(Editor's note: Keith Glass is an accomplished producer, writer, music historian, and performer. Keith was a personal friend of Johnny Duncan, and produced Johnny's last cd, "From Tennessee to Taree- The Johnny Duncan Story" available on the Rollercoaster label. website: www.rollercoasterrecords.com)
The Windrock Coal and Coke Company, a subsidiary of the Bessemer Coal, Iron and Land Company of Birmingham, Alabama began operations of a coal mine outside the small East Tennessee town of Oliver Springs in approximately 1904. This area is close to the Great Smoky Mountain National Park with the larger town of Oak Ridge and the city of Knoxville being the main communities in the region.
There were two camps on the Windrock Mountain. An upper area consisting of the entrance to the underground mine at about 250 feet elevation, a powerhouse, maintenance buildings, a store, a Church/school and approximately 105 houses for the miners families.
The lower area consisted of the main tipple, the L&N railroad tracks, similar community structures as at the top and a slightly smaller group of houses. Upper and lower were connected by a one mile incline track used for the haulage of coal in 10 ton cars raised and lowered by a steel wire cable.
The wooden frame and clad two bedroom houses were originally without electricity and largely still minus indoor plumbing in the early 1950’s. The Windrock mine is the oldest continuously operated coal mine in Tennessee and the biggest in the state; at its peak employing 350 men, with more than 700 people living in the combined area.
The Duncan family had been in the general vicinity since the late 1700’s, the first recorded being descendants of Benjamin Duncan [1752-1803] from Scotland. His son Moses Duncan had 21 children by three wives.
The Civil War era produced
the colourfully named ‘Devil Tom Duncan’ while a later relative with the
Christian name Byrd displayed the initial signs of musical ability. In the book
‘Circling Windrock Mountain’ author Augusta Bell writes ‘Of all his activities, it was the gospel singing
however, that made Byrd Duncan famous. He was known far and wide because of the Lake City
singing convention. A hundred or so people belonged to his group that sang every weekend
all over the country each January, February and March to raise money for the Anderson
March of Dimes, and then kept right on singing most of the rest of the year at community
homecomings’
By the time John Franklin Duncan entered the world in 1932* there were many descendants of the Duncan clan in the area and life in a coal mining community was still hard. Earlier times were the boom years. In 1912 the stores were stuffed with fresh food and boasted cold storage for meat. The miners demanded and received the best including good accommodation newly supplied with electricity first from the company plant and then the Norris Dam in 1937. The bottom fell out in the Great Depression when factories closed and coal demand was down. There was a brief boom after WWII but strip mining became cheaper than deep mining, leaving great scars in the hills. The houses too started to deteriorate and were allowed to fall down or were given away.
At ‘the top’ as Upper Windrock was called, it was a colder climate; in Winter the roads were closed by snowfalls, then came the rain, with flooding and landslides common. There were rattlesnakes and even wild cats in the surrounding woods. The true beauty of the area was revealed in Spring with the blooming of flowers and in the Fall glorious colour adorned the native deciduous trees but much work was needed to be done in the Summer to make it through the rest of the year. Life revolved around the church and school while the miners came home covered in dust and the womenfolk had sufficient chores to keep them occupied dawn to dusk. The porch of the Commissary (company store] was a favorite hang-out for after-work hours, and impromptu music may have occurred then too.
Saturday night was ‘Opry time’ when a young Johnny Duncan tuned into the radio and began to hear music from outside of the Southern Baptist gospel ‘shape note’ singing he participated in at church and at all day singing, dinner on the ground camp meetings of the type first celebrated by his probable ancestor Byrd and hundreds of other communities in the South.
School was another matter. Johnny attended the two room school at the top only while he had to. At the age of 14 his schooling was done apart from music lessons with a teacher called Miss Elizabeth Miles. She put names to the chords he’d been watching a black sharecropper play whenever he could, travelling some distance from home to do it. Initially while still learning, Johnny performed with Elizabeth and her two brothers Roy and Floyd in the area, mainly singing gospel songs. There was a wanderlust evident as early as the age of nine when he and his brother Robert rode boxcars to Cincinnati, Ohio and Dearborn, Michigan before being warned by a railroad patroller to ‘go home’.
