Gathering Flowers from the Hillside · Take Back the Heart

Bill Clifton was born William August Marburg in Riderwood, Maryland, in 1931, and took his stage name because his family opposed his playing music. The Dixie Mountain Boys name went back to his student days at the University of Virginia, where he formed the band with Paul Clayton and Dave Sadler. His first single came out on Blue Ridge in 1954: “Flower Blooming in the Wildwood” backed with “Burglar Man”, recorded that February at the university in Charlottesville with Johnny Clark on banjo and tenor vocal and Curley Lambert on mandolin. A second Blue Ridge single, “Wake Up Susan” with “All the Good Times”, followed in 1955.

After two years in the Marine Corps, Clifton came back to music in 1956. He paid for his own session at RCA Victor’s studio on McGavock Street in Nashville that November, with Ralph Stanley on banjo, Curley Lambert on mandolin and George Shuffler on bass. Starday issued “Gathering Flowers from the Hillside” and “Take Back the Heart” from it in April 1957, and the record’s success moved him to the Mercury-Starday roster. At the same studio in April 1957 he cut “Little White Washed Chimney” and “Pal of Yesterday”, singing lead to Johnny Clark’s tenor, with Tommy Jackson and Gordon Terry on fiddles, Junior Huskey on bass and Johnny Johnson on rhythm guitar. Mercury released them as 71130 in May. Two more Mercury singles followed, the last of them “Blue Ridge Mountain Blues” with “Are You Alone?” in April 1958.

A November 1958 session in Nashville, billed to Bill Clifton and the Dixie Mountain Boys, produced the Kapp single “Spring Hill Disaster”. From 1959 his singles came out on Starday, beginning with “I’ll Wander Back Some Day” and “Corey” in April. Many of these sides were made at the Capitol Transcription Service on Connecticut Avenue in Washington, with John Duffey on mandolin, Johnny Clark on banjo, Roy Self on bass, Carl Nelson on fiddle and Mike Seeger on autoharp and banjo. A February 1961 session at Starday’s studio on Dickerson Road in Nashville, produced by Don Pierce, went into the Carter Family Memorial Album and the singles “Cannonball Blues” and “Give Me Your Love”. The last Starday single, in November 1962, paired “There’s a Star-Spangled Banner Waving Somewhere” with “The Sinking of the Maine”. Both came from the September 1962 sessions at Wynwood Studio in Falls Church, Virginia, for the album Soldier, Sing Me a Song.

Clifton moved to England in 1963. That November, alone with his guitar at Regent Sound in London, he recorded “Beatle Crazy” and “Little Girl Dressed in Blue”. Decca issued them in Britain in December, and London Records released them in the United States in February 1964.

Session details drawn in part from the Bluegrass Discography.