Musicians
Carter Stanley wrote “Harbor of Love” and the Stanley Brothers first recorded it on 29 August 1954 at the Bradley Studio in Nashville for Mercury, with Carter singing lead and Ralph Stanley and Joe Meadows taking the other vocal parts. Carter played guitar and Ralph banjo, with Joe Meadows on fiddle, Bill Lowe on mandolin, Charlie Cline on guitar and Lightnin’ Chance on bass. Mercury issued it on 22 October 1954 as the other side of “Calling from Heaven,” another Carter Stanley song from the same session.
The words are a gospel invitation. A time is coming on the great judgment morning when the Savior will welcome you home, and the question is whether you will be prepared for the journey: the waters of the river of Jordan are deep, but the light shines bright from heaven above, and at the new day the great ship carrying God’s chosen ones will anchor in the harbor of love. The last verse is addressed to anyone wandering in sin, who is told to ask for guidance and to kneel in the chapel next Sunday and meet friends in heaven someday.
The Stanleys recorded it again for King at the King Studio in Cincinnati on 3 May 1962, with George Shuffler and Ralph Mayo now in the band; Carter sang lead, with Ralph Stanley, Mayo and Shuffler singing the other parts, and Chick Stripling played bass. It appeared on Good Old Camp Meeting Songs (King 805, 1962), where it is one of three Carter Stanley songs they had first cut for Mercury. Billboard, reviewing the album as a sacred “spotlight” pick in March 1963, named “Harbor of Love” among its songs. Later recordings include Bill Monroe and the Blue Grass Boys on Cryin’ Holy Unto the Lord (MCA, 1991), the Johnson Mountain Boys on Blue Diamond (Rounder, 1993), and Jim Lauderdale and Ralph Stanley on I Feel Like Singing Today (Rebel, 1999).
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