February | 2016 | Old Time Blues

UPDATE: Diligent experts have identified these tunes as “Down Yonder” (first side), and “The Waltz You Saved For Me” (second side). Thank you, for your great assistance, Messrs. Chalfen, Johnston, and Bosch!

Here’s another home recording that I found along with that old time fiddle one, it features two very familiar sounding, and quite enjoyable piano solos whose names I cannot seem to place. I’m hoping someone out there can help me identify the names of the pieces being played. If any of you treasured readers out there can put a name with them, I’ll update the article with special thanks.

This Wilcox-Gay Recordio home recording disc is completely unmarked, making it impossible for me to offer any information on its artist or date. The copyright date of 1950 would likely place it in that vicinity as far as dating goes. As is often the case with these home recordings, sound quality is on the low end, and there is quite a bit of noise, but these aren’t too bad, all things considered.

This side sounds especially familiar to me, but I just can’t put my finger on the title. At first I though it was “Waiting on the Robert E. Lee”, but it doesn’t seem to quite fit that tune.

Thanks to a reader’s identification, this tune seems to be L. Wolfe Gilbert’s 1921 composition “Down Yonder”.

Down Yonder, recorded ? by unknown pianist.

This little ditty, too, sounds quite familiar, but again, I just can’t quite think of the title, if I ever knew what is was called. Some talking can be heard in the background of this one at one point.

The Waltz You Saved for Me, recorded ? by unknown pianist.

Updated with improved audio on July 2, 2024.

Recorded in the deepest depths of the Great Depression, I offer to you these two boogie woogie piano tunes from the brief recording career of the skilled Alabama blues man Walter Roland.

Walter Roland was born in December of either 1902 or 1903 in Tuscaloosa County, Alabama—the twentieth of December is most often given as his birth date. He was working as a musician by the 1920s, playing both piano and guitar and singing. Though Roland remained an active musician until the end of his life, he recorded only a few times in the 1930s. In 1933, Roland traveled to New York with guitar player Sonny Scott to record for the American Record Corporation, and would return twice between then and 1935. During those trips, he recorded solo, and also played as an accompanist with Lucille Bogan and Joshua White, as well as part of the “Jolly Jivers” with Scott and Bogan. Some of his records were released under the pseudonym Alabama Sam. After returning home, Roland did not make another recording, but continued to play music. By the 1950s, he was a farmer, but sometimes worked as a street musician. Sometime in the 1960s, he was blinded by buckshot after trying to break up an altercation between neighbors, and he retired in the later part of that decade. Roland died of lung cancer October 12, 1972 in Fairfield, Alabama.

Perfect 0252 was recorded over two consecutive days on July 19 and 20, 1933 in New York City, Roland’s second released disc from his ARC sessions. It got an honorable mention in 78 Quarterly’s famous “Rarest 78s” column. These ARC race records seldom turn up in very good condition, and this one is no exception, but thankfully, despite a few brief blasts of noise, the music is still prominent.

Roland’s first number is the classic “Early This Morning (‘Bout Break of Day)”, his own version of Charlie Spand’s “Soon This Morning”. Unfortunately, the text on the label has faded away completely, leaving only the faintest trace of what was originally printed. This side was recorded on the July 20 date. Roland also recorded the same tune the previous day, accompanying his guitar-playing associate Sonny Scott.