JA-064C (Uncle Charlie Osbourne - "100 Years Farther On" - Cassette)
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Charles Nelson Osborne, (December 26, 1890 – May 27, 1992), affectionately known as "Uncle Charlie," was a musician in the Appalachian Mountains of southwest Virginia. He was born in what is now known as Cowan Osborne Hollow, named for his father, in Copper Creek, Virginia. He was regionally famous from the time he was about 15 until his death at age 101 in 1992. Charlie had a unique style of playing the fiddle with his left hand, on a right-handed fiddle. He and his brother, Emmett Osborne, played on WOPI radio station in Bristol, Tennessee, from the early 1920s until the early 1930s. They were contemporaries of country music founders Jimmie Rodgers and the Carter Family, and occasionally gave advice to Tennessee Ernie Ford on his music. Uncle Charlie played numerous shows at the Carter Family Fold in Scott County, Virginia, a theatre showcasing traditional music ran by Janette Carter, one of the daughters of the original Carter Family. On one occasion, Johnny Cash was Uncle Charlie's "opening act". He was a regular performer at Mountain Empire Community College's annual Home Craft Days festivals from 1985 until his death. Other performances included the Brandywine Festival, Appalshop's Seedtime on the Cumberland festival and a campaign rally for Jesse Jackson in Hazard, KY. n 1985, in conjunction with East Tennessee State University, Appalshop's June Appal Recordings recorded Uncle Charlie's first album, "Relics And Treasures". The album contained over a dozen traditional mountain songs, including "Ida Red", "Brown's Dream", and "Old Joe Clark". Uncle Charlie recorded two more albums with the label; his final was 1991's "One Hundred Years Farther On", which included the powerful and mournful mountain gospel song "Farther On," which Uncle Charlie called "As We Travel Through The Desert". Also featured on the recordings were his son, Johnny C. Osborne, on clawhammer banjo, and Tommy Bledsoe, on guitar and banjo. These recordings were reissued by June Appal Recordings as "Uncle Charlie Osborne: The June Appal Recordings."
Recordings for JA0064, 100 Years Farther On, were made by Doug Dorschug on September 10, 1990 at the Osborne home in Russell County, Virginia on a TCD-DI0 Pro Sony Digital Audio Tape Recorder. "Farther On" was recorded in 1987 at the Osborne home on a Sony portable cassette deck by Tommy Ray Bledsoe. "No Place Like Home" was recorded in 1984 at Minor Blue Studio in Gate City, Virginia with engineer Larry Gillenwater. The final release was mixed and edited by Doug Dorschug and Tommy Ray Bledsoe, and produced by Tommy Ray Bledsoe. Musicians included Charlie Nelson Osborne on fiddle and vocals, Johnny Cowan Osborne on banjo, and Tommy Ray Bledsoe on guitar and banjo. JA0064, 100 Years Farther On, was reissued in 2009 along with his 1985 release JA0049, Relics and Treasure, on the June Appal Recordings double album Uncle Charlie Osborne: The June Appal Recordings.
This audio collection consists of ¼-inch production masters, preservation DVD-R, and preservation CD-R access copies.