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Henry Taylor of Cairo, Missouri, won a major fiddlers’ contest held at Paris, Missouri, as reported in the article below from the Moberly Monitor, November 16, 1922. It’s a great little window into Missouri fiddling culture of the time—how contests were run, what tunes were played, and even how the fiddlers themselves carried and presented their music.
What really grabs me is the language. It’s wonderfully flowery—very much a holdover from the 19th century—and it gives the whole piece a kind of charm you just don’t see anymore. That’s my kind of journalism! There’s also a note that Taylor was a descendant of President Zachary Taylor.
Paris sat right in the heart of “Little Dixie,” and you can feel that throughout the article. There are several moments that hint at the Southern character of the region—something that clearly shaped the fiddling tradition there at the time.
I can’t help but wonder—was the “Old Virginia Reel” mentioned here the same tune that later turns up in R. P. Christeson’s Old-Time Fiddler’s Repertory (University of Missouri Press, 1973)?
NOTE: Images have been enhanced using ChatGPT.
HENRY TAYLOR — SOME FIDDLER
Edgar White of Macon Tells How Randolph County Man Won First Prize At Fair
A BIGGER ATTRACTION THAN HORSE RACES
Henry Taylor, of near Cairo, winner of the fiddlers’ contest at the Macon Fair held recently, is the subject of an interesting article which was prepared by Edgar White and published recently in the Macon Chronicle-Herald.
It would have delighted the music-loving souls of Governor Bob and Alf Taylor of Tennessee to have witnessed the old-timers manipulate the “fiddle and the bow” at Macon, Old Settlers’ day. By chance it happened that Henry Taylor, winner of the first prize, was a cousin of the Tennessee Taylors, and his father John Belvard Taylor, was a nephew of Zachary Taylor, the twelfth president of the United States.
It may have been an announcement in a local paper that the St. Louis Star was interested in the contest that brought such a big line-up of old fiddlers out to take a hand in the contest. There were here 13 old fiddlers, every one of them a real artist in the “way of playing ‘The Arkansas Traveler’ and other classics of the fiddle. At the Monroe county contest last December there were five. Shelby county organized an old fiddlers’ contest in which seven took part. It was expected here there would only be six or seven at the most and when thirteen enrolled it was clear that something was going to happen in musical circles.
Entrants in the Fiddlers’ Contest at the Macon Fair.
Chairman R. A. Guthrie started the contestants to sawing at 1:30 in a big tent jammed with people, and tho the races, with some of the best horses in the country, were started while the fiddlers were at work, not a person left the crowded tent. If you ever attended a fiddlers’ contest by old-timers you’ll understand why. It is the individual characteristics of the performers.
All keep time with their feet. Some sway their bodies backward and forward or sideways. One man played “Whipping the Devil Around the Stump” with the fiddle back of his head. When Taylor played “The Lost Indian,” he would inject a long, and mournful call sounding like “Wa-he-e—wa-ho-o-o!” trailing off like a cry in the distance.
Entrants in the Fiddlers’ Contest at the Macon Fair.
It was a day in Indian summer with secret tinted foliage creeping close to the big tents and exhibition building, and the incense of wood fires from nearby farm houses sifted through the air, suggesting long winter evenings soon to come, when the family would gather ’round the hearth and the gray haired father would take from its case the loved instrument of the pioneer and make the welkin ring. Under such conditions the old fiddler was born, and the melody he produces was placed in his soul at birth.
The fiddlers sat in an arena in the center of the big tent, the crowd packed densely around them.
As the music switched to a well known lilt, the crowd would laugh. Not so the performers. They were a serious group, and no smile overspread their features, even when doing their merriest airs. This winning of the fiddle contest with artists all around in the competition was no joking matter. It is an honor handed down from father to son and to generations yet to come.
Some of the fiddlers were men with distinguished looks, long gray mustaches, keen blue eyes and well-moulded features. There were others who looked the part of the old-time fiddlers as handed down in song and story. Such was Bill Harris, the blind musician of Adair county, who says he has been fiddling for dances and country celebrations for more than 50 years and is good for goodness knows how many more.
The crowd really decided the winner when Henry Taylor of Cairo, Mo., …“hand it to that man!” “Boys, ain’t he making that ole fiddle talk?”
When the performer shifted to “The Arkansas Traveler” the crowd just yelled.
Left: Bill Harris, the blind fiddler of Adair county;
Right: Henry Taylor, winner of first prize.
Right: Henry Taylor, winner of first prize.
