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"Aunt" Samantha Bumgarner (October 31, 1878 - December 24, 1960) was an American early country and folk music performer and singer from Dillsboro, North Carolina. She won much praise for her work with the fiddle and banjo. In 1924, accompanied by guitarist Eva Davis, she traveled to
New York City New York, often called New York City (NYC), is the most populous city in the United States, located at the southern tip of New York State on one of the world's largest natural harbors. The city comprises five boroughs, each coextensive w ...
and recorded about a dozen songs for Columbia Records.Country: The Music and Musicians, The Country Music Foundation, New York, , page 320. The recordings are also notable for being the first use of a 5-string banjo on a recording. She was a yearly staple at
Bascom Lamar Lunsford Bascom Lamar Lunsford (March 21, 1882 – September 4, 1973) was a folklorist, performer of traditional Appalachian music, and lawyer from western North Carolina. He was often known by the nickname "Minstrel of the Appalachians". Biography ...
's Mountain Dance and Folk Festival from 1928 until shortly before her death. Folksinger
Pete Seeger Peter Seeger (May 3, 1919 – January 27, 2014) was an American singer, songwriter, musician, and social activist. He was a fixture on nationwide radio in the 1940s and had a string of hit records in the early 1950s as a member of The Weav ...
attended Lunsford's festival in 1935 at the age of 16 in the company of his father, musicologist and composer Charles Seeger, then working for the music division of the WPA, and his stepmother, noted modernist composer Ruth Crawford Seeger, and would have heard Bumgarner perform there. Seeger has credited Bumgarner as his inspiration for wanting to learn the five-string banjo. "He learned (he says) to play the banjo after first hearing one played by a mountain girl named Samantha Bumgarten ic��came from the Great Smokies"


Royal command performance

Bumgarner was also among the artists Lunsford assembled to play before
George VI George VI (Albert Frederick Arthur George; 14 December 1895 – 6 February 1952) was King of the United Kingdom and the Dominions of the British Commonwealth from 11 December 1936 until Death and state funeral of George VI, his death in 1952 ...
and Queen Elizabeth of England in June 1939 at the invitation of President and Mrs. Roosevelt at a
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concert of American music arranged by Charles Seeger and Adrian Dornbush (of the WPA) for the benefit of the first visit by a reigning British monarch and his consort on American soil. Among the other (racially integrated) performers were American concert artists Marian Anderson,
Lawrence Tibbett Lawrence Mervil Tibbett (November 16, 1896 – July 15, 1960) was an American opera singer and recording artist who also performed as a film actor and radio personality. A baritone with large, deep, and dark-timbred voice. His dynamic range (in ...
, and Kate Smith, singing classical and light popular music; and folk performers Lily May Ledford and the Coon Creek Girls; Josh White; the Golden Gate Quartet; Sam Queen and the Soco Gap Square Dance Team, who demonstrated clog dancing; and Alan Lomax, singing cowboy songs. According to Judith Tick, Professor of Music at Northeastern University, "It was a singular moment of glory for the Washington WPA folklorists."Judith Tick, ''Ruth Crawford Seeger: A Composer's Search for American Music'' (Oxford University Press, 1997), p. 257.


First female Country recording artist

Bumgarner and her friend, Eva Davis, recorded the same year as another female country singer, Roba Stanley.Women in early Country Music: A Tribute to the First Female Recording Artists
Stanley, whose recordings were made in July, 1924, is believed by many to have been the first female to record country music, but Bumgarner and Davis' recordings were made three months earlier, in April. The pair recorded both in duet and as singer and accompanist and thus qualify for the distinction of having been the first female country solo recording artists.


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{{DEFAULTSORT:Bumgarner, Samantha 1878 births 1960 deaths American women country singers American country singer-songwriters Old-time musicians Singer-songwriters from North Carolina People from Jackson County, North Carolina 20th-century American singer-songwriters American fiddlers American women violinists 20th-century American violinists 20th-century American women singers 20th-century American singers Country musicians from North Carolina