Biography
Lee Sexton spent his entire existence in close proximity to Letcher County, KY, where he entered the world in 1927, and he developed unmatched command of drop-thumb banjo technique while also proving adept at two-finger picking. At the age of eight he obtained his initial instrument—a homemade wooden fretless banjo fitted with a groundhog-skin head—for the sum of one dollar after laboring an entire week to clear a field. Guidance from his father and uncles, among them the distinctive and masterful Morgan Sexton, enabled him to quickly attain proficiency on both banjo and fiddle. Throughout his early adulthood he spent weekdays employed in the mines and devoted weekends to performing at house parties, bean stringings, and corn shuckings. June Appal released the traditional-music LP Whoa Mule in 1988 and followed it in 2004 with an expanded CD edition containing forty additional minutes of recordings. Widely admired throughout eastern Kentucky as one of the region’s foremost folk musicians, Sexton appeared briefly in the 1980 film Coal Miner’s Daughter, performing at a square dance. The Kentucky Governor’s Award for Lifetime Achievement in the Arts was bestowed upon him in 1999.