On This Day in 1930, Jimmie Rodgers Recorded “Blue Yodel No. 9” with an Uncredited Louis Armstrong on Trumpet

On this day (July 16), in 1930, Jimmie Rodgers recorded “Blue Yodel No. 9” also called “Standing on the Corner.” The Father of Country Music enlisted some legendary musicians on the track. However, at the time, they went uncredited due to contractual obligations.

Rodgers is hailed as the Father of Country Music. He was among the artists who attended the seminal Bristol Sessions, led by Ralph Peer for the Victor Talking Machine Company in Bristol, Tennessee in 1927. Rodgers recorded “Sleep, Baby Sleep” and “The Soldier’s Sweetheart” during the session. The sales of those songs led to many more sessions with Victor including a series of Blue Yodels, his most popular songs. In total, he recorded 13 Blue Yodels before his untimely death due to complications of tuberculosis in May 1933.

[RELATED: On This Day in 1933 Jimmie Rodgers, the Father of Country Music, Recorded His Final Songs]

Jimmie Rodgers Records “Blue Yodel No. 9”

While Jimmie Rodgers is hailed as the father of country music, he was at his core, a blues singer. Over the years, he learned to sing and play the blues from several Black musicians as he traveled the country as a brakeman on the railroad. His blues influences are especially clear in the series of Blue Yodels which were a combination of blues and Hillbilly Music, an early moniker for and form of country music.

Rodgers decided to record “Blue Yodel No. 9” on a whim while in Los Angeles, California on July 16, 1930. He enlisted the legendary Louis Armstrong to play trumpet on the record. His wife, Lil Hardin Armstrong, played piano on the recording. However, neither artists were credited on the original pressing of the song because Armstrong was under contract with Okeh Records. Rodgers, on the other hand, recorded for Victor.

Decades after recording the song with Rodgers, Armstrong played it on The Johnny Cash Show with the program’s host. Before they performed the song, he recalled how the legendary recording session came to be.

“I had been knowin’ Jimmie for a long time and following his music,” Armstrong told Cash. “After meeting one morning, Jimmie said, ‘Man, I feel like singing some blues.’ I said, ‘Okay, daddy, you sing some blues and I’m gonna blow behind you.’ And that’s how the record started,” he recalled.

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