Customer Reviews

The Carter Family - Will the Circle Be Unbroken

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(6)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

THE CARTER FAMILY: WILL THE CIRCLE BE UNBROKEN is an interesting DVD documentary from PBS, but it really could have easily been made better. As it is, it is still the only documentary available on DVD, and it is quite interesting.

It fits well as a companion piece to the book WILL YOU MISS ME WHEN I'M GONE? by Mark Zwonitzer and Charles Hirshberg. Zwonitzer appears frequently throughout this DVD.

This DVD is about 50 minutes long, with about 19 minutes of bonus material. They use actors to recreate some scenes, but they should have marked these scenes as "recreations." Too often they show old, generic footage, or recreations, without captioning it as stock footage or recreations. If you didn't know better, you might think you were seeing the actual, original Carter Family in action, but you're not.

There is NO actual moving pictures of the original Carter Family on the DVD, though Maybelle and Sara appear too briefly in b/w TV and moving film footage, presumably from the 1950's (Maybelle on TV, playing some of "Wildwood Flower") and in the 1960s, (Sara and Maybelle, elderly but still sounding great, standing around outside, playing "Sweet Fern" for the camera, appearing as the credits rollover the picture at the end of the DVD).

It is really frustrating that they did not include these two songs as DVD bonuses, in a COMPLETE song version! Especially since the rest of the DVD uses only still photos of the three original Carter Family members.

The DVD explains a lot about their lives before the music business, the formation of the group, and the business and cultural circumstances of their influential careers! I watched this DVD after finishing my reading of the book WILL YOU MISS ME WHEN I'M GONE? and I very much enjoyed what is on this DVD. I just wish they had shared more of the live action footage that they had access to!

There are many still photos shown of A.P., Sara, and Maybelle which I had not seen before. The best quality photos come from an aborted LIFE MAGAZINE photo shoot for a cover story, which potentially would have boosted their careers, but was ill-timed and got bumped when the Japanese invaded Pearl Harbor, and so the Carter story got pulled out, and was unfortunately never ran later!

The DVD tells the story of the strained marriage of A.P. and Sara, with a little more weight than what we are perhaps used to in 2006. I grew up in a family shattered by divorce, and I take too much of that grief for granted, maybe most of the Western culture does, since it seems to have happened to nearly everybody's family. Perhaps we really should recognize A.P. and Sara's failed marriage as the family tragedy that it is, but it does sound strange to hear the divorce described as some huge tragedy unique to this very famous family. It is as if the music business chores destroyed their marriage, and A.P. could never had guessed the incredibly high price he would pay, with his broken marriage, to establish and maintain the Carter Family career.

Sara Carter comes off as one of the earliest "feminists" in the entertainment industry. They showcase a recreation of them recording "Single Girl, Married Girl," their first big hit, which has lyrics that envy the "freedom" of a single woman who can go have fun, while lamenting the responsibilties of a married mother and wife who envies the single girl. I don't applaud this sentiment, nor do I agree with it, but this is a fact that this was their first big hit, and an early feminist "anthem" of sorts, back in the late 1920's.

The DVD later shows how Sara pitches her marriage to an angry and unresponsive A.P., to have an affair with her husband's cousing, Coy Bayes, whom she would eventually marry, many lonely years later. A true family tragedy, yet all too common today. I wish it were a unique situation, but I grew up with that kind of situation in my parents marriage, too. It is heartbreaking.

The DVD extras last about 19 minutes and show people talking about Maybelle's guitar and her guitar playing techniques. They also show The Carter Fold, which is a weekly musical showcase hosted by the daughter of A.P. which is still going on today! Check it out!

If you are a serious Carter Family fan, then you will be happy to see this documentary, but you will likely wonder why they did not max out the possibilities when they had some really rare, great footage that went so underused in the final cut.

Besides the biography book, WILL YOU MISS ME WHEN I'M GONE?, I can also highly recommend the CD collections from JSP Records, THE CARTER FAMILY 1927-1934, and THE CARTER FAMILY 1935-1941, which are the best and most comprehensive CD collections currently in print and available on amazon.com; VERY REASONABLY PRICED at about $25 per 5 CD set (which is about $5 per CD). Both sets feature 5 CDs that are completely loaded with just about every thing that the original Carter Family recorded in the studio during their 15 year career. These CDs sound pretty good (allowing for how PRIMITIVE these 80 year old original recordings are, from the dawn of the music industry as we know it), and they are the easiest way to get nearly all the Carter Family's music quickly (and before these go out of print, too, so hurry up and get yours).

