Annotation:North Carolina Breakdown

Back to North Carolina Breakdown

NORTH CAROLINA BREAKDOWN. Old-Time, Bluegrass; Breakdown. USA, Tenn. G Major. Standard tuning (fiddle). AABB (Songer): AA'BB (Phillips). Composed by Tennessee's Fiddlin' Arthur Smith [1] (1898-1971). The tune is a current festival favorite among younger old-time fiddlers. Ernest Smith, Arthur's son, believes his father wrote "North Carolina Breakdown" around 1937, about the same time as "Smith's Breakdown," Smith's recording was released by Nashville's Starday label in 1962. See also the variant "Tarheel Breakdown," and the similar, if not directly ancestral, "Whistling Rufus."

Source for notated version: fiddler Judy Hyman (Ithica, N.Y.) [Phillips].

Printed sources: Phillips (Traditional American Fiddle Tunes, vol. 1), 1994; p. 166. Songer (Portland Collection), 1997; p. 148.

Recorded sources: HFM 1301, Hillbillies from Mars - "Hillbillies from Mars" (1993). Pine Mountain PMR 202, Fiddlin' Arthur Smith and the Dixieliners - "Rare Old Time Fiddle Tunes" (c. 1960's) [2].

See also listing at:
Jane Keefer's Folk Music Index: An Index to Recorded Sources [3]
Hear Arthur Smith's version on youtube.com [4]
Hear other versions on youtube.com [5] [6]
See Seth Austin's transcription & MP3 [7] [8]