Charlie Daniels (1936 to 2020) took the fiddle to the top of the pop charts. The Devil Went Down to Georgia reached number three on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1979 and won a Grammy. He started in a bluegrass band in 1953, played on Bob Dylan’s Nashville Skyline in 1969, and led the Charlie Daniels Band from 1972 until his death. The Country Music Hall of Fame inducted him in 2016.
Why Daniels matters
The Devil Went Down to Georgia framed the fiddle as a contest between a young player and the devil, and it sold a fiddle duel to rock radio. No real contest works that way, but the song sent a generation of kids to fiddle lessons. He also kept bluegrass in front of arena crowds through his Volunteer Jam concerts and his 2005 bluegrass gospel album.
Life and career
Daniels was born on October 28, 1936, in Wilmington, North Carolina. He grew up on gospel, local bluegrass bands, and rhythm and blues, and learned fiddle and guitar in high school. In 1953 he joined the bluegrass band the Misty Mountain Boys. In the late 1950s and 1960s he played rock and roll in a band that became the Jaguars.
He moved to Nashville in 1967 and became a session player. He worked on Bob Dylan’s Nashville Skyline in 1969, Ringo Starr’s Beaucoups of Blues in 1970, and Leonard Cohen’s Songs of Love and Hate in 1971, and he recorded with Flatt and Scruggs. His self-titled debut album came out in 1970, and he formed the Charlie Daniels Band in 1972.
Uneasy Rider reached the pop top ten in 1973. Fire on the Mountain went gold in 1974, the same year he held the first Volunteer Jam. In 1979 Million Mile Reflections went triple platinum on the strength of The Devil Went Down to Georgia, which hit number one on the country chart and number three on the Hot 100. The song won CMA Single of the Year in 1979 and a Grammy at the 1980 ceremony, and the band won CMA Instrumental Group of the Year in 1979 and 1980.
Daniels kept recording into his eighties. He turned to gospel with The Door in 1995 and to bluegrass with Songs from the Longleaf Pines in 2005. He joined the Grand Ole Opry on January 19, 2008, and entered the Country Music Hall of Fame in October 2016. He died of a hemorrhagic stroke on July 6, 2020, in Hermitage, Tennessee, at age 83.
Playing style
Daniels played fiddle the way he played guitar: loud, direct, and built for a big room. His shuffle cut through drums and two electric guitars. He favored open-string double stops and drones that made the fiddle sound bigger than it is. In The Devil Went Down to Georgia the fiddle carries both characters, the devil’s slashing lines and Johnny’s clean hoedown breakdown.
He was not a contest player. His fiddle came from bluegrass and honky-tonk, then got plugged in. On the bluegrass album he pulled back, played straight, and let Scruggs and Skaggs set the tone.
Influences and legacy
Daniels learned from the bluegrass and gospel he heard as a boy in North Carolina and from years of Nashville sessions. His Volunteer Jam shows brought Roy Acuff, Stevie Ray Vaughan, and dozens of others onto one stage. For Songs from the Longleaf Pines he recorded with Earl Scruggs, Mac Wiseman, Ricky Skaggs, the Whites, Chris Thile, Rob and Ronnie McCoury, Jason Carter, and Mike Bub. He sang Uncle Pen on stage with Scruggs and Del McCoury.
His biggest legacy for fiddlers is the audience he built. The Devil Went Down to Georgia became a rite of passage for young players.
Signature tunes and songs
The Devil Went Down to Georgia The South’s Gonna Do It Again Uneasy Rider Uncle Pen I’ll Fly Away.
Essential recordings
Fire on the Mountain (1974) Million Mile Reflections (1979) Songs from the Longleaf Pines (Koch, 2005) Night Hawks (2016)
Awards and honors
CMA Single of the Year, The Devil Went Down to Georgia (1979) CMA Instrumental Group of the Year, the Charlie Daniels Band (1979, 1980) Grammy Award, Best Country Vocal Performance by a Duo or Group, The Devil Went Down to Georgia (1980) North Carolina Music Hall of Fame (1999) BMI Icon Award (2005) Grand Ole Opry member (2008) Musicians Hall of Fame and Museum (2009) Country Music Hall of Fame (2016)
Watch and listen
The Charlie Daniels Band plays The Devil Went Down to Georgia live in 2005. Watch him switch between the devil’s part and Johnny’s part.
What to learn from Daniels
Learn Johnny’s break from The Devil Went Down to Georgia. It is a hoedown built on open-string double stops, and every crowd knows it. Get it clean before you get it fast. The technique to steal is his volume. Daniels dug the bow into the string and played open double stops to fill a room. In a loud jam, lean on the open strings and let the bow do the work. A fiddle that can be heard over a banjo gets asked to take the next break.
Sources
Charlie Daniels, Wikipedia Charlie Daniels, Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum Charlie Daniels, Grammy Awards Charlie Daniels passes after suffering stroke, Bluegrass Today The Devil Went Down to Georgia, Wikipedia Songs from the Longleaf Pines, Wikipedia
Related players
See the fiddle players hub and the fiddle guide for more crossover fiddlers. Roy Acuff played Daniels’s Volunteer Jam, and Jason Carter played on his bluegrass album. For the swing side of electric fiddle, see Bob Wills and Johnny Gimble. Vassar Clements brought a similar rock crowd to the fiddle with Old and In the Way.