Riley Puckett- I Wished I Was Single Again-1925

Riley Puckett was born near Atlanta, Georgia in 1894. He was blinded as a young boy when a doctor, treating a minor eye infection, used too much of a lead based medicine. As a teen he learned the banjo and guitar. After graduating from the Georgia Academy for the Blind in 1912, he moved to Atlanta to become a professional musician. He attended fiddlers conventions and played on the streets of Atlanta for coins. In 1922, he got his big break and national exposure when he played with fiddler Clayton McMichen on powerful WSB, 750 in Atlanta which could be heard from Maine to the Rockies in the days of clear channel radio. In 1923 he teamed with fiddler Gid Tanner and in 1924 they travelled to New York to record duets for Columbia Records. Riley was the first singer to yodel on a recording, beating Jimmie Rodgers, the cowboy superstar, by three years. In 1926, Tanner and Puckett, along with McMichen, Lafayette Norris and Bert Layne began recording and performing as the Skillet Lickers. After the Skillet Lickers broke up in '34, Tanner went back to chicken farming but Puckett struck out on his own during the 30s and 40s playing banjo and guitar. He made personal appearances and managed his own tent show travelling throughout the midwest, Texas, and the deep south. In '45 he was a regular on the Tennessee Barn Dance broadcast over WNOX in Knoxville, Tennessee and also recorded for RCA Victor and Decca during the 1940s. He died an untimely death in 1946 from a minor infection that turned into blood poisoning.

Category:

Music

Tags:

• Riley
• Puckett
• Wished
• Was
• Single
• Again
• 1920s
• 1930s
• Appalachian
• Hillbilly
• 78s
• Skillet
• Lickers
• Clayton
• McMichen
• Gid
• Tanner

[wandafoster]

this is so cool!!! thanks for posting~

[preservationhall01]

@wandafoster Quite welcome-I hope you enjoyed this little offering.

[fscofi]

Absolutely the best I have seen in some time. Great work.

[preservationhall01]

Thanks for your kind comment.

[TorontoEd7]

Wow, nice video and song. Thanks for your extensive educational comments. How in the world do you know so much about these people 80-90 yrs ago!

[preservationhall01]

Thanks again for visiting, Ed.

[wandafoster]

Wonderful ...I told my 85 year old mother about this and she said that her father used to little to Riley on the victorolla ......

[caley956]

Thanks so much for posting this - Ed. It's incredible how these songs travelled even before the Internet - Highway Patrolman Frank Quinn's version somehow got over to Leicestershire in the UK and turned up at a pub session in Husbands Bosworth in the 1960s. John Tams heard it, learned it, recorded it - and off we go again!

[fscofi]

Your welcome.

[preservationhall01]

Thanks Idaho!