Poor Ellen Smith · Helen

The Country Gentlemen started on 4 July 1957 around Washington, D.C., when Charlie Waller, John Duffey and banjo player Bill Emerson formed a stand-in band for Buzz Busby’s Bayou Boys, several of whose members had been hurt in a car accident. Their first record was made that October at radio station WARL in Arlington, Virginia, with Don Nelson producing. Duffey sang tenor and played mandolin, Waller sang lead and played guitar, Emerson sang baritone, and Tom Morgan and John Hall played bass and fiddle. “Going to the Races” and “Heavenward Bound” came out on the small Dixie label.

From December 1957 they recorded for Starday at Ben Adelman’s studio on Cedar Street in Washington, with Adelman producing. Singles such as “Backwoods Blues” and “High Lonesome” followed in 1958. The banjo chair changed often: Pete Kuykendall played it on “The Devil’s Own,” which also had Kenny Haddock on dobro. By June 1959 Eddie Adcock had the job. On 30 June the band cut “New Freedom Bell” and “The Hills and Home” at Capital Transcription Service on Connecticut Avenue, with Adcock singing baritone, Jim Cox on bass, and Mike Seeger producing and playing harmonica. Starday released the pair that September.

Seeger’s sessions in early 1960 filled a Folkways album issued that year, and Folkways leased some of the recordings to Starday. One was “Poor Ellen Smith,” which Starday put out that September with “Helen” on the other side. Tom Gray took over the bass in early 1961, completing the Waller, Duffey, Adcock and Gray line-up that lasted until 1964, and the last Starday single of the period was “Red Rocking Chair” that autumn.

Rebel became the band’s label in 1962. The early Rebel sessions were at Wynwood Studios in Falls Church, Virginia, with Kuykendall producing, and the first single was “Christmas Time Back Home” in November 1962. After Gray left, Ed Ferris played bass. “Bringing Mary Home” and “Northbound” were recorded at Syracuse University in February 1965 with Charles Freeland producing, and Rebel issued them that July. “Matterhorn,” cut at Recordings, Inc. in Baltimore in June 1966, came out in May 1967 backed with “The Battle Hymn of the Republic.”

From 1968 the band recorded mostly at Roy Homer’s studio in Clinton, Maryland. Duffey left in 1969 and Jimmy Gaudreau took the mandolin, Adcock left in 1970, and Emerson came back on banjo. The later Rebel singles drew on pop songs, among them “Mrs. Robinson” and “Two Little Boys” in 1970 and “Teach Your Children” in 1971. The last, in 1972, was “Legend of the Rebel Soldier” with “C. G. Express,” before the band moved to Vanguard.

Session details drawn in part from the Bluegrass Discography.