{"id":613981,"date":"2023-03-03T07:25:00","date_gmt":"2023-03-03T13:25:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.sellorbuyhomefast.com\/index.php\/2023\/03\/03\/the-rich-musical-legacy-of-doc-watson-a-rare-interview-with-the-legendary-guitarist\/"},"modified":"2023-03-03T07:25:00","modified_gmt":"2023-03-03T13:25:00","slug":"the-rich-musical-legacy-of-doc-watson-a-rare-interview-with-the-legendary-guitarist","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/2023\/03\/03\/the-rich-musical-legacy-of-doc-watson-a-rare-interview-with-the-legendary-guitarist\/","title":{"rendered":"The Rich Musical Legacy of Doc Watson: A Rare Interview with the Legendary Guitarist"},"content":{"rendered":"<article id=\"post-118604\" role=\"article\">\n<div id=\"cb-featured-image\">\n<p><img width=\"759\" height=\"500\" alt decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\"   data-old-src=\"data:image\/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns='http:\/\/www.w3.org\/2000\/svg'%20viewBox='0%200%20759%20500'%3E%3C\/svg%3E\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/acousticguitar.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/07\/Doc-Watson-Jeff-Turner-Photo.jpg?resize=100%2C65&#038;ssl=1 100w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/acousticguitar.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/07\/Doc-Watson-Jeff-Turner-Photo.jpg?resize=260%2C170&#038;ssl=1 260w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/acousticguitar.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/07\/Doc-Watson-Jeff-Turner-Photo.jpg?resize=759%2C500&#038;ssl=1 759w\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/acousticguitar.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/07\/Doc-Watson-Jeff-Turner-Photo.jpg?resize=759%2C500&#038;ssl=1\"><span>JEFF TURNER PHOTO<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<section>\n<p><strong><strong>This article originally appeared in the March\/April 1993 issue of\u00a0<em>Acoustic Guitar<\/em>\u00a0magazine and was excerpted for the the\u00a0<a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/store.acousticguitar.com\/collections\/back-issues\/products\/no-324-september-october-2020\" target=\"_blank\">September\/October 2020<\/a>\u00a0issue<\/strong>\u00a0| By Stephanie P. Ledgin<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>For more than three decades, Arthel \u201cDoc\u201d Watson has been America\u2019s most renowned and influential folk guitar stylist. Now about to turn 70, he\u2019s mostly retired, staying off the road except for a half dozen dates a year. In a series of interviews last year, Watson reflected on his bittersweet career, shedding light on the development of his unique style and on the legacy of his late son, Merle, his performing partner for many years.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>At any given <a href=\"http:\/\/www.docsguitar.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Doc Watson<\/a> performance, one will see and hear not only a guitar player of the finest caliber, but also an intelligent, witty, down-to-earth gentleman who loves to share the music of his heart and home. Watson is an extraordinary entertainer who never fails to capture the admiration and affection of his audience. His concerts are filled with hot flatpicking tunes, slow romantic ballads, gutsy blues numbers, and delicately fingerpicked melodies. Each song is sung with unmatched clarity, each tune played with a dexterity that has placed Doc Watson\u2019s name in the music history books.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Watson did not set out to become a famous musician. In fact, if given his druthers, he never would have struck out on the road to make a living as a performer. While music would have been a part of his life no matter what, carpentry, electrical work, mechanics, or even engineering would have been Watson\u2019s calling of choice . . . if given that choice. But a childhood infection took Watson\u2019s vision by the time he was one year old.<\/p>\n<p>Born into a musical family on March 3, 1923, in Deep Gap, North Carolina, Doc Watson refers to his blindness only as a hindrance, not as a disability. But he adds quietly that he regrets not being able to see the smiles on the faces of his loved ones.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>It\u2019s those loved ones who instilled in Watson the traditional folk music of his native region. As Watson puts it, \u201cI cut my teeth on it. Mother used to sing a few of the old ballads, and Dad was a singing leader in the little church from the time I can remember. He played a bit of old\u00adtime banjo. I had a brother that could pick some old-time banjo, and there were folks that lived around there that played a bunch of the old-time music. I got a good bit of my repertoire first-hand from some of the old-timers\u2014fiddle tunes, ballads. But a lot of it came from early 78 [rpm] recordings and early radio.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Watson\u2019s father, General Dixon Watson, provided his first instruments. \u201cMy very first instrument was a little harmonica,\u201d he recalls. \u201cIt was like the one I was playing \u2018Milk Cow Blues\u2019 on out there [at the concert that evening]\u2014the same type. I got one every Christmas as far back as I can remember. And sometimes if I was a good boy, I got one for my birthday, because I usually wore them out pretty quick as a kid or lost them somewhere!