter Family".
  5. Augusta Heritage Center: "Ernie Carpenter; Augusta Visit; 7/20/1987".
  6. Slippery Hill: "Grandad's Favorite" (Ernie Carpenter).
  7. Mark Gilston: "American Old Time Tunes For Dulcimer, Volume 1".
  8. Image: Jack Delano, Mr. Ed Larkin, seventy-eight year old fiddler at the "World's Fair" in Tunbridge, Vermont, photograph, 1941. Library of Congress.

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