My Unkind Letter to Mother Maybelle Carter

Grave of Mother Maybelle Carter. 
Photo courtesy Gary Firstenberg.

To my shame I once wrote an unkind letter to the much respected and now legendary Mother Maybelle Carter. I was young, a hippie artist and idealist at the time. I had just purchased her newly released double album of 1973 and was more than a little disappointed. I'll explain why in a minute.

I was attending Ohio University in Athens, Ohio at the time. My eclectic mix of musical interests ran the gamut from Bowie to Velvet Underground to Jefferson Airplane, Beatles, Stones and all the various forms of rock and roll, to jazz, classical, folk and bluegrass. 

My own family roots were Kentucky and West Virginia so that my "native tongue" could be considered to be bluegrass. The college hosted a long weekend Folk Festival in 1971 in which many familiar names were present. Mary Travers, The Youngbloods, Doc Watson and many others were there. There were three days of workshops during the day, with a lot of spontaneous bluegrass immersion.

The following year the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band's major hit triple album was released, Will the Circle Be Unbroken Mother Maybelle was featured on this album but I also listened some older records with A.P Carter. Maybe the soundtrack for Deliverance popularized the genre and made it mainstream. Whatever reason I was drawn to it, just as I had been to earlier folk music. 

Mother Maybelle's 1973 double album

So when Mother Maybelle's Mother Maybelle Carter album was released, I purchased it as soon as I saw it. I really don't know what I expected but my first and immediate reaction was something akin to Greil Marcus's response to Bob Dylan's Self Portrait. 

Why? Three reasons. First: It was all instrumental. What happened to the songs? I was a lyrics guy. I liked Nine Pound Hammer and Tennessee Stud for the stories. Second: the album included a bunch of studio chatter that was fun and seemingly original on Will the Circle Be Unbroken and now came across as cliche. Third: It seemed to me something that was assembled to capitalize on her name. Record companies like Columbia are in it for the money but I held it against her personally. 

Oh well. It wasn't the first time I said something unkind that I'd later regret. It may have been the first time I wrote something unkind to someone of stature, and thankfully the last (if my memory serves me well.)

I just finished listening to it again on YouTube, the first time in near 50 years. (You can listen to it here. It's friendly and warm, and it's unpretentious.) I'm hoping that whoever opened that letter discarded it before she ever laid eyes on it. And when I meet her on the other side, I'll ask her forgiveness just in case she opened it herself.