\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe first stringed instrument I had was a little homemade banjo that Dad made for me when I was 11. Then my first guitar came along when I was about 13. Though it was my second [stringed instrument], it was my first love as an instrument.\u201d<\/p>\n<figure><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" width=\"750\" height=\"919\" alt   data-recalc-dims=\"1\" data-old-src=\"data:image\/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns='http:\/\/www.w3.org\/2000\/svg'%20viewBox='0%200%20750%20919'%3E%3C\/svg%3E\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/acousticguitar.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/Doc-Watson-2.jpg?w=750&#038;ssl=1 750w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/acousticguitar.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/Doc-Watson-2.jpg?resize=245%2C300&#038;ssl=1 245w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/acousticguitar.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/Doc-Watson-2.jpg?resize=408%2C500&#038;ssl=1 408w\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/acousticguitar.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/Doc-Watson-2.jpg?resize=750%2C919&#038;ssl=1\"><\/figure>\n<p>Watson recalls his earliest playing attempts. \u201cDad showed me a few tunes on the old five-string. It was a fretless, and it was very hard to play true notes on. Then the original Carter Family\u2014Sarah and Maybelle\u2014were the first guitar influence. The first thing I learned was the old Carter Family style, using a thumbpick and a strum with the fingers. Maybelle Carter played the lead on the bass strings with her thumb and did the rhythmic strum with her fingers. Then Jimmie Rodgers came right along; that good full-strum sound he played with a thumb lead and a finger strum.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Watson continues, \u201cThen I got into flatpicking. I ordered a guitar from Sears and Roebuck, and there came a book with it with different little songs in there that you could flatpick. It showed the old-time jazz guitarist Nick Lucas; it showed how he held his pick. My youngest brother, David, showed me how Lucas held his pick, and that\u2019s how I learned to hold mine. But I figured out that if you\u2019re going to play good flatpicking, you have to learn an even up-and-\u00addown stroke on the strings. That\u2019s the first step in learning. But I never tried to do too much lead with the flatpick until I began to hear Hank Garland and Grady Martin. Hank was a jazz guitar player, but in the early days he played some country music up in Nashville with Red Foley and different people. I heard them play fiddle tunes and I thought, \u2018By golly, if they can do that, I can.\u2019\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI had to put in a little work on it. I learned a few things during the square dance and rockabilly days in the \u201950s. Then, when I switched back over to the flattop in the early \u201960s during the folk scare, as Michael [Coleman] calls it, I began to really work hard on the fiddle tunes, \u2019cause I found out people like \u2019em!\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Watson\u2019s earliest influences were wide and varied, mainly introduced by the family\u2019s \u201cgraphophone,\u201d as they called their windup Victrola. He recalls his early experiences with blues: \u201cThere was a record or two by [Mississippi] John Hurt, Furry Lewis, some of the other blues artists. I think we had one with Skip James and the Memphis Jug Stompers. The blues were there; it was part of the background. And when Merle started on the road with me, he loved the blues, I think better than I did. We just naturally incorporated blues in the repertoire as we went along. It became a very big part of our sets. Sonny Terry and Brownie McGhee furthered the cause as far as Merle and I were concerned. We learned a lot of songs from those boys. They were certainly a fine team.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Not only did Watson come from a musical background, but he married into another family of music when he wed Rosa Lee Carlton, whose father, Gaither Carlton, was a fiddler with whom Watson played regional hymns and ballads. Doc and Rosa Lee Watson had two children, Eddie Merle, named after guitar great Merle Travis, and Nancy Ellen. [<em>Editor\u2019s note: In 2020, an <a href=\"https:\/\/amzn.to\/2D743bj\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">album of early \u201960s recordings<\/a> of Doc and Gaither Carlton was released.<\/em>]<\/p>\n<p>Watson had supported his family with his music since the early \u201950s, playing in a country dance band on an electric Gibson Les Paul. All the while he continued to play the traditional acoustic music of his home region with Tom \u201cClarence\u201d Ashley, Clint Howard, and Fred Price.\u00a0<\/p>\n<figure><\/figure>\n<p>It was while performing with Ashley, Howard, and Price at Union Grove, North Carolina, in 1960 that the now-legendary meeting of folklorist Ralph Rinzler and Doc Watson took place. Rinzler\u2019s discovery of Watson led to Watson touring the coffeehouse circuit in the Northeast and eventually taking him to the stage of the Newport Folk Festival in 1963, where he was embraced enthusiastically by the folk community, young and old. That appearance and a historic concert with the father of bluegrass, Bill Monroe, at Town Hall in New York City in 1964 paved the way for Watson\u2019s first recording contract.