No Mother or Dad · Foggy Mountain Breakdown

Lester Flatt and Earl Scruggs left Bill Monroe’s Blue Grass Boys early in 1948 and that spring formed their own band, the Foggy Mountain Boys. Their first records were for Mercury, made around November 1948 at radio station WROL in Knoxville with Murray Nash producing. Jim Shumate played fiddle, Howard Watts played bass, and Mac Wiseman sang on all four sides, among them “We’ll Meet Again Sweetheart” and “My Cabin in Caroline.” Curly Seckler, on mandolin and tenor, joined in 1949. Seckler and fiddler Art Wooten were on a Cincinnati session that produced “Down the Road.” At another Cincinnati date on 11 December 1949, with Benny Sims on fiddle, the band recorded “Foggy Mountain Breakdown.” Mercury issued it in March 1950 as the B-side of “No Mother or Dad.” The last Mercury session, at WDAE in Tampa on 20 October 1950, produced “Roll in My Sweet Baby’s Arms,” “Salty Dog Blues,” “Pike County Breakdown” and “Doin’ My Time.” Mercury kept issuing those into 1952.

Columbia, their label for the rest of the partnership, first recorded them on 21 November 1950 at Castle Studio in Nashville’s Tulane Hotel, where they worked until 1955. Everett Lilly took Seckler’s place at the May 1951 session with Chubby Wise on fiddle, which produced “Jimmie Brown, the Newsboy” and “Don’t Get Above Your Raising.” He was there again in October, when Howdy Forrester fiddled on “Earl’s Breakdown.” With Seckler back and Benny Martin on fiddle, the session of 9 November 1952 produced “Flint Hill Special” and “Dim Lights, Thick Smoke,” issued together that December. In 1953 Martha White Flour began sponsoring their early-morning shows on WSM. Bassist E. P. “Cousin Jake” Tullock joined that year and fiddler Paul Warren in 1954, and both stayed to the end.

Buck “Uncle Josh” Graves brought his Dobro into the band in 1955. His first sessions with them were on 2 and 3 September 1955 at Bradley Studio on 16th Avenue South, with Don Law producing, and they produced “Gone Home” and “Bubbling in My Soul.” The band joined the Grand Ole Opry the same year. Later sessions at Bradley’s gave “Six White Horses” (January 1957) and the gospel “Cabin on the Hill” (April 1959), one of the records that began to put them on the country charts. By 1960 some sessions had a drummer, often Buddy Harman.

An appearance at the Ash Grove in Hollywood led to “The Ballad of Jed Clampett,” the theme of The Beverly Hillbillies. Recorded on 24 September 1962 and issued that October, it was their only single to reach number one on the country charts. In 1967 their 1949 “Foggy Mountain Breakdown” was used in the film Bonnie and Clyde. The Columbia singles of those years turned to newer songs: “Nashville Cats” in February 1967, then “Last Train to Clarksville” and “Like a Rolling Stone.” From September 1967 Bob Johnston produced them, and Scruggs’s sons Randy and Gary joined the sessions. Musical and business differences ended the act early in 1969.

Session details drawn in part from the Bluegrass Discography.