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Archive Files of Cajun, Creole, and Zydeco Musicians |
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The Hackberry Ramblers |
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More historical information on the Hackberry Ramblers is available in chapters by Ben Sandmel and by Luderin Darbone in Accordions, Fiddles, Two Step and Swing: A Cajun Music Reader, ed. Ryan A. Brasseaux and Kevin S. Fontenot, published by the Center for Louisiana Studies, 2006.
Luderin Darbone died Friday,
November 21, 2008, at Calcasieu-Cameron Hospital in Sulphur,
Louisiana. With his passing, Southwest Louisiana and the world
beyond have lost perhaps the last direct link to an era when
performing meant driving for hours on a gravel road to travel
thirty miles to arrive at a dance hall where the band's new
amplified sound system had to be powered by Darbone's 1931 Ford.
Darbone reminisced about those times when he performed at
Festival International de Louisiane in 2008 with the Lost Bayou
Rambers (the next week he was at the New Orleans Jazz Festival,
his last performance). He needed assistance from his son to be
seated, but once he began playing the joy and vitality that the
Hackberry Ramblers brought to every performance since 1933 came
alive as strong as ever. Edwin Duhon, 1911-2006 Edwin Duhon, co-founder of The Hackberry
Ramblers, passed away on Sunday, February 26, 2006. He was 95.
In 1933, Duhon formed The Hackberry Ramblers along with fiddler
Luderin Darbone, who survives him. Initially, Duhon played
acoustic guitar; he went on to play electric guitar, piano,
upright bass, harmonica, and accordion, at various times,
focusing solely on the accordion in the mid-1990s. Duhon's last
performance was in November, 2005, at the Shaw Center for the
Arts in Baton Rouge. Although quite ill, he gave it one hundred
percent, as always. |
 Luderin Darbone, born 1913 in the town of Evangeline, is pictured at top during a performance at the Liberty Theater. Edwin Duhon, born in 1910 in Broussard, is shown next when the band played at the 2000 Festival International de Louisiane in Lafayette. Beneath that picture, members of the band are shown at Festivals Acadiens in 1999, and at the Liberty: Edwin Duhon, Darbone, Ben Sandmel, Glen Croker, and the late Johnny Faulk. At the time of his death Oct. 17, 2004, Faulk had played with the Hackberry Ramblers for 25 years. |
Click here for photos of a performance Feb. 8, 2003, at the Liberty Theater while being filmed for a segment on NBC's Today Show and for an update on some of the group's activities.
Luderin Darbone was born in Evangeline in 1913 but spent much of his childhood in East
Texas. He learned to play the violin from a correspondence course ordered for him by
his mother. As a teenager, Darbone began attending house parties where he picked up tunes
from musicians whom he describes in an interview with Ann Savoy as "hillbilly
fiddlers." Darbone met Edwin Duhon, who played Cajun music on the accordion, when his
family moved to Hackberry, a small town south of Sulphur and Lake Charles. Together they
formed the Hackberry Ramblers in 1933, playing dances but also performing on radio
broadcasts. Darbone ordered an amplifier for the band, an innovation that other bands in
the region soon copied. To play at country dances, Darbone would hook the amplifier to a
generator powered by his 1931 Ford. The amplification was especially helpful in
carrying the sounds of the fiddle, enhancing the appeal of the band's blend of Cajun and
western swing music which included songs in both French and English. The band's 1936
recording of "Jolie Blonde" became a hit (the first recording of the song under
that title), followed by other hit recordings of songs like "Une Piastre Ici, une
Piastre Là-bas" and "Wondering." The band made English recordings
under the name the Riverside Ramblers (the band's sponsor on a Lafayette radio station was
Montgomery Ward. which marketed tires under the Riverside brand).
During the succeeding decades, the Hackberry Ramblers generally remained active, including a 10-year gig starting in 1946 playing every Saturday night at the Silver Star Club near Lake Charles. The band reached a low point in the early 1960s, but then Chris Strachwitz of Arhoolie Records produced a new recording and re-released some old classic recordings the band made for the RCA Bluebird label. Since then the Hackberry Ramblers have gone on to perform at major festivals across the country and to receive recognition in a variety of national media. They released "Cajun Boogie" in 1992, and their 1997 release, "Deep Water," received a Grammy nomination in the traditional folk category. On Dec. 4, 1999, the Hackberry Ramblers made their debut performance at the Grand Ole Opry. During the trip to Nashville, Darbone donated a fiddle he played on the recording of "Jolie Blonde" to the Country Music Hall of Fame. The group continues to perform, playing Cajun, country, rockabilly, and honky tonk music with a zest that remains undiminished after 66 years on stage.
An extensive discography of the Hackberry Ramblers' earlier recordings is included in Ann Savoy's Cajun Music: A Reflection of a People. "Jolie Blonde," a 1993 release, includes the 1963 recordings, plus some live recordings from 1965.