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>That same year marked what was to be another momentous occasion. Upon returning home from a tour, Watson found that his son, Merle, had taken up the guitar. Rosa Lee had taught Merle his first chords, and Merle, as Watson says, \u201cjust took it and went with it.\u00a0<\/p>\n<figure><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" width=\"750\" height=\"750\" alt   data-recalc-dims=\"1\" data-old-src=\"data:image\/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns='http:\/\/www.w3.org\/2000\/svg'%20viewBox='0%200%20750%20750'%3E%3C\/svg%3E\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/acousticguitar.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/watson_country_UP.jpg?w=750&#038;ssl=1 750w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/acousticguitar.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/watson_country_UP.jpg?resize=300%2C300&#038;ssl=1 300w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/acousticguitar.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/watson_country_UP.jpg?resize=150%2C150&#038;ssl=1 150w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/acousticguitar.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/watson_country_UP.jpg?resize=500%2C500&#038;ssl=1 500w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/acousticguitar.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/watson_country_UP.jpg?resize=125%2C125&#038;ssl=1 125w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/acousticguitar.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/watson_country_UP.jpg?resize=50%2C50&#038;ssl=1 50w\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/acousticguitar.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/watson_country_UP.jpg?resize=750%2C750&#038;ssl=1\"><\/figure>\n<p>\u201cThe first time Merle ever went to a festival with me was the Berkeley Folk Festival in 1964. He was 15. When he went on the stage with me, he had been pickin\u2019 the guitar three months, and he played backup guitar for me on the whole set. He met John Hurt on that trip and began to do a bunch of fingerstyle things, then things of his own notion, and picked up a couple of John\u2019s tunes. I don\u2019t remember how long it was before he began to really work on flatpicking, but he did it the way he thought it ought to be. If you\u2019ve noticed his flatpicking style, it was a little different from mine. I taught him melodies of things that I\u2019d want him to learn, but he\u2019d get off in a corner and do it the way he wanted to; tunes like \u2018Salt Creek\u2019 or \u2018Nancy Rowland,\u2019 some of those old tunes.\u201d<\/p>\n<figure><\/figure>\n<p>From a listener\u2019s point of view, it was easy to distinguish which Watson was picking a particular break without actually seeing who it was, because the younger Watson so quickly developed his own distinctive sound.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>In talking about his own playing, Watson often refers to \u201cDoc style.\u201d But one would be hard-pressed to place a precise definition on his guitar technique. \u201cDoc style\u201d is not just a picking method; it\u2019s also his genuine, warm, down-home personality and his delivery. As Watson says, \u201cStage presence is everything, something some people are just lucky enough to be born with.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Continuing about his style, Watson emphasizes, \u201cAs long as I\u2019ve been picking professionally, I\u2019ve been putting my own notions into the music. Whatever tune I play, I play the way I play it. I may have attempted to copy a few things when I first learned them, but very few things. I\u2019ve purposely tried my best to copy every lick Smitty played on the early Ernest Tubb recordings. [Fay \u201cSmitty\u201d Smith was Tubb\u2019s first electric lead player.] He was a jazz guitar player turned country. God, I loved his guitar picking! Whew, did I ever! Smitty didn\u2019t do anything real fancy, they were just pretty little ripply licks, little triplets thrown in, a lot of them were just little pull-off rolls.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Watson mentions a few other guitar inspirations. \u201cFor years, Chet [Atkins] was my idol. I finally figured out that I can\u2019t play three-finger style or four-finger style like he does\u2014literally, physically can\u2019t do it. I don\u2019t have the span, the reach that he has on the neck of the guitar. But I still love to hear the man play. Merle Travis, oh, God, I loved his music. The Delmore Brothers, um-um! I guess I liked every guitar player that I listened to, but there\u2019s some at the top of the list, like Chet, Merle, Smitty, Hank Garland. I like George Benson pretty much. And my son, Merle, of course. He was the best slide player I ever heard in my life\u2014I mean, Duane Allman and all the rest of them thrown in. Merle was the fastest, played the truest notes. And he was no slouch fingerstyle guitar player either. And Merle, as you noticed on the <a href=\"https:\/\/amzn.to\/3hPfoeU\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\"><em>Remembering Merle<\/em> <\/a>CD, could flatpick when he wanted to.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWhat impressed me the most about Merle\u2019s guitar playing was the tasteful style that he had developed and his ability to learn very quickly,\u201d Watson adds. \u201cHe was a much faster learner than I ever was. Those are the things that impressed me so much. He didn\u2019t have to play 900 notes to make you like what he did,\u201d he says, laughing, \u201cif you\u2019ll pardon a good healthy figure there!