James and Martha

Martha Carson was born Irene Amburgey in Neon, Kentucky, and as a girl played guitar in a troupe led by her father. With her two sisters she formed a trio that worked radio in Kentucky and West Virginia under the stage names Mattie, Martha and Minnie, and the sisters went on to WSB in Atlanta, where Martha met the mandolin player James Roberts, who performed as James Carson. As James and Martha Carson the couple became regulars on WSB and on the church concert circuit of the Deep South.

Their first records were made in late 1946, probably at radio station WGST in Atlanta, with Delbert “Deb” Dyer producing, and issued on White Church as by James and Martha, the Barn Dance Sweethearts. Three singles came out in 1946: “I’m Gonna Let It Shine” with “Budded on Earth to Bloom in Heaven,” “When He Heard My Plea” with “He Will Set Your Fields on Fire,” and “The Man of Galilee” with “The Sweetest Gift, a Mother’s Smile.” A fourth, “There’s an Open Door Waiting for Me” with “I Ain’t Got Time,” followed in 1948.

Capitol signed them, and Walter David “Dee” Kilpatrick produced all of their sessions for the label. The first, on 31 March 1949 at the Emory Hotel in Atlanta, remade “I Ain’t Got Time” and “Budded on Earth to Bloom in Heaven” and added “When God Dips His Pen of Love in My Heart,” “Living in the Promised Land” and “I’ll Shout and Shine”; “I Ain’t Got Time” with “When God Dips His Pen of Love in My Heart” was their first Capitol single, in April 1949. Two sessions at WGST that August included “Looking for a City” and “King Jesus Spoke to Me,” sung with members of the Carroll Family, and in December 1949 they recorded “Crossing Over Jordan,” “When I Reach That City” and “Heaven’s Jubilee” with the Johnson Gospel Singers. Their last two sessions were in Nashville, at Castle Studio in the Tulane Hotel. On 18 June 1950 they cut “I’ll Fly Away,” “We Will Rise and Shine (Jacob’s Ladder),” “Got a Little Light” and new versions of “Man of Galilee” and “He Will Set Your Fields on Fire,” and on 23 October 1950 “Shining City,” “(I’m Gonna) Sing, Sing, Sing,” “I Ain’t Gonna Sin No More” and “Lay Your Burdens at His Feet.” Capitol kept issuing the duo’s singles until September 1951, the last pairing “Salvation Has Been Brought Down” with “Got a Little Light.”

The couple divorced in 1950, which ended the duo. Martha began appearing alone on WNOX in Knoxville and sang on records by Bill Carlisle’s group, the Carlisles, and on 5 November 1951, at Castle Studio with Ken Nelson producing, she recorded her own “Satisfied,” with Carlisle and her sister Opal Jean, the former Mattie, singing harmony and Chet Atkins on lead guitar. Don Gibson, the Blackwood Brothers, Barbara Mandrell and Elvis Presley later recorded the song. Martha Carson died on 16 December 2004.