Louis Marshall Jones was born in 1913 in Niagara, Henderson County, Kentucky, and grew up partly in Akron, Ohio, where as a teenager he sang Jimmie Rodgers songs on WJW. In 1935, while he was working with the singer Bradley Kincaid on WBZ in Boston, Kincaid named him “Grandpa” because he sounded old and grouchy on the early-morning show, and dressed him for the part. He was twenty-two. He learned clawhammer banjo from Cousin Emmy, and at WLW in Cincinnati he sang with Merle Travis and the Delmore Brothers in the Brown’s Ferry Four.
His records begin at King, the new Cincinnati label of Syd Nathan. In the fall of 1943 Jones and Travis cut “The Steppin’ Out Kind” with “You’ll Be Lonesome Too.” Issued as King 500 under the name the Shepherd Brothers, it was the label’s first release. “It’s Raining Here This Morning,” recorded in Cincinnati in January 1944 with Travis on electric guitar, came out on King 502. Over the next decade King issued dozens of his singles, many billed as Grandpa Jones and His Grandchildren. “Eight More Miles to Louisville” was cut in 1946 with Travis, probably in Hollywood. “Mountain Dew” and “My Darlin’s Not My Darlin’ Anymore” came from a Nashville session of March 1947 with Hank Garland on guitar and Jethro Burns on mandolin, and appeared together on King 624. “Old Rattler” was made that September at Castle Studio with Pee Wee King’s Golden West Cowboys. “Are You from Dixie” and “Jesse James,” recorded in December 1947, were not issued until March 1950. In October 1946 he married the fiddler and singer Ramona Riggins, and the couple moved to Nashville, where he joined the Grand Ole Opry. Ramona played bass, mandolin or fiddle on many of his later sessions.
From 1952 to 1956 Jones recorded for RCA Victor in Nashville, with Steve Sholes producing and Chet Atkins often on guitar, and cut several duets with Minnie Pearl. Decca followed from 1956 to 1959, where Paul Cohen produced new versions of “Eight More Miles to Louisville” and “Mountain Dew.” In 1960 he moved to Fred Foster’s Monument label, which gave him two of his biggest records, Jimmie Rodgers’s “T for Texas” and the recitation “The Christmas Guest.” He joined the cast of Hee Haw in 1969 and was elected to the Country Music Hall of Fame in 1978. He had a stroke just after an Opry performance in January 1998 and died that February.
Session details drawn in part from the Bluegrass Discography.
Tracklist
- 1 Mountain Dew alt version
- 2 My Darling's Not My Darling Anymore
