Wade Mainer in the early 1940s, when he and his Sons Of the Mountaineers band were among the most popular acts on the radio.
Originally broadcast on the 100th(!) birthday of Wade Mainer, who was born near Asheville, NC, on April 21, 1907, this week's "Bluegrass Signal" provides a musical overview of and memorial tribute to the musician who's been called the "Grandfather Of Bluegrass" on the 105th anniversary of his birth. Wade passed away last September, but his music provides a vital transitional link between the old-time stringbands of the 1920s and the emerging bluegrass style of the 1940s, and his repertoire is the basis for numerous now-standard bluegrass songs. This show includes Wade Mainer's earliest recordings in 1935 with brother J.E. Mainer, a 1941 radio show with his Sons Of the Mountaineers band, studio sessions with his band in the '30s, '40s, and '50s, and more recent recordings with his wife Julia (aka Hillbilly Lilly).
