Dick,

The last song that Bill Monroe recorded for Columbia was 'The Girl in the Blue Velvet Band' on 22 October 1949. This spawned numerous bluegrass recordings of the song in the following decades. One of the most recent that I've heard is Pete Rowan and Jerry Douglas on their 'Yonder' album for Sugar Hill, although it is treated there as a slow ballad, and they attribute it to 'traditional'!

The song was a collaborative effort between the legendary country steel guitarist, Cliff Carlisle, and Acuff-Rose's Mel Foree who collaborated with with numerous country songwriters, including Charlie Monroe and Hank Williams. Douglas Green says that this 'garbled tale of robbery and deceit' was supposedly based on an actual incident. According to Linnell Gentry in his 'A History and Encyclopedia of Country, Western and Gospel Music', Carlisle recorded it for Victor and it was one of his most popular recordings. Unfortunately, Gentry gives no date and the song does not appear on the recent Arhoolie compilation of Carlisle's work. I would say that your 1920s date may be suspect because, although Carlisle was entertaining in tent shows etc in the late 1920s, his recording debut was 1930 for the Gennett and Champion labels. It was not until 1939 that he recorded another song that Monroe also turned into a bluegrass standard - 'Little Footsteps in the Snow'. Whilst Tony Russell's early country music discography remains stillborn, it may be difficult to track down the date for Carlisle's recording, but I will keep my eye open for you.

Regards, Stewie.