Ernest V. Stoneman: The Unsung Father of Country Music

If, in some sort of Twilight Zone alternate universe, Ernest V. Stoneman had never been born, country music as we know it may not have existed either. After all, the 1927 Bristol recording sessions, long considered to be the birth of modern country music, were the result of Stoneman’s collaboration with talent scout/record producer Ralph Peer, the man who recorded Stoneman for Okeh Records two years before the Carter Family and Jimmie Rodgers stepped up to his microphone.

Aware of his role as a pioneer, Stoneman’s most fervent wish was to be inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame. The liner notes to The Unsung Father of Country Music relate the heartbreaking tale of Stoneman’s death in 1968 at the age of 75: in order to ease his passing, his children were forced to tell him that he had indeed been inducted to the Hall. Forty years after his death, Stoneman has finally been awarded this long-awaited honor.

The Unsung Father of Country Music is a collection befitting Stoneman’s status. The beautifully packaged two-disc set provides a nice bookend to an artist whose first recordings were on wax cylinders over 80 years ago. The 46 remastered songs span approximately the first decade of Stoneman’s recording career (1925-34), long before “Pop” formed his famous family band. His most famous song, “The Sinking of the Titanic”, is represented in this set, but it’s the lesser known songs that are a must-listen for anyone interested in country music history. The tracks on Unsung Father range from old-time gospel to classic fiddle tunes to hillbilly humor skits. With each Stoneman recording, the foundations of American music were being laid. The influence of his songs and his hardscrabble method of delivery can be seen in everyone from Woody Guthrie to the Dixon Brothers to Bo Diddley, who remade the lullaby “Say, Darling, Say” into a rock and roll barnburner decades after Stoneman’s version had faded from public memory.

The liner notes are a fascinating work in themselves. His daughter Patsy (number four of Ernest and Hattie Stoneman’s 14 children, now in her 80s) provides an introduction humanizing her father and the family’s quest for his Hall of Fame induction, while producers Christopher King and Hank Sapoznik shine an illuminating life on Stoneman’s life and career with an essay as well as thoroughly annotated notes about the recordings and their context. Thanks to the efforts of King and Sapoznik, this collection can stand next to box sets such as The Complete Hank Williams and Johnny Cash’s At Folsom Prison: Legacy Edition. These two men are to be commended for their work in preserving music history.

Make no mistake, Stoneman does not have a singing voice that would be described as “great”. But the voice fits the subject matter as well as the era in which these songs were recorded. Listening to these recordings is listening to history as it was being made. After decades of obscurity, Ernest V. Stoneman is unsung no longer.