A man in the audience said: “You can’t lay down no rules for fiddlin’. I’m something of a fiddler myself, but I wouldn’t want to go against that bunch—not since having heard that man Taylor. A fiddler plays whichever way is most comfortable to him. He don’t pay no attention to what the book says—he just handles his old music bow the handiest. Why, if you’d tell these boys they had to learn how to play to notes and bars and scales they’d smash you.”
“The Old Wagoner” seemed to be new to most of the crowd. It was played by Wm. Startup, and its beauty and fine rendition made for him a place with the winners.
Some of the selections had quaint names suggestive of the grim humor of the old log cabin days. There were others that caused you to wonder just what they meant. Besides the pieces mentioned the contestants also played “Leather Breeches,” “Natchez Under the Hill,” “Sail Away,” “Bob Woods,” “The Old Virginia Reel,” “Old Dan Tucker,” “Pop Goes the Weasel,” “The Girl With a Hole in Her Stocking,” “Charlotte Harris,” “The Irish Washer Woman,” and of course “Turkey in the Straw” was very much in evidence.
Names of Contestants:
Bill Harris — Kirksville
S. D. Shoemate — New Cambria
M. D. Richardson — Clarence
Douglas Cook — Mexico
S. S. Phipps — Callao
W. R. Blankenship — Bevier
Henry Taylor — Cairo
William Startup — Clarence
James F. Miles — Macon
J. H. Tracy — Macon
John N. Johnson — Macon
F. G. Turner — Ethel
C. A. Terry — College Mound
Titles of Tunes Mentioned:
The Arkansas Traveler
Whipping the Devil Around the Stump
The Lost Indian
The Old Wagoner
Leather Breeches
Natchez Under the Hill
Sail Away
Bob Woods
The Old Virginia Reel
Old Dan Tucker
Pop Goes the Weasel
The Girl With a Hole in Her Stocking
Charlotte Harris
The Irish Washer Woman
Turkey in the Straw
I’m not a fan of most AI content, especially video. If you’re a consumer of scrollable vertical format video (YouTube shorts, Instagram/Facebook reels, TikTok) you will have noticed that AI has completely flooded the zone. Yuk!
There are redeeming aspects of AI like ChatGPT, for instance. Check the photos output I used for the Henry Taylor article. The blurred images are output from newspaper microfiche and the cleaned up versions from ChatGPT. Pretty impressive even though some aspects of the photos are altered, mostly because there wasn’t much to work with in the first place. I don’t see any problem with using such AI-enhanced images provided they are labeled as such.
Our friend Tom Faux with Community Center for the Arts in Urbana sent us this announcement concerning an upcoming banjo workshop and performance:
C4A is proud to present a Clawhammer banjo immersion with banjo maestro Mark Olitsky. Mark O. tours and records with the celebrated Earl White Stringband, and is a well-known and highly respected jammer at old-time festivals everywhere. Banjo players will recognize his virtuosic up-the-neck “popcorn” technique, a driving melodic style of playing that has influenced legions of festival banjo players in recent years.
Mark will be in residence at the Community Center for the Arts, on Saturday, May 16. He will offer an immersion “master class” from 10AM-3PM (with an hour lunch break at noon.) The cost for participating is $25. There will also be a limited number of $5 seats (for beginners only) who would like to audit the session without actively participating.
At 6PM Mark will perform a short set at the 25 O’Clock Brew Pub, 208 W. Griggs St. in Urbana, to be followed by an open old-time music jam. Performance and jam participation are free of charge.
To reserve your spot or for more information email info@c-4a.org or leave a message at (217) 550-9647.
The time for the Bethel (MO) Youth Fiddle Camp is fast upon us. The dates this year are June 14 to 18. More info at https://www.facebook.com/BethelFiddleCamp
I’ve been slowly getting rid of my old dust collectors and decided to share them with you as many represent some fond memories. Here’s another one from the dusty shelf. It’s from a little contest in Perry, Missouri. Perry is a small town in Ralls County in Northeast Missouri. It’s become a jumping off point for people headed to Mark Twain Lake.
The trophy is from 1982. I was living in Columbia at the time and attending many contests with my stalwart accompanist John Stewart. We got third place, but the sting of not winning was quickly forgotten when we realized the trophy was made from a beer can! I gave this tropy to John a several years ago and he displays it proudly to this day. I don’t recall any other details of the event.
“King of Beers” trophy donated by Budweiser.
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This is from an old decrepit VHS tape of a fiddle contest held at Jamestown, MO, on July 12, 1987. Pete McMahan of Harrisburg playing Gray Eagle and Flowers from Heaven Waltz accompanied by Wes Brown (on his right) and Joe Stevens. NOTE: The audio cuts out for a few seconds in the first tune.
Here’s a playlist with more highlights from that same event.
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLmTYxwAJb9JBwwS5qInDTdyIFeXiadut8
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