There’s not a lot of Delmore Brothers footage out there, but there are some good clips of other folks playing Delmore Brothers songs. Here’s Red Foley taking on one of their later songs: Freight Train Boogie. That’s Grady Martin playing the groovy Bigsby double-neck.

Ethnic stereotypes are on parade in this 1960s commercial, in which hillbilly cartoon characters guzzle caffeinated sugar water and play with firearms. The soundtrack uses the Bascom Lamar Lunsford tune Old Mountain Dew, and one of the characters sure sounds like Grandpa Jones.

Steve Martin’s banjo was more than a stage prop — he was is a solid Scruggs picker who rubbed shoulders with some of the greats. He reminisced rather, rather eloquently, about crossing paths with Doug Dillard in the cat-poem-free literary magazine The Oxford American:

The Dillards boasted the fastest and most thrilling banjoist alive, Doug Dillard. They played live in Orange County in those days, and watching Doug Dillard was like watching God, if God were a finger-picking madman. Doug, thin as a rail, had a grin that Lewis Carroll could describe, like a piano keyboard stuck on the end of a reed. But the sound of the banjo accelerating from zero to sixty in a nanosecond, in a town that had heretofore heard only the lazy folk guitar, made us freeze. Doug was generous, too, and he would teach us various licks (slang for finger and chord sequences).

So here the erstwhile Gern Blanston applies what he learned, dueling with the Muppets.

This 37-minute film from 1965 captures the Dubliners in their native habitat, O’Donoghue’s Pub in Dublin. According to the Irish Film Institute’s website, O’Donoghue’s Opera was the first Irish musical film. The plot loosely follows the trad tune, ‘The Night Before Larry Was Stretched’. Lyrics are below the fold.

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The good Reverend tears it up with a tune that bears more than a superficial resemblance to Scott Joplin’s Maple Leaf Rag. He makes it look so easy…

This is from a newly released compilation of Reverend Gary Davis performances. You can learn more about it here: http://guitarvideos.com/dvd/13111dvd.htm

I think this is the earliest Phil Ochs clip I’ve seen, from a 1965 television appearance. It’s great to see Phil young and in his prime.

Previous Phil Ochs posts:
Phil Ochs sings Cannons of Christianity and I Ain’t Marchin’ Anymore
Phil Ochs interview video (part I)
Phil Ochs interview video, (part II)
Phil Ochs sings Joe Hill
1974 Phil Ochs clip
Phil Ochs singing The War is Over
Phil Ochs singing Here’s to the State of Richard Nixon
Phil Ochs singing The Crucifiction in 1969