Chubby Wise (1915 to 1996) was the fiddler in Bill Monroe’s Blue Grass Boys when the band cut the 28 Columbia sides of 1946 and 1947 that defined bluegrass. He stood beside Lester Flatt and Earl Scruggs in the lineup fans call the original bluegrass band. He then spent 16 years, 1954 to 1970, as the fiddler for Hank Snow. The International Bluegrass Music Hall of Fame inducted him in 1998.
Why Wise matters
Bluegrass fiddle had to come from somewhere. Before the 1940s, string band fiddlers played dance tunes with a rough, sawing bow. Wise brought a smooth, singing tone and long bow strokes into Monroe’s band. He mixed swing and blues phrasing into breakdowns and waltzes. When Scruggs added the three-finger banjo in late 1945, Wise’s fiddle was the voice that tied the new sound together. Every bluegrass fiddler since has worked from the parts he played on those Columbia records.
Life and career
Robert Russell Wise was born on October 2, 1915. The Bluegrass Music Hall of Fame lists his birthplace as Lake City, Florida. He grew up on a farm and started on banjo and guitar. He took up the fiddle in his early teens, around age 12 or 13. He later said the fiddle bow fit his hand better than plow handles did.
In 1938 he joined the Jubilee Hillbillies in Gainesville, Florida, and stayed with them until 1942. Around this time he met Ervin Rouse, the Florida fiddler who wrote and copyrighted Orange Blossom Special in 1938. Wise claimed for years that he helped write the tune. Rouse’s copyright stands, and other fiddlers who knew both men backed Rouse. What no one disputes is that Wise made the tune famous. He played it week after week on the Grand Ole Opry, and his 1969 recording became the model most fiddlers copy.
Wise joined Bill Monroe’s Blue Grass Boys during World War II. The Hall of Fame dates his first run with Monroe from 1943 to 1948, with a short return in 1949 and 1950. He was in the band when Lester Flatt and Earl Scruggs arrived, and he fiddled on the Columbia sessions of 1946 and 1947. Those 28 songs, including Blue Moon of Kentucky, became the bluegrass canon. In 1947 he also recorded with Hank Williams.
After leaving Monroe in 1948 he worked with Clyde Moody’s Radio Ranch Men. He and Moody wrote Shenandoah Waltz together. The song crossed into pop when bandleader Sammy Kaye recorded it, and that version sold 150,000 copies. Wise worked with Flatt and Scruggs in 1951, then joined Hank Snow’s Rainbow Ranch Boys in 1954. He stayed with Snow until March 1970. Along the way he cut sessions with the York Brothers, Mac Wiseman, and Red Allen.
From 1970 until his death Wise worked as a solo act. He recorded a string of albums for the Stoneway label in the 1970s, then two late albums for Pinecastle in 1994 and 1995. In 1992 he joined the Bass Mountain Boys. He died on January 6, 1996, in Bowie, Maryland, at age 80.
Playing style
Wise played with a long, smooth bow. His tone was rich and round, with a slow vibrato that came from country and pop singing rather than old-time fiddling. He held notes and let them ring where an older fiddler would have chopped them off. That sound gave Monroe’s fast songs a warm top layer over the hard drive of the mandolin and banjo.
He borrowed from western swing and blues. His breaks slid into notes from below and used double stops in thirds and sixths. He was a strong twin fiddle player, and his time with Hank Snow put that harmony sense on hundreds of country records. On Orange Blossom Special he played the train whistle double stops and the long, repeated shuffle that fiddlers still use to close the tune.
Sonny Osborne, who produced one of his records, said Wise wanted to play each tune one time and no more. He would finish a take and say that was the best he could play it. That is the sound on his records: one pass, played with full commitment.
Influences and legacy
Wise came up in Florida string bands and learned from the swing and pop music on the radio. His fiddle partners in the Monroe years included Howdy Forrester, who held the chair before him, and Jim Shumate, who filled in when Wise left. After him came Benny Martin, Vassar Clements, Bobby Hicks, and Kenny Baker. All of them built on the smooth bluegrass fiddle sound he set on the Columbia records.
His long run with Hank Snow put him beside other Nashville fiddlers like Tommy Jackson and Dale Potter. Clyde Moody and Roy Acuff were his peers on the Opry stage. When Michael Cleveland or Jason Carter plays a long, singing double stop under a bluegrass vocal, that is Chubby Wise’s idea.
Signature tunes and songs
Orange Blossom Special Shenandoah Waltz Blue Moon of Kentucky Fiddle Wise Boogie.
Essential recordings
Chubby Wise and the Rainbow Ranch Boys (Starday, 1961) Chubby Plays Bluegrass (Stoneway, 1970) Grassy Fiddle (Stoneway, 1975) Chubby Wise in Nashville (Pinecastle, 1994) An American Original (Pinecastle, 1995)
Awards and honors
International Bluegrass Music Hall of Fame (1998)
Watch and listen
Wise plays Orange Blossom Special live late in his career. Watch the bow arm on the train whistle double stops and the closing shuffle.
An Oklahoma public television segment. Wise tells the story behind the tune, then plays it.
What to learn from Wise
Learn Shenandoah Waltz. It is slow, it sits in a friendly key, and it forces you to work on tone instead of speed. Play the melody with a full bow and hold the long notes without letting them wobble. The technique to steal is his slide into a note from below. Listen to his breaks on the Monroe Columbia sides and copy how he approaches the third of the chord from a half step under it. That one move turns a plain fiddle break into a bluegrass fiddle break.
Sources
Chubby Wise, Bluegrass Music Hall of Fame and Museum Chubby Wise, Wikipedia Bill Monroe, Wikipedia Blue Moon of Kentucky, Wikipedia Orange Blossom Special (song), Wikipedia Ask Sonny Anything: Chubby Wise and his hair lifting fiddle, Bluegrass Today
Related players
See the fiddle players hub and the bluegrass fiddle guide for more on the style Wise helped build. Howdy Forrester held the Monroe fiddle chair before him. Benny Martin, Vassar Clements, and Kenny Baker followed him and carried his smooth sound forward.