\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Merle Watson had a quiet but very visible presence. Onstage, the younger Watson would listen intently to the notes around him and respond with his own. He would often pick with his eyes closed and his head cocked down toward his guitar to hear better and concentrate on the crystal\u00ad-clear notes he was picking. As he slid out of a break, a beautiful, satisfied smile would come across his face.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>His father\u2019s performing and business partner for more than 20 years, Merle Watson played guitar, banjo, and slide guitar alongside his dad and produced most of their recordings. He recorded his first album with his father a mere eight months after strumming his first chord. They went on to record more than 20 albums together, winning four Grammy awards along the way. (Doc has since won two more.) Merle\u2019s expertise on the guitar not only equaled that of the elder Watson, many in the industry considered Merle to be an even finer picker. Merle\u2019s life ended tragically in a tractor accident at his farm on October 23, 1985.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cMerle loved music,\u201d Watson relates quietly. \u201cHe was an entertainer. Merle\u2019s stage presence . . . well, just looking at Merle and that smile and knowing he was up there was half his presentation, and his music was the other half. I always thought that from what people said; I couldn\u2019t see that, of course. He\u2019d flash that smile and you knew he was up there!\u201d<\/p>\n<div>\n<hr>\n<p>Get stories like this in your inbox<\/p>\n<hr>\n<\/div>\n<p><em>\u00a0Doc Watson died on May 29, 2012, at 89.<\/em><\/p>\n<figure><\/figure>\n<figure><\/figure>\n<p>Five Doc Watson albums worth checking out: <em><a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/amzn.to\/319Rvbs\" target=\"_blank\">The Best of Doc Watson, 1964-68<\/a><\/em>; <a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/amzn.to\/39Gjx21\" target=\"_blank\">Never the Same Way Once <\/a>(Doc and Merle live), <a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/amzn.to\/2P7Tzep\" target=\"_blank\">Doc &#038; Merle Watson\u2019s Guitar Album<\/a>; <em><a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/amzn.to\/336wYHg\" target=\"_blank\">Trouble in Mind: The Doc Watson Country Blues Collection<\/a><\/em>; <a href=\"https:\/\/amzn.to\/3fgVasX.\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\"><em>Foundation: The Doc Watson Guitar Instrumental Collection<\/em>.<\/a><\/p>\n<div>\n<hr>\n<div>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" data-recalc-dims=\"1\" data-old-src=\"data:image\/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns='http:\/\/www.w3.org\/2000\/svg'%20viewBox='0%200%200%200'%3E%3C\/svg%3E\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/acousticguitar.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/March-April-1993.jpg?w=1200&#038;ssl=1\"> <img decoding=\"async\" data-recalc-dims=\"1\" data-old-src=\"data:image\/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns='http:\/\/www.w3.org\/2000\/svg'%20viewBox='0%200%200%200'%3E%3C\/svg%3E\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/acousticguitar.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/001-324-Cover_150px.jpg?w=1200&#038;ssl=1\"><\/p>\n<p> This article originally appeared in the March\/April 1993 issue of <em>Acoustic Guitar<\/em> magazine and was reprinted in the <a href=\"https:\/\/store.acousticguitar.com\/collections\/back-issues\/products\/no-324-september-october-2020\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">September\/October 2020<\/a> issue.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<hr>\n<\/div>\n<div>\n<p>This article is free to read, but it isn&#8217;t free to create! Make a pledge to support our work (and get special perks in return.) <a href=\"https:\/\/www.patreon.com\/acousticguitarplus\" target=\"blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><span>LEARN MORE&#8230;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/section>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/acousticguitar.com\/the-rich-musical-legacy-of-doc-and-merle-watson-a-rare-interview\/\" class=\"button purchase\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Read More<\/a><br \/>\n Tomi Noren<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>JEFF TURNER PHOTO This article originally appeared in the March\/April 1993 issue of\u00a0Acoustic Guitar\u00a0magazine and was excerpted for the the\u00a0September\/October 2020\u00a0issue\u00a0| By Stephanie P. Ledgin For more than three decades, Arthel \u201cDoc\u201d Watson has been America\u2019s most renowned and influential folk guitar stylist. Now about to turn 70, he\u2019s mostly retired, staying off the road [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":613982,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[534,3341,2773],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-613981","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-financial","8":"category-legacy","9":"category-musical"},"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/613981","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=613981"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/613981\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/613982"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=613981"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=613981"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=613981"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}