The life of a coalminer, which his father had been all his life, was not for Johnny. As described he’d seen the best and worst of such a life. Having already followed the hobo trail north and later rambling south as far as The Lone Star state, when he was barely old enough he joined the army to see the world. Initially he saw Lubbock Texas and kept playing music with a trio while in boot camp. He had requested duty in Germany where his brother was stationed in the Air Force but wound up in England where he hooked up with a few more servicemen to keep playing the music that was in his blood, distilled from church, The Opry and the high lonesome bluesy sound of Johnny’s home, close as it was to the Kentucky, Virginia and North Carolina borders.
When he returned to the USA in 1953 with his
English wife Betty, 
a musical career was the last thing on his mind. Johnny was there as his
father, Columbus Duncan passed away. Subsequently Johnny found employment in the aircraft
industry in Wichita, Kansas. That could have been the end of it had Betty not become ill
while visiting her family for Christmas back in England. She was ‘in a bad way’ and required an operation. Johnny crossed the
Atlantic once more and worked at his father-in-law’s clothing stall in Huntingdon
market while she recovered.
On a whim and because he’d always liked Dixieland jazz, Duncan went to central London to see Chris Barber’s Jazz Band at a club run by Humphrey Lyttelton, 100 Oxford Street. He swears he knew little about Lonnie Donegan, or the fact Lonnie had just left Barber’s employ. Johnny says Ottilie Patterson spotted him from the stage and at the end of the set came up to him to remark on his resemblance to Donegan. Duncan said he was a singer too and somehow a meeting was arranged with Barber** which led to an invitation to attend a rehearsal in Southall a few nights later. With Johnny an ‘authentic’ hillbilly and Barber’s open minded attitude to the peculiar mixture of country, gospel, folk and blues that made up skiffle the deal was clinched for Johnny to perform for 10 pounds a week. It was an attractive arrangement all round and Duncan stayed with Barber for nearly a year and made his first recordings with the trombonist and part time bass player thousands of miles from his home.
Songs such as Diggin’ My Potatoes’ and ‘Get Along Home Cindy’ were not really indicative of Johnny’s roots, rather they were the type of material the distillation of American folk and blues music the skiffle craze had thrown up but Duncan had a natural high lonesome sound that gave him an edge over those learning the basics secondhand. In a musical climate where rock ‘n’ roll was starting to cause musical divisions and kids had a thirst for ‘the real thing’ Johnny was as real as it got outside of visiting American stars such as Josh White, Big Bill Broonzy, Odetta etc. When it became too real, such as with the highly electrified Muddy Waters band, the folkies, jazzers et al turned off. Hard core country was not hip and while it took a certain ‘hillbilly cat’ to fuse the blues with country and make it acceptable, southern boys like Johnny mostly had an innate feel for both sides of the musical coin with a side order of sanctified gospel thrown in.
Basically Johnny’s natural style took equal parts from Bill Monroe and Hank Williams which meant he could be bluesy and he could get real gone but he was country to the core and the extra baggage of skiffle was extraneous to his real persona.
Ironic but understandable then that his first ‘solo’ single should be Hank’s Kaw-Liga, which was a flop, and that a Calypso song called Last Train To San Fernando, which impressed Duncan not one bit, became a massive hit. Finishing 1957 as the 17th biggest chart record of the year it occupied a slot between Buddy Holly & The Crickets That’ll Be The Day and Bing Crosby & Grace Kelly’s song from High Society True Love. For weeks Duncan was kept from the top spot by Paul Anka’s huge international hit Diana which went on to become the biggest song of the year.
Last Train To San Fernando was originally performed by Trinidad group, The Duke Of Iron/The Mighty Dictator and brought to Duncan by EMI Records musical supervisor Dennis Preston whose wife was from the Carribean. Johnny told writer Trevor Cajiano in 1996 ‘Dennis said “What do you think of this?” I said “Open the window and I’ll show you” Those were my exact words’ Nevertheless the musicians Preston had put Duncan together with, Denny Wright [guitar] and Jack Fallon [bass] worked it up with him. With a vaguely etherial melody, a stop start rhythm and signature take off jazzy guitar solo from Wright the recording hit hard after a bit of promotional work from the savvy Preston and an associate publisher. Wright and Fallon were experienced musicians with backgrounds in jazz but with an openminded attitude to what Duncan had to offer. Their contribution to the liveliness of many of his early recordings cannot be overestimated – they were his Scotty Moore and Bill Black. The remaining significant ‘Bluegrass Boys’ as they were rather unfortunately dubbed, were Danny Lavan [fiddle] and Lennie Hastings [drums]. While many others filled roles in the peak years, these four are the main players that allowed Duncan to translate his exuberance to disc. The flip side of Last Train’ was Johnny’s own ‘Rockabilly Baby’ composed in just a few minutes to fill the recording date. It shows Duncan was well aware of the musical revolution around him. He maintained a rocking sound in original songs such as If You Love Me Baby and Blue Blue Heartache but also recorded many Hank Williams songs as well as bluegrass standards in a more country mode. Only in comparatively full on rhythm & blues workouts such as Kansas City did the country boy lose his way.
