Annotation:Bow Legged Irishman (The)
BOW LEGGED IRISHMAN. American, Reel (cut time). USA, western Kentucky. G Major. Standard tuning (fiddle). AABB. "Bow Legged Irishman" is one of the notable tunes of Muhlenberg County, western Kentucky, fiddler Ted Gosset (1904-1990), who learned the piece from his stylistic influence, Charlie Jones, the one fiddler whom he considered the best in his neighborhood (Guthrie Meade, 1980). Gossett and his string band, consisting of Gossett, brother Enos Gossett (gtr.), Earl Nossinger (gtr.) and Pete Woods (banjo), only recorded once, in September, 1930, at the Gennett Recording Studio, in the Starr Piano Company Building, Whitewater Gorge Park, Richmond, Indiana. They recorded nine sides that day, five of which were relaesed on the subsidiary Champion, Supertone and Superior labels. The session was also split with an older fiddler Tommy Whitmer (b. 1886), also from Muhlenberg County, who sometimes played with Gossett and his band. Whitmer fronted the band for three cuts while Gossett sat out. Folklorist Mike Seegar (1923-2012) tracked down Gossett and interviewed him late in life, archived at The Southern Folklife Collection of the University of North Carolina.
