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 When you listen to Fiddlin' John Carson's version of "Little Old Log Cabin in the Lane," you are hearing a major document of country music history. Its recording in June, 1923 unexpectedly sold thousands of copies, and marked the commercial beginning of what is now called "country music." Prior to this time, the record industry had been profoundly urban-based and urban-oriented. No recording company had attempted to tap into America's rural music, and none had demonstrated any recognition that a market existed for such music. The occasional examples of "rube humor," or of old-time music that had been issued on recordings or had been displayed on the vaudeville stage, were invariably offered by city interpreters. Carson called forth an audience of farmers, factory hands, and blue-collar workers who showed that they wanted a music that reflected their own interests and, most profoundly, one that was represented by people like themselves.
The entertainment industry eventually discovered that still another audience was receptive to rural music in the '20s--those city-dwellers who were dissatisfied with jazz and other popular genres, and who wanted a reminder of old-time village styles and values. The musicians who made this newly emergent form of homespun music were mostly working people who were never able to leave their day jobs. These farmers, miners, millhands, mechanics, carpenters, sawyers, railroadmen--and an occasional country lawyer, doctor, or preacher--made music when they could. Some, like Carson and Gid Tanner, were well-known participants at fiddle contests; others played at house parties, church socials, fish fries, political rallies, and other community events; and a few, like Charlie Poole, already had some professional experience playing for medicine shows, tent repertoire productions, or in southern vaudeville houses. But the idea of a full-time career in music was a romantic dream that few believed could be consummated.
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