Joe Meek engineered many of Johnny’s sessions and Meek’s approximation of slap back echo is a precursor to the wild overuse of reverb/echo on his own productions of the 1960’s. There was little or no record company intervention to Duncan’s recording whims according to Johnny today. This seems odd given the fact Last Train [virtually a company selected song] was a huge hit while Johnny’s subsequent failure to produce significant chart placings*** marked him as a one hit wonder. That one hit however was enough to keep him busy playing prestigious venues and rubbing shoulders with show business aristocracy.
Cliff Richard, just starting off, shared billing with Duncan. The John Lennon fronted Quarrymen and later The Silver Beatles came to see him play Liverpool. Dr Who actor John Pertwee pestered Johnny to add his harmony vocal to a session until it happened on I Heard The Bluebird Sing. He was a regular on the BBC’s first teen oriented television program, The 6.5 Special and had his own BBC radio series, ‘Tennessee Songbag’, which was also the title of his first album.
Johnny performed with and often headlined over visiting US stars such as Hank Locklin, The Browns and Marvin Rainwater. ‘The Bluegrass Boys’ would have been quite a show. Musically tight and as was the order of the day well dressed. Johnny took photographs of various American stars in western cut clothes down to Saville Row to have suits and jackets made in different colours with contrasting piping – West End western wear was a short lived trend!
In the March 1958 issue of ‘Country & Western Express’, the enthusiastic editor helps to perpetuate some false and misleading claims made about Johnny Duncan. [Although many had already been made on the notes to his albums and E.P’s]. However these should be seen in the context of the era when the most outrageous stories were concocted for this or that artist, often by overzealous publicity agents who knew the tenor of the times was against being ‘found out’ and by that time the act would most likely be a distant memory anyway! Johnny is quoted as saying about his Tennessee mountain home. [It is]‘three and a half miles out in the sticks; country where I guarantee in 30 minutes you could get enough meat to last you a week – squirrels, deer, rabbits, coons, all sorts of things’ – fair enough, as is the description of a 13 year old Duncan singing with a gospel quartet while a claim of them ‘singing all over Tennessee’ may be a little far fetched.
At pains to explain the country/western connection the editor depicts Johnny as an expert horseman and yes, it’s true he did saddle up around the Windrock/Oliver Springs area but that was basic transportation. While it is true Johnny has a great love for western music this came mainly from the movies not from being a cowboy in coalmining country. One of the highlights of his early years was catching up with The Callahan Brothers, Bill & Joe, [who performed in Westerns with Jimmy Wakely] when he worked by day with a roofing company and by night with a hillbilly trio. This apparently happened in an earlier time spent in Texas than when Johnny was initially stationed there by the army. Where the editor of Country & Western Express goes overboard is in the claim Johnny was ‘for several years’ a ‘featured attraction’ with Bill Monroe, who is also referred to as ‘a celebrated Country and Western bandleader’ – well, neither claim is true and Johnny named his ‘Bluegrass Boys’ as both a tribute to Bill and the bluegrass and music of Kentucky, which when all is said and done is the closest to his heart.
There is a good section on Johnny’s English
arrival however and the description of how he met his wife at Molesworth, Hunts. ‘Johnny had formed a small hillbilly group in
which he sang and played the guitar and mandolin – a group which spent all of its
off-duty hours either playing for its own amusement or entertaining fellow GI’s and
British locals at camp concerts and dances. One day the other members of the band, eating
at a Molesworth café, noticed Johnny appeared to be very smitten with the assistant
manageress – but was too shy to do anything about it on his own. They kidded him
along until he finally plucked up enough courage to ask the girl to join them at camp that
night for a dance. The lady accepted and it was [of course] love at first
sight…Johnny made Betty Mrs Duncan on the 4th of July, 1953 –
Independence Day. “It seemed suitable” he says wryly “that the day the US
gained its freedom should be the one I lost mine”.
