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Lonesome Pine Fiddlers

One of the earliest bluegrass groups, The Lonesome Pine Fiddlers left a legacy of some of the finest examples of intense, raw-edged music ever recorded, including original songs like “I’m Left Alone,” “Nobody Cares (Not Even You),” “Twenty-One Years,” “My Brown Eyed Darling” and “Dirty Dishes Blues.”  Founded in West Virginia in 1937 by Ezra Cline, the initial band included his cousins “Curly” Ray and Ireland “Lazy Ned” along with Gordon Jennings. Over the years the group weathered a number of personnel changes, performing a variety of music ranging from old-time to bluegrass and country.

After a hiatus during World War II where Ned was killed in action, the band resumed their daily broadcasts on WHIS, and multi-instrumentalist Charlie Cline joined the band full-time.  In 1949 fiddler Ray Morgan, Bob Osborne (guitar) and Larry Richardson (banjo) joined the group, and their style shifted to full-fledged bluegrass. They recorded four records for the Cozy label in 1950, including “Pain in My Heart,” which has since become a bluegrass standard recorded by many artists including Flatt & Scruggs.

A number of respected musicians performed with the band through the mid-‘60s, including Paul Williams and Ray & Melvin Goins. In addition to being the first bluegrass band signed to the RCA Victor label in the 1950s, The Lonesome Pine Fiddlers later recorded for the Starday label. They played radio station WJR in Detroit and WLSI in Pikeville, Kentucky in the 1950s, and they hosted television programs in Huntington, West Virginia and Bristol, Virginia from the late 1950s through the  early 1960s. By the mid-‘60s the Lonesome Pine Fiddlers disbanded, and their former members over the years have pursued distinguished careers with other bands including Bill Monroe & his Blue Grass Boys, The Stanley Brothers, Ralph Stanley & the Clinch Mountain Boys, Jimmy Martin & the Sunny Mountain Boys, The Osborne Brothers and The Goins Brothers.