Tennessee Wagoner

Uncle Jimmy Thompson, born in 1848, is said to have played it first when he went on WSM in Nashville in November 1923, the broadcast that grew into the Grand Ole Opry. The tune is known all over, and the state in its title changes from place to place.

R.P. Christeson and Samuel Bayard both traced it to the "Belle of Claremont Hornpipe." Bayard thought it was put together from older pieces, the first part from "Billy in the Lowground" and the second from the Scottish air "The Gaberlunzie Man." The John Lusk band, a Black string band from the Cumberland Plateau, played it as "Rolling River."