I actually give this 3.5 stars, but I am rounding up for effort.

This is a good companion video to the book Will You Miss Me When I'm Gone?, the definitive Carter Family biography. I can't think of anything from the program that isn't covered in the book. There is the added element of direct comments from various musicians and writers about the Carter Family, including Jeanette and Joe Carter, two of A.P. and Sara's children. Mark Zwonitzer, co-author of the book, is also featured quite extensively in the program. With a running time of one hour, the program really only gives the Cliff Notes version of the Carter Family story.

As another reviewer pointed out, the focus is on A.P. and Sara's relationship and less on Maybelle Carter's contribution. I understand the feeling -- Maybelle would merit a documentary all her own -- but we wouldn't have had the Carter Family were it not for A.P. and Sara. All stories have a beginning.

We are treated to a clip of Maybelle performing "Wildwood Flower" for a TV program sometime in the 50s. This is somewhat marred by the voiceovers the director chose to place during the scene. The clip is repeated with fewer distractions on one of the disc's supplements, but it would have been nice to have it in its uninterrupted entirety. There is also some footage of Maybelle and Sara performing together in the 60s at the end of the program.

Extras include footage from the Country Music Hall of Fame induction ceremony for Maybelle's guitar and a small bit about her playing technique (which is covered in the main program), a very brief history of the guitar in American music, and a short piece about the Carter Family Fold, the museum and performance space that continues to exist today.

All in all, it was an interesting program to watch, but I couldn't shake the feeling that it could have been more. Perhaps this will open the door for a more extensive documentary in the future. Also, with the success of Walk the Line, could a feature film of the Carter Family be close behind?

I would have given this five stars if it weren't for not enough coverage of Maybelle Carter's contribution to country music, especially her (at the time) innovative method of playing the guitar so that it sounded like two guitars. After the Carter Family broke up circa 1943, she toured with her three daughters as "Mother" Maybelle Carter and was sought for counsel for decades afterward. She was also the centerpiece of the Nitty Gritty Dirt Bands 1971 recording "Will the Circle be Unbroken".

A lot of the DVD focuses on A.P. and Sara's marital woes, neither of whom, in my estimation, contributed as much to country music as Maybelle.

This is a good history, however, for country music history enthusiasts.

The Carters, along with Jimmy Rodgers, are the true heroes of pure country music. The so called evolution into the electrified contemporary offerings by sequined faux country performers is comparable to the moving of melodious music into acid rock.

Music by the Carter Family deserves to be in the collection of anyone who values our heritage.

My main complaint about this documentary is that it is simply too short and therefore incomplete. You get an introduction to the members of the original trio and the highlights of their successes as well as the principle strains in A.P. and Sara's marriage, and a bit about Maybelle's importance as a guitarist, but in the end it is barely an introduction. The show ends up feeling more like a rough outline of the Carter Family story than something that is anyway comprehensive. Watching it made me wish that Ken Burns would make his next major project a 15 hour documentary on American roots music. Wouldn't that be something to watch?

What there is in the documentary is good, but there just isn't enough of it. I wish they had made this at least a two-hour documentary. There was just no time to get to any of the good stuff, such as the larger place that their music played in American life. For instance, the Carters did virtually no performing across the country. Unlike Jimmie Rodgers, who embarked on long tours throughout the U.S., what little performing the Carters did was done in their local community. They were more likely to sing at a church social than across the state line. They did very little performing on radio or elsewhere. As artists, their careers were almost exclusively restricted to recordings.

Now, I'm not saying that what they actually dealt with on the show was wrong, but that there simply wasn't time to deal with everything that needed to be addressed. Sometimes less really is less. So while this is worth watching, it really just scratches the surface of the role that the Carter Family played in American popular culture. But it is an OK place to start.

