Born Arthel Watson in Deep Gap, North Carolina in 1923, Doc Watson lost his sight before age two and went on to change how the acoustic guitar is played. This episode covers the radio audience that gave him his nickname, the dead chestnut trees he chopped to buy a mail-order Sears Silvertone, the mountain repertoire he memorized by ear, and the 1953 gig with Jack Williams’ band in Johnson City where he played fiddle tunes on an electric Gibson Les Paul because the band had no fiddler.

The hosts explain how the light strings and low action of the electric guitar let Watson build blinding speed that he later carried back to the acoustic, and how Ralph Rinzler’s advice to go fully acoustic launched him into the folk revival, from Old Time Music at Clarence Ashley’s and a Greenwich Village concert in 1961 to the 1963 Newport Folk Festival. They discuss his Gallagher guitars, his partnership with son Merle from 1964, the touring trio with T. Michael Coleman, Tennessee Stud on Will the Circle Be Unbroken, Merle’s death in a 1985 tractor accident, the founding of MerleFest, his seven Grammys and National Medal of Arts, and his final performance in April 2012.

• How losing his sight as an infant shaped an education built on oral tradition and ear
• Why a missing fiddle player and an electric guitar created the flatpicking style
• Ralph Rinzler and the folk revival that made Watson a national star
• The Doc and Merle years and the birth of MerleFest at Wilkes Community College
• His lineage in players like Clarence White, Tony Rice and Billy Strings