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Help: performer on the Grand Ole Opry

11 Aug 02 - 12:55 PM (#763412)
Subject: performer on the Grand Ole Opry
From: GUEST,1827Byrd

Back in the 1940's there was a performer on the Grand Ole Opry named Robert Lunn (or Lund). He specialized in humerous and novelty songs. Grandfather's Clock and a talking blues were two of his best known. A 33 rpm record came out in the 1960's or there abouts. Does anyone know where a copy of that album can be obtained?

11 Aug 02 - 01:17 PM (#763418)
Subject: RE: Help: performer on the Grand Ole Opry
From: masato sakurai

At least one CD (Robert Lunn: The Original Talking Blues Man) has been released, but Yahoo! says "This Product Is Currently Not Available on Yahoo! Shopping". Info on Robert Lunn is given in Charles K. Wolfe, A Good-Natured Riot: The Birth of the Grand Ole Opry (CMF/Vanderbilt, 1999, pp. 237-240).

~Masato

11 Aug 02 - 01:25 PM (#763420)
Subject: RE: Help: performer on the Grand Ole Opry
From: masato sakurai

The LP was released in 1962 as The Original Talking Blues Man (Stardy SLP-228).

11 Aug 02 - 01:49 PM (#763426)
Subject: RE: Help: performer on the Grand Ole Opry
From: masato sakurai

From AMG All Music Guide:

Robert Lunn
Born Nov 28, 1912 in Franklin, TN
Died Mar 8, 1966
"Believe it or not, if you're a fan of the deeply moving talking blues style that Woody Guthrie used to expose the social ills of early 20th century America, then you owe a debt to a silly, light-hearted vaudevillian performer named Robert Lunn. Performed on the stage of the Grand Ole Opry for nearly 30 years, Lunn's rambling comic numbers were more spoken narrative than actual song but were widely popular among concert-goers of the '30s and '40s. Though he rarely recorded, his radio broadcasts of these talking numbers had a great influence on other performers, among them the great Woody Guthrie."--Steve Kurutz

11 Aug 02 - 02:00 PM (#763430)
Subject: RE: Help: performer on the Grand Ole Opry
From: Stefan Wirz

now we have (at least) TWO 'Original Talking Blues Men' - the other being Chris Bouchillon
Any hints on which of them has been 'more original' than the other ?

13 Aug 02 - 05:39 PM (#764684)
Subject: RE: Help: performer on the Grand Ole Opry
From: Art Thieme

I do think Chris Bouchillon was the first. His 78rpm record came out in 1927 if my memory is correct. The other side was "ANNAH", Won't You Open That Door"----a great song.

Art

14 Aug 02 - 02:35 AM (#764969)
Subject: RE: Help: performer on the Grand Ole Opry
From: Stewie

Your memory is fine, Art. As Stefan has on his site, 'Talking Blues/Hannah' were recorded by Bouchillon on 4 Nov 1926 and released by Columbia on some unrecorded date in April 1927 [Meade, Spottswood, Meade biblio-discography].

Stefan, there seems little doubt that Bouchillon was 'more original'. Linnell Gentry's encyclopedia of country music indicates Lunn toured with Uncle Dave and Acuff, but his earliest appearances on the Grand Ole Opry were in 1938, continuing on until 1958.

In his 'Country Roots: The Origins of Country Music' Hawthorn Books 1976, Douglas B. Green writes at page 58:

Another exponent of blues style, or more specifically a blues style, in country music's middle years was the Opry's Robert Lunn, 'The Talking Blues Boy'. Talking blues - hard-luck stories, occasionally quite risque, narrated over a bluesy guitar accompaniment - was not a new form, having been pioneered on record by Chris Bouchillon and others in the 1920s. It was Lunn, however, a frequent part of Roy Acuff's road show, who kept the style alive long after its initial popularity had waned, and it was thus unfortunate that Lunn died just as urban folk groups such as the New Lost City Ramblers were reviving the talking blues and delighting a new generation and a new audience with them.

--Stewie.