Forewords
 

Let's Get Vapor-Locked

John Hartford
Nashville, Tennessee

     The violin, or the fiddle, is the ancient grandfather of all musical instruments. Essentially, it's no more than string strung over a box, and can be played using a bow fashioned from a stick and some hair - or anything else rough enough to produce friction. Rubbing the bow across the strings produces sounds nor unlike human and animal voices in excitement, pain or flagro delecto.
      If you're clever enough, you might even get someone to give you money in return for your waltzes and breakdowns. Sometimes, however, it seems that the fiddle is the most difficult instrument with which to earn a living - especially playing hillbilly style, or whatever you want to call it.
     One way to survive is by performing on a cash-and-carry basis - a practice called "busking" - in taverns, on streetcorners, or wherever else people might stop and listen. Ervin T. Rouse worked this way most of his life, even after Orange Blossom Special had become one of the most familiar fiddle tunes of all time. Chubby Wise also did his share of busking, both before and after he hooked up with Bill Monroe and hit the big time.
Why? Well, there are those who claim that fiddlers behave strangely because they continually breathe in rosin dust that accumulates under the strings and between the f-holes, thereby affecting the brain.
     For example, my friend Vassar Clements, the great fiddler who hails from Kissimmee, Florida says that all he ever wanted to do was to get "vapor-locked," drink black coffee, smoke his pipe, and play music. He simply hoped that the rest of the world would bring him what he needed - food, a little money, a good rhythm section (or none at all) - and carry him from place to place as needed. Luckily for Vassar, that's pretty much how things have worked out.
     As musicians, we have a tendency to spend a lot of time contemplating the mysterious problem of why one melody that you don't car for is so popular, while another one you love nobody seems much to like. We're always trying to play somewhere close to what we hear in our heads, and we're never satisfied - unless we stay drunk all the time, and even then it's hard. As a result, our dreams are flooded with the little triangles and parallelograms of fingering, sometimes to where we can't sleep at all.
     Some, however, contend that the act of fiddling is fairly simple because, as its very essence, here are only four choices to be made' two choices each on which way to go with your fingers and with the bow. In other words, if you pull and it ain't right, then you push. Ervin and Chubby knew when to push and when to pull. I knew and admired both men, an am glad that they're finally getting their due.
     Vassar once met Ervin at the Nashville bus Station, and recalls that the Old Man from the Everglades was wearing an overcoat despite the summer heat. The first thing he did upon his arrival was to go out in front of the depot,"unveil that antique" and start to play. What a great Rouse Brother thing to do. Fiddlin' in Florida, to me, is Vassar, Chubby, Ervin, and Orange Blossom Special. I like this book. Let's get vapor locked.

     John Hartford was a Nashville-based singer-songwriter whose compositions include Gentle On My Mind, one of the most recorded songs in popular music history. In 1976, his solo album Mark Twang (Flying Fish Records) won a Grammy for Best Ethnic or Traditional Recording. He was also a participant in the Grammy winning soundtrack for the film Oh Brother Where Art Thou? A music historian widely admired for his talent and his artistic integrity, Hartford died in June 2001.
 

Shaking Hands With a Ghost

Marty Stuart
Nashville, Tennessee

     Orange Blossom Special is the definitive fiddle tune, used by fiddlers worldwide as a showpiece. It's a standard, performed at every bluegrass festival or fiddle event. In fact, some musicians feel that this 60-year-old crowd pleaser has been played to death. Requesting it of an accomplished fiddler, for example, is not unlike asking a great mariachi band to play La Bamba. The weight of the tune's own popularity has crushed it into becoming a kind of musical tourist trap.
     However, if you go back and listen to Ervin and Gordon Rouse's original 1939 recording, it's easy to hear the Special's beauty, elegance, and power. It bonds the romance of rambling around on trains through the Everglades with the mystique of a far away land known as Florida. It is pure country music; it is pure Americana.
The Rouse Brothers, say old-timers, were colorful characters whose legend was built around traveling up and down the Eastern Seaboard, playing their music along with way, Vassar Clements once told me that Ervin would "unveil" that fiddle for a quarter, perform until the hat was full, and then move on.
     The Special made him the most money. But good as it was, he also wrote another classic, Sweeter Than the Flowers, and is credited with at least some connection to the bluegrass standard Some Old Day (although it now appears that another Rouse Brother, Earl, was the composer of that venerable chain-gang ballad).
I met Ervin in Miami at a bluegrass festival in 1973, when I was working in Lester Flatt's band. We had an enjoyable conversation and I had my picture made with him. The thing I remember most is the briefcase he was carrying; it was filled with pictures of swamp buggies he claimed to have built and an uncashed royalty check for $25,000. I was honored to meet him. I knew I was in the presence of where greatness had lived. When I look back on it, it was like shaking hands with a ghost.
     Now, Ervin's story is finally being told - along with that of Chubby Wise, another Florida fiddler strongly associated with the Special. It's a strange story, but, like the song, it's unforgettable. Knowing its origins will enable us to hear this old tune in a new way - and to appreciate its magnificence all over again.

     Marty has been a professional musician since the age of 13, when he joined Lester Flatt's band, the Nashville Grass. He later backed Johnny Cash before embarking on a successful solo career. His 1999 album, The Pilgrim won broad critical praise, and he has authored numerous articles and one book on country music.