Jimmie Skinner - Doin' My Time (Blue Grass Special 45-EP-604), 1961
Jimmie Skinner was an artist of his own. Neither strictly bluegrass, neither mainstream country, Skinner developed his very own sound. Bear Family once said, if the term "alternative country" had been already invented in the 1950s, Skinner would have fitted it 100 percent. Although Skinner was not part of the Nashville establishment, he graced the world with a few classic, like "Doin' My Time". This song has been covered numerous times, including both well-known and obscure versions by Flatt & Scruggs, Johnny Cash, Jeff Johnson, Red Allen, Sherwin Linton, Bill Flagg, Jimmy Martin and others.
James "Jimmie" Skinner was born on April 27, 1909, in Blue Lick, Kentucky, near the town of Berea to William and Emma Skinner. When Skinner was a teenager, the family moved to Hamilton, Ohio, where he began performing on local radio and with his mother and grandmother on the streets. By the early 1930s, Skinner had become an accomplished musician, deeply rooted in the traditional mountain folk music of Kentucky and Ohio. With his older brother Esmer, who was born in 1906, he auditioned unsuccessfully at Gennett Records in 1931.
The brothers tried again in 1941 with the folks at Bluebird to no avail. Skinner had his first success as a songwriter in 1946, when Ernest Tubb recorded his "Let's Say Goodbye (Like We Said Hello)". Afterwards, Skinner's career really took off. He began recording for Red Barn Records in 1947, having two singles released on the small independent label, then signed a management contract with Lou Epstein and switched to Radio Artists Records, the E. T. Herzog Studio in-house label from Cincinnati. This association provided Skinner with his first success, a cover of Jimmy Work's "Tennessee Border". In those years, Skinner was often accompanied on record by his brother Esmer on fiddle or banjo and Ray Lunsford on electric mandolin, which gave many tracks a distinct bluegrass feel. It was a sparse line-up that melted with Skinner's recognizable voice into a sound of its own.
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| Jimmie Skinner, 1950s |
In the early 1950s, Skinner opened the Jimmie Skinner Music Center, a mail-order and retail record story in Cincinnati. The store was heavily advertised on the powerhouse WCKY radio station and Skinner also hosted a rad show out of his shop that was carried by WNOP from Newport, Kentucky. In 1950, Skinner signed with Capitol Records and switched to Decca in 1953. His most successful phase began when he began recording for Mercury in 1956, scoring such hits as "Will You Be Satisfied That Way", "Dark Hollow", and "I Found My Girl in the U.S.A.". He made another change when he joined Starday Records' roster in 1963.
In the early 1960s, Skinner produced some mail-order EPs on his Blue Grass Special label, including today's selection. These sides were recorded at the King Recording Studio in Cincinnati with Rusty York and the Kentucky Mountain Boys, including Willard Hole, Curley Tuttle, Harold Kress on fiddle, and Billy Thomas on bass.
In 1963, Skinner's manager Epstein died, which led to a downfall of his career. He resurrected it by becoming a regular on bluegrass festivals and continued to record for small labels, including Rich-R-Tone. Skinner moved to Nashville in 1974 and passed away on October 28, 1979, at the age of 70 years.
Recommended reading
Sources
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