Eventually of course the ex-hit artist slips down the hierarchy and Duncan settled in to a constant grind of touring workingman’s clubs, particularly in the North East of England. He moved to Sunderland after revisiting the US in the early 1960’s at which time he had separated from Betty.
When the article was printed, Johnny was top of
the heap, the magazine quotes sales of 500,000 copies for Last Train To San Fernando with follow up Blue Blue Heartache/Jig Along Home ‘following
its predecessor into the nation’s juke-boxes [and] into the top twenty’. The editor goes on to enthuse‘A second EP and a dynamic LP enhanced his
reputation still further, ‘while his unchallenged position as the number one Country
and Western draw was consolidated still more by his record breaking Variety tour in the
Autumn of 1957, by his Luxembourg radio series, by his “Tennessee Song Bag”
disc-jockey show on the BBC – and numerous T.V appearances and sold-out
concerts!’
The live dates for the period of issue of the magazine are given as follows:-
Worcester - Feb 24th, and from there to Glasgow, Bradford and Brighton [no dates]
Birmingham – March 31st Sheffield – April 7th Bristol – April 14th
Manchester – April 21st and Hanley – April 28th
No venues are listed but the indication is these are all theatre appearances.
Finally, the editor writes ‘Today, Johnny lives with his wife Betty, lovable
young daughter Julie and sister-in-law Doreen in North London. Doreen is Johnny’s
secretary and also heads up his ever widening fan club as President. They are sincere and
friendly as the country songs Johnny sings and with this good natured down to earth
manner, Johnny cannot help but win over all who meet him.’…..’When relaxing
from his heavy schedule, Johnny plays a devastating game of darts, devastating to his
opponents…a fact well and truly learned by your Editor!’
Despite the over the top hyperbole, Johnny was
riding high but fashions, trends and time were overtaking him. By late 1964 the same
magazine reviewed Johnny’s version of Roger Miller’s‘Dang Me’b/w /Which Way Did He Go’ ,
a humorous Duncan original, with these words – ‘Roger Miller’s hit covered by our own
Johnny Duncan, who does fair enough on this novelty, but who is worthy of better things
than just “cover jobs”. Johnny’s own song “Which Way” is lively
and features some nice guitar.’ A three star rating for both sides compares to 5
for ‘lesser known’ artist Willie Nelson’s ‘River Boy’ and 4 stars for Buddy Ebsen's version of ‘Ballad Of Jed Clampett’.
Johnny himself commented to Trevor Cajiao in 1996,
when asked who picked his material ‘I had a
free hand to record what I wanted to. Dennis [Preston]
came to me once and got me to make a cover of that
Roger Miller thing “Dang Me” which I wasn’t too happy about. It was all
right, I suppose,’
The record labels became smaller and the recording time tighter but the hard country style Johnny settled into in mid-life was a good way to gain steady work, if one away from the public spotlight he had been perhaps prematurely thrust into. Long nights, repetition and the hard living and drinking lifestyle did take its toll which could explain why in 1972**** Johnny made his first trip to the Antipodes. He had already helped out Australian country star Reg Lindsay on a UK visit now Reg returned the favour on a near year long tour of the vast countryside. A recording session for the RCA label with local producer Rocky Thomas was arranged and the subsequent release of another version of Kaw-Liga backed with yet one more Hank song Mind Your Own Business is a fairly obscure piece of Johnny Duncan history. The single sank without trace despite a strong vocal from Johnny – it is lumbered with typical early 70’s production touches such as twee female backing singer harmonies and the overuse of fellow US expatriate Pee Wee Clark’s pedal steel guitar. Two other songs were recorded but remain unreleased from the same session, Johnny remembers one being an original called Song For Lydia but no-one can recall the other.
In any event by 1976 Johnny was back in England
playing the clubs. A 15 year old Trevor Cajiao interviewed him in South Shields in
September and Johnny was unsure of the year he had left the UK in the first place, only
offering the comments he enjoyed Australia but ‘the
Aussie bastards – I couldn’t stand’.
