The Ledford String Band

Master fiddler Steve Ledford guided the Ledford String Band after establishing himself among the era’s most prominent players during the 1930s. Born and raised in Bakersville, North Carolina, he captured his initial fiddling contest at nine years old. Together with relatives he performed string-band music at one-room schoolhouses throughout the Roan Mountain area, and the group eventually adopted the name Carolina Ramblers Stringband before relocating to New York in 1931 to appear on local radio broadcasts. The following year they committed twenty titles to the American Record Company, eight of which appeared on Perfect and Romeo. Ledford subsequently returned home, where he married and took up farming. Several years afterward he joined Wade Mainer, and during that association he cut his signature piece “Little Maggie.” Throughout the early 1940s he performed regularly on a Roanoke station alongside Jay Hall and his brother Roy. In 1942 Ledford resumed farming once more; after another interval he assembled a fresh version of the Carolina Ramblers that included his younger brother Wayne and kinsman James Gardner. The ensemble later became known as the Ledford String Band, issuing an album on Rounder in 1971 and a pair of singles on the Roan Mountain imprint.