Annotation:Saturday Night Breakdown

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X:1 T:Saturday Night Breakdown S:Wil Gilmer & Leake County Revelers M:C| L:1/8 D: F:https://www.slippery-hill.com/recording/saturday-night-breakdown Z:Transcribed by Andrew Kuntz K:C (ef|g2)(ga-) a(ge2)|c2G2E3(E|F)GFE DEFG|AG2A G2(ef| g2) (ga-) a(ge2)|c2G2E3(E|F)EFd- dc B2|[E4c4][E2c2]:| |:[_E2B2]-|[=Ec]AGF EG2A|"*"c2G2E2C2|DEFE DEFG|AG2A G2(AB| c)AGF EG2A|c2G2E3(E|FEF)d- dcB2|[E4c4][E2c2]:|] P:Substitution |"*"c2G2E3(E|F)GFE DEFG||

SATURDAY NIGHT BREAKDOWN. American, Canadian; Reel (2/4 or cut time). C Major. Standard tuning (fiddle). AB (Silberberg): AABB (Messer, Phillips, Songer). This rag-time influenced reel was originally recorded in 1929 by fiddler Wil Gilmer with his group The Leake County Revelers. The quartet (which also included Dallas Jones, R.O. Moseley) were already regionally popular when they recorded in Atlanta, Georgia, in 1929. They had accompanied Louisiana politician Huey Long on his campaign for governor in 1928. Their record sales, propelled by live broadcasts from the 1000-watt WJDX (Jackson, Mississippi) in a coveted 6PM-7PM Saturday night spot, made them sought after performers across the southeast. The group members still kept their 'day jobs' however. In the 1980s their descendants, appearing as the Leake County String Band, provided music for the 1976 movie Ode to Billie Joe. "Saturday Night Breakdown" was used as the theme of "Sandy Bradley’s Potluck", heard for a time on public radio, played by Seattle brothers Jere and Greg Canote ^[1]. Fiddler Lonnie Ellis and the Mississippi Possum Hunters' "Mississippi Breakdown" is a variant of "Saturday Night Breakdown."

"Saturday Night Breakdown" was equally popular in Canada, where it was given a "down east"-style treatment in the mid-20th century by radio and TV fiddlers Don Messer and Ned Landry. Don Messer recorded the tune in the early 1950's followed, in 1956, by New Brunswick fiddler Ned Landry (1921-2018), a three-time Canadian Open Fiddle Champion who received the Order of Canada and who was inducted into the New Brunswick and Nova Scotia halls of fame. A CBC program schedule for Friday, December 21st, 1945, records that it was played by Messer and his band The Islanders on his 5 P.M. broadcast (along with "Honeysuckle Schottische," "Haste to the Wedding" and "Cuckoo's Nest").

Additional notes

Source for notated version: - fiddler Wil Gilmer with the Leake County Revelers [Phillips]; Laurie Andres [Silberberg].

Printed sources : - Messer (Way Down East), 1948; No. 4. Messer (Anthology of Favorite Fiddle Tunes), 1980; No. 24, p. 26. Phillips (Traditional American Fiddle Tunes, vol. 1), 1994; p. 215. Silberberg (Tunes I Learned at Tractor Tavern), 2002; p. 141. Songer (Portland Collection), 1997; p. 176. Sannella (Balance and Swing), CDSS.

Recorded sources: - Columbia 15470-D (78 RPM), Leake County Revelers (1929). County 532, "The Leake County Revelers: Saturday Night Breakdown, 1927-1930 Recordings" (1975). RCA Victor 56-3258 (78 RPM), Ned Landry and His New Brunswick Lumberjacks – Saturday Night Breakdown/The Plough Boy’s Reel (1956). RCA/Camden Records CAL-780, Ned Landry – “Saturday Night Breakdown” (1963).

See also listing at:
Jane Keefer's Folk Music Index: An Index to Recorded Sources [1]
Hear the Leake County Revelers 1929 recording at Slippery Hill [2] and at youtube.com [3]
See another standard notation transcription by John Lamancusa [4]

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↑ Susan Songer, Portland Collection, 1997

[1] Susan Songer, Portland Collection, 1997

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