Nonetheless he was soon back ‘downunder’ and seems to have had little trouble with any immigration problems or illegitimate Aussies. This is probably due to the way he initially arrived. Coming from the UK he was unaware of any visa requirements he may need as either a US citizen or an English resident. After all, Australia was a Commonwealth country with the Queen as head of state! His lack of the proper papers did in fact cause a hitch but a quick phone call to Reg [at that stage a nationally known star] set in motion a request for the colourful then Minister for Immigration, Al Grassby to present Johnny with a letter allowing him ‘indefinite’ stay in Australia, a very unusual situation!
His second wife and several children arrived and while Johnny moved around for some time the family settled in Cranbourne a town just outside of Melbourne in the state of Victoria through the mid to late 1970’s. Johnny even appeared on the national television talent show ‘New Faces’ as a contestant – not quite as demeaning as it may seem because of the limited opportunities for musical acts, especially country performers, on the video screen. Johnny says he got a Tasmanian tour out of his appearance and it has stayed in the memory of the proprietor of ‘Hound Dog’s Bop Shop’ [and one of the world’s leading ‘oldies’ record shops], Denys Williams. ‘Basically that was the only way we knew Johnny was here’ Denys commented. Indeed, even the initial Bear Family vinyl album release of a collection of Johnny’s Columbia sides only alluded to his possible Australian hideaway.
The misinformation was compounded by Paul Pelletier’s more extensive notes to the 28 page booklet included in the 4CD box set issued in the 1990’s. Speculation and rumour replaced fact with the author casting doubt on Duncan’s birthplace and even having him working as a milkman back in the UK in Sunderland in the early ‘80’s.
Well Johnny would have to have been the ‘slowest milkman in the west’ because he was moving north at a snails pace living first in New South Wales second biggest city, Newcastle and then working his way up the coast 150 K to Taree [Pop 17,500] where he has remained the past seven or eight years.
So why did Johnny step out of the limelight? Basically his race was run save for the grind of gigs he continued in a minor way through the early years of his life in Australia. His kind of music was out of synch with what was happening in the 1970’s and 80’s and unlike say Slim Dusty who remains a major Australian icon, he was of little relevance to the vibrant Aussie country music scene, especially as he never had a hit here. The other point is Johnny Duncan was and remained a hillbilly [or, in Australian terminology, a bushie] and he had found peace and contentment in the Australian countryside. His property outside of the bustling centre of Taree, overlooked rolling farmland. Inside were three television sets, just like that other hillbilly cat [but Elvis never had cable] and Johnny continued to enjoy a smoke and a drink. Talk about the old days came with a certain amount of exaggeration but without bitterness or regret over what he had and lost. He didn’t speak of having been ‘ripped off’ or any of the common complaints of the once famous and was serene in retirement.
I first tracked Johnny down through his old sparring partner, steel guitarist and another expatriate American, Pee Wee Clark who still plays up on Australia’s Gold Coast in Queensland. It is true when these two good ol’ boys hooked up in the 1970’s gigs became a hit or miss affair after the first set, when the alcohol took effect and then as the saying goes, ‘Katie, bar the door!’
Johnny’s consequent recollection of events
could become tangled but the man lived thirds of his life in three separate environments.
His speech became a charming mixture of soft Tennessee drawl, English phrases and
Australian expressions such as ‘it’s
good tucker mate!’
Once Johnny had got under my skin I found myself drawn to the idea of recording him again and the song Tennessee To Taree was born on the way back from that very first visit. It wasn’t long before I’d demo’d a couple of tunes and found a few others and sent them up to him. Johnny was receptive, enthusiastic even, but in mid 1999 he wasn’t in good shape. He needed an operation to clear blocked arteries in his legs. Once this was out of the way on my next visit with musician Dwayne Elix [who had grown up among English migrants in South Australia and knew Johnny’s recordings well], the old fire was starting to rekindle. In the middle of a power blackout and a wild storm we ran through the songs – I still wasn’t sure whether Johnny was up to it.
