Roscoe Holcomb

Biography

Roscoe Holcomb (born Roscoe Halcomb; September 5, 1912 – February 1, 1981) was an American singer, banjoist, and guitarist from Daisy, Kentucky. A prominent figure in Appalachian folk music, Holcomb was the inspiration for the term "high, lonesome sound", coined by folklorist and friend John Cohen in 1959. It was meant to describe the singing style and vocal timbre of Holcomb. The "high lonesome sound" term is now used to describe bluegrass singing, although Holcomb was not, strictly speaking, a bluegrass performer.

Performance style

Holcomb's repertoire included old-time music, hymns, traditional music and blues ballads. In addition to playing the banjo and guitar, he was a competent harmonica and fiddle player, and sang many of his most memorable songs a cappella. Holcomb stated: "Up till then the blues were only inside me; Blind Lemon was the first to 'let out' the blues."
Holcomb sang in a nasal style informed by the Old Regular Baptist vocal tradition. Bob Dylan, a fan of Holcomb, described his singing as possessing "an untamed sense of control×An Untamed Sense of Control25 March 2003 · Album · CompilationSpotifyYouTube Music (search)Tracklist · 26 tracks1Swanno Mountain3:182Across the Rocky Mountain5:233Graveyard Blues3:014Single Girl3:025Little Maggie3:026Born and Raised in Covington2:167Barbara Allen Blues1:308Coal Creek1:319Rock Island Prison1:3510I Am a Man of Constant Sorrow3:0011Combs Hotel Burned Down2:3212The Hills of Mexico2:3313Knife Guitar1:1714Mississippi Heavy Water Blues2:1615Coney Isle1:5116Train That Carried My Girl From Town2:0217Milk Cow Blues2:0818Black Eye Susie1:1519Darling Cory3:4020I Ain't Got No Sugar Baby Now2:5021Sitting on Top of This World2:4222Frankie and Johnnie5:1123Foggy Mountain Top1:5224Fair Miss in the Garden3:5325Willow Garden3:2726True Love6:24". Dylan was said to be deeply affected by Holcomb's style. He was also admired by the Stanley Brothers and Eric Clapton, who cited Holcomb as his favorite country musician.

Life and career

A coal miner, construction laborer and farmer for much of his life, Holcomb was not recorded until 1959 when he was discovered by folk musicologist John Cohen in Daisy, Kentucky. Cohen spent nearly two decades working with Holcomb but they never quite understood each other. Cohen had actually been the reason for the changing of the spelling of Holcomb's last name from Halcomb on a recording. After which his career as a professional musician was bolstered by the folk revival in the 1960s. He had grown up all around music in Eastern Kentucky, hearing it from family and community but it was never his sole source of income until he was much later in his life. Holcomb gave his last live performance in 1978. Due to what he described as injuries he sustained during his long career as a laborer, Holcomb was eventually unable to work for more than short periods, and his later income came primarily from his music. Suffering from asthma and emphysema as a result of working in coal mines, he died in a nursing home in 1981, at the age of 68.