Happy Hollow: A Song History
The "Happy Hollow" played at old-time jams, sometimes spelled "Happy Holler," comes from Marcus Martin (1881–1974), a fiddler from the Swannanoa area of western North Carolina.[1] The field recorder Artus Moser recorded Martin playing it at Swannanoa on September 20, 1942, and the disc went into the Library of Congress archive.[2] It is a reel in A major, and Martin played it with the fiddle cross-tuned to AEac#,[1] a tuning that one fiddle course notes also goes by names such as "Black Mountain Rag" tuning or calico tuning.[3] Martin was born in Aquone in Macon County and moved to Swannanoa in the 1920s, where he worked as a watchman at the Beacon blanket mill. He also made fiddles and mountain dulcimers, and in 1949 he won the title of Champion Fiddler at the North Carolina State Fair.[4]
Marion Post Wolcott, “Farm scene near Asheville, North Carolina,” photograph, November 1939. Farm Security Administration, Library of Congress. No known restrictions.
Peter Hoover recorded Martin again near Swannanoa in the late 1950s and early 1960s. When the Field Recorders' Collective issued those tapes on CD in 2004, "Happy Hollow" opened the disc.[5] A writer for FolkWorks names "Happy Hollow" among the Martin tunes he began hearing at jam sessions and on much-copied cassettes of those sessions.[6] The tune is printed in the third volume of The Portland Collection (2015),[1] and Bruce Molsky teaches it in an online old-time fiddle course.[3]
Find books with Happy Hollow for sale →
Sources
- The Traditional Tune Archive: "Annotation:Happy Hollow".
- Library of Congress, American Folklife Center: "Happy Hollow" (catalog card, AFS 07892 B02).
- Peghead Nation: "Happy Hollow, Part 1: Melody".
- Asheville Museum of History: "Beacon Manufacturing and a Swannanoa Fiddling Phenom".
- Field Recorders' Collective: "Marcus Martin (FRC502)".
- FolkWorks: "Marcus Martin: North Carolina Fiddle Mage".