On the day of actual recording adding guitarist Bill Chambers [whose daughter Kasey’s album has recently gone platinum in Australia and is now released in the UK on Virgin], Michael Vidale - who has handled the bass slot for many local and international artists including Dale Watson and Rosie Flores, Slim Dusty’s percussion man Robbie Souter and ex Emmylou Harris Hot Band fiddle player Wayne Goodwin to the mix gave the impetus for Johnny to dig deep. The results are here and I’m proud to say supplement Johnny Duncan’s work so long ago.
Sadly there was to be no more. Two weeks after
being diagnosed with inoperable bowel cancer, Johnny Duncan died at approximately 5pm on
Saturday July 15th 2000 in Taree Base Hospital. He is survived by five children
from two of his three marriages.
The Johnny Duncan story is a one-off in the world of show business. He was in
the right place at the right time and was exactly the tonic needed for that time. He
produced more than a handful of totally exhilarating sides with a group of great musicians
unfamiliar with the high lonesome sound that was his birthright. Against the odds, the
recording engineers and supervisors gave him perhaps too much freedom to do what he wanted
despite his only major hit being from total left field. Then he disappeared. The trail was
stone cold while his collective recordings were reissued and skiffle was re-evaluated. The
30 year recording hiatus may prove to be Johnny’s smartest move yet. He travelled
light and free and without memorabilia to weigh him down. There was however, always a cold
beer waiting in the fridge for anyone who cared to make the trek to Taree.
Keith Glass Sydney, Australia. June 2000 e-mail Kglass@one.net.au
*Johnny’s year of birth has been printed many times as 1931 and this date is also on his Army records but September 7th 1932 is the correct birthdate.
** Dickie Bishop, banjoist with Chris Barber says he invited Johnny along to the White Hart in Southall to meet with Barber after seeing Johnny perform at the American Club in Busbey Park. Although Barber has been quoted as suggesting Johnny was first sighted at the 100 Club and Barber was impressed ‘he could play mandolin and a jumbo Martin guitar behind his head’. [as reported by Spencer Leigh]
* ** the revamped
bluegrass classic Footprints In The Snow and Johnny’s own composition Blue Blue Heartache were minor chart successes in
1958
* * * * this initial Australian arrival has variously been written as happening in ‘73 or ’74 and his stay being from a period of ten months to two and a half years – it now seems Johnny basically remained in Australia from 1972, except for a six month period back in the Northern Hemisphere in 1976
Sources:-
For background on Johnny’s early years I have drawn heavily on the following:
The Story Of Oliver Springs, TN and Its People, Vol II’ Snyder E. Roberts
Roane County Schools, Kingston, TN 1983 [from articles originally published as ‘A Glimpse Of The Past’ in local newspapers by City Historian, S. E. Roberts]
‘Circling Windrock Mountain’ Augusta Bell University Of Tennessee Press 1998
The Oliver Springs Historical Society website http://www.oshistorical.com
Pat Roberts McDonald, website consultant and former webmaster, Oliver Springs Historical Society
Mrs Betty Taylor Borum, editor ‘Legacy’ magazine, Oliver Springs
Country & Western Express [UK] Issue 18, 1958 and new series # 15 1994
Trevor Cajiao
People who have offered insights or information into facets of Johnny’s life and career: John Bothroyd, Hedley Charles, Rocky Thomas, John Lomax III, John Pilgrim,
Denys Williams, Pee Wee Clark, Alan Tomkins, Duncan Mitchell, Heather Walls, Trevor Taylor, Norm Burke, Dan Fernandez - SightSound Australia
Johnny Duncan himself
Very special thanks to Ms Pat McDonald of the Oliver Springs Historical Society for her valuable distillation of material on a beautiful part of the great state of Tennessee.
She Took The Engineer [D. Elix/H. Field/J. Gillard/J. Bonnefond]
Cold And Lonely Trail [K. Glass]
Hillbilly Daddy [B. Chambers]
Tennessee To Taree [K. Glass]
K.Glass – Festival Music
B. Chambers/D. Elix/J. Bonnefond – control
J. Gillard/H. Field – EMI Music
Keith Glass – guitar. Dwayne Elix – guitar/mandolin Bill Chambers guitar/steel/Dobro
Wayne Goodwin – fiddle. Michael Vidale – bass. Rob Souter – snare drum.
Produced by Keith Glass Engineered & mixed by Mark Tinson.
Recorded Newcastle, New South Wales, 7th & 20th December 1999