There is a slight inaccuracy that one of the contributors to the documentary, Barry Mazor, could have corrected. As he points out in his recent (and highly recommended) book, MEETING JIMMIE RODGERS, the Original Carter Family did not perform for the last time in 1943, as is often repeated, but in 1953 at the unveiling of the Jimmie Rodgers memorial in Meridian, Mississippi. Among the many performers who assembled to honor the Singing Brakeman were the extended Carter Family, including A.P., Sara, and Maybelle. As Mazor recounts, A.P. "ruefully" remarked that many there might have forgotten the original Carter Family name, as they proceeded to perform several songs together.

Nice DVD to own for a rare insight into the Carter Family. Not the best or longest, but it's all we have. Go get it.

It is an outstanding collection. You have this one you have it all records and photos of the Carter Family.

THIS IS A GREAT DOCUMENTARY DVD ABOUT THE CARTER FAMILY AROUND THE LATE 1920'S AND THE 1930'S AND LATER. THE CARTER FAMILY CONSISTS OF A.P.CARTER, HIS WIFE SARA, AND SARA'S COUSIN MAYBELLE. THEY ARE FROM "POOR VALLEY" NEAR "CLINCH" MOUNTAIN IN VIRGINIA, NEAR THE TENNESSEE BORDOR. During August, 1927, a Mr.Pierce (a talent scout from the Victor Talking Machine Company) set up a "make-shift" recording studio in Bristol, Tenn. He was auditioning musicians from the region, so he could select some musicians for record contracts. The Carter Family auditioned, and were granted a record deal. Also, around this time period, Jimmie Rodgers (from Meridian, Miss.) auditioned and was selected also. These early (late 1920's) Bristol, Tenn. recording sessions of the Carter Family and Jimmie Rodgers became known as the "BIG BANG" or the "Foundation" of Country Music!!!

THE CARTER FAMILY BECAME THE "FIRST FAMILY OF COUNTRY MUSIC" AND JIMMIE RODGERS BECAMDE THE "FATHER OF COUNTRY MUSIC"!!!!

THIS DVD CONTAINS COMENTARIES FROM MARTY STUART, GILLIAN WELCH, JOAN BAEZ, AND OTHERS INCLUDING FAMILY MEMBERS.

CARTER FAMILY MUSIC IS PLAYED DURING MOST OR AT LEAST SOME OF THE DVD!

THIS DVD IS EXCELLENT ARCHIVAL "AMERICAN ROOTS" MUSIC MATERIAL!!! THE CARTER FAMILY ALONG WITH JIMMIE RODGERS LAID THE FOUNDATION FOR THE GENRE OF COUNTRY MUSIC!

THE CARTER FAMILY ARE FAMOUS FOR SUCH SONGS AS "KEEP ON THE SUNNY SIDE", "WILL THE CIRCLE BE UNBROKEN", "WILDWOOD FLOWER", "WORRIED MAN BLUES" AND "NO DEPRESSION IN HEAVEN". THEY DREW UPON FOLK MUSIC THEY SAW PERFORMED IN AND AROUND THE APPALACHIA REGION. THEIR MUSIC WAS VERY POPULAR DURING THE GREAT DEPRESSION OF THE 1930'S. RAIDO STATIONS LOVED PLAYING THEIR MUSIC AROUND THIS PERIOD OF TIME.

The record company was paying $50.00 per record that the Carter Family could come up with. So, A.P. teamed up with a black man and they traveled throughout the Appalachia regions searching out folk songs for A.P. to perfect and to record as the Carter Family for the record company.
A.P. would write down the words and the black man would remember the tune or the rhythm of the song. Then A.P. would "refine" and "re-work" the song and put it in writing. This resulted in 100's of songs with the Carter Family name and copyright on them.


THIS DVD CONTAINS SOME OF THE OLD FOOTAGE AND PICTURES OF THE CARTER FAMILY TRIO, BUT NOT VERY MUCH. HOWEVER, THE FOOTAGE THAT IS IN THE DVD IS GREAT ARCHIVAL MATERIAL. IT DOES CONTAIN SOME GOOD AUDIO RECORDINGS OF THE CARTER FAMILY. YOU DO GET FOOTAGE OF MATERIAL TO BACKUP THE DOCUMENTARY STORY! THE DVD CONTAINS EXCELLENT RE-CREATED FOOTAGE DEPICTING THE CARTER FAMILY PERFORMING AND RE-CREATED FOOTAGE TO BACKUP SOME OF THE DOCUMENTARY STORIES. IT HAS EXCELLENT SCENERY OF THE APPALACHIA REGION, CLINCH MOUNTAIN AND "POOR VALLEY".

YOU GET A STORY OF THEIR LIFE, WHICH INCLUDED HARDSHIPS LIKE OTHER FAMILIES. A.P. CARTER'S WIFE LEFT HIM AND MOVED TO CALIFORNIA WITH A.P.'S COUSIN. HOWEVER, SHE DID RETURN TO SING AND RECORD WITH A.P. AND MAYBELLE, BECAUSE THEIR MUSIC WAS IN SUCH HIGH DEMAND!!! SARE EVEN ENDED UP BEING BURIED IN THE SAME CEMETERY AS A.P. ONLY 2 ROWS AWAY. A.P. AND SARA HAD SEVERAL CHILDREN. SOME ARE INTERVIEWED IN THIS DVD.

MOTHER MAYBELLE (ORIGINALLY MAYBELLE ADDINGTON) MARRIED A CARTER MAN (ONE OF A.P.'S COUSINS), AND BECAME MAYBELLE CARTER. SHE CONTINUED THE TRADITON OF THE CARTER FAMILY WITH HER AND HER DAUGHTERS (THE MOST FAMOUS ONE BEING JUNE CARTER WHO MARRIED JOHNNY CASH).

THERE IS GREAT BONUS MATERIAL, WHICH INCLUDES: THE CARTER SCRATCH (THIS IS MOTHER MAYBELLE'S UNIQUE GUITAR PLAYING STYLE), AND MOTHER MAYBELE'S GUITAR (THIS GUITAR IS ON DISPLAY AT THE COUNTRY MUSIC HALL OF FAME - I'VE SEEN IT!). THE GUITAR IN AMERICAN MUSIC, AND THE CARTER FAMILY FOLD - A WHOLESOME FAMILY EXPERIENCE. THERE IS A NEAR COMPLETE PERFORMANCE OF MAYBELLE CARTER PERFORMING AND PLAYING HER GUITAR IN THIS BONUS MATERIAL.

OVERALL, THIS IS GREAT "AMERICAN ROOTS" AND GREAT "AMERICAN MUSIC" ARCHIVAL MATERIAL!!! IF YOU'RE INTO THIS KINDA STUFF, THEN I THINK YOU'LL LIKE THIS DVD, JUST DON'T EXPECT SOME GREAT PERFORMANCE VIDEO, BECAUSE IT ONLY HAS LIMITED AMOUNTS. IN THIS CONTEXT, I DO HIGHLY RECOMMEND THIS DVD!!! I LOVE "AMERICAN MUSIC" HISTORY!!!

I have reviewed the various CD'd put out by the Carter Family, that is work of the original grouping of A.P., Sara and Maybelle, elsewhere in this space. Many of the thoughts expressed there apply here, as well. The recent, now somewhat eclipsed, interest in the mountain music of the 1920's and 30's highlighted in such films as The Song Catcher and Brother, Where Art Thou, of necessity, had to create a renewed interest in the Carter Family. Why? Not taking the influence of that family's musical shaping of mountain music is like neglecting the influence of Bob Dylan on the folk music revival of the 1960's. I suppose it can be done but a big hole is left in the landscape.

What this PBS production has done, and done well, is put the music of the Carters in perspective as it relates to their time, their religious sentiments and their roots in the seemingly simple mountain lifestyle. Is there any simpler harmony than Will the Circle Be Unbroken? Nevertheless, these gentle mountain folk were as driven to success, especially A.P, as any urbanite of the time. Moreover, they seem, and here again A.P. is the example, to have had as many interpersonal problems (in short, marital difficulties) as us city folk.

I have mentioned elsewhere, and it bears repeating here, that this fundamentalist religious sentiment expressed throughout their work does not have that same razor-edged feel that we find with today's evangelicals. This is a very personal kind of religious expression. These people took their beating during the Scopes Trial era and turned inward. Fair enough. That they also produced some very simple and interesting music is the product of that withdrawal. Listen.