our band use to do it,, we tried to keep it as close to the country gentlemen version as possible. i enjoyed it myself.

Thanks for sharing.

I wonder what the venue was in Centreville, Virginia. That's not too far from me in the greater DC area, and I was still going out to hear live bluegrass in 1975. Mostly at the Red Fox Inn, Cellar Door, and a few other local spots. Not every week, like I did in summer of '72.

Anyway . . .

I'm certain the vast majority of bluegrass fans did not know the origin of Fox on the Run. The tremendous exposure it got from the Country Gentlemen version, compared to the obscurity of the Manfred Mann original, is what made people think of it as a bluegrass composition.

Former Country Gentlemen John Duffey and Tom Gray brought the song to the Seldom Scene and it was part of their initial multi-set live repertoire when they had recorded only one album.

It always gives me a laugh when I hear or read comments from people who don't like songs from other genres, especially rock, brought into what they think of as "traditional"  bluegrass. They have no problem with Fox on the Run.

How did copywrite work back then? My understanding is that if a band wants to record an already recorded song, they have to pay a fee for doing so?

Just last night I told a guy that Manfred Mann first did FOTR and he was "no, that's an old Bluegrass standard", and I said Right!

Our band used to pick and sing it and it was an audience favorite and also one of my favorites to sing and pick.

I think this is a good example of why second-generation bands like The Country Gentlemen, J.D. Crowe And The New South and the Seldom Scene made so much good music. Instead of trying to create their own original songs, they chose good songs from other genres and adapted them to the Bluegrass format.

For reference, here's the version by Manfred Mann.  This is what Bill Emerson must have heard.

Fox On The Run - Manfred Mann

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Originally posted by banjonz

How did copywrite work back then? My understanding is that if a band wants to record an already recorded song, they have to pay a fee for doing so?

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Pretty much same as today. If you want to distribute a physical and/or digital download recording of a song, which someone else wrote, you have to pay the composer/publisher for a mechanical license. They are compulsory; songwriters are required to grant it; you don't need their permission. But you do have to pay, the amount is per copy based on how many units you plan to distribute (not how many you actually sell). Currently standard per copy is 12.4 cents for songs under 5 minutes, or 2.38 cents per minute if over 5 minutes. 

Streaming (platforms like Spotify, or YouTube) is considered a different license and rate.

I had heard that Manfred Mann hated the Bluegrass cover versions.

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Originally posted by RB3

I think this is a good example of why second-generation bands like The Country Gentlemen, J.D. Crowe And The New South and the Seldom Scene made so much good music. Instead of trying to create their own original songs, they chose good songs from other genres and adapted them to the Bluegrass format.

For reference, here's the version by Manfred Mann.  This is what Bill Emerson must have heard.

Fox On The Run - Manfred Mann

 

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...and as recorded by Tony Trischka, with Tom Adams, Dudley Connell, and Sally Love Connell:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wy0CpIZCsIw .

Ira makes a great point about Tony Trischka's record, it follows the key change pattern of Manfred Mann, unlike the typical bluegrass versions. A wise simplification. Dudley Connell sings his head off.

Anyone know how Dudley is doing since his fall?

Going back to the text in the OP about the song  being performed too often, I can remember a short period of time when sarcastic bumper stickers were sold at festivals, playing off a concern in that time about the future of whales.  Certain wags who were tired of constan tly hearing about whales, made bumper stickers "Nuke the Whales!".   This morphed into a bluegrass fans' version "Nuke the Fox!"  Good taste prevailed and the bumper stickers went off the merch market.

Ya'll can shoot me if you want, but FotR didn't gain widespread popularity until Tom T Hall released it in 1976. It got quite a bit mainstream Country radio airplay back then. That exposure really increased the fanbase for the song.

Up here in Canada The Good Brothers made lotsa hay off it in the mid 1970’s. Country radio and even some pop-rock stations played it. (banjo player Larry Good & his brothers played on some Gordon Lightfoot albums,, here's one that the 0044 album covered https://youtu.be/p-EOWQGNza0?si=feVGhySepyVl-0oR )

The Good Bros did a superb job on it and made it an Ontario bluegrass hit!!! Theyre still sing it today...

youtu.be/rQAd3tcMWvY?si=T9J6S-15wpQE93hR

The Good BROTHERS sure did a nice job.
Here's one of the good Sisters, giving it a shot.
(No audio available)

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Originally posted by southerndrifter

Ya'll can shoot me if you want, but FotR didn't gain widespread popularity until Tom T Hall released it in 1976. It got quite a bit mainstream Country radio airplay back then. That exposure really increased the fanbase for the song.

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Yeah. In the bluegrass world we usually don't start hating on a song until the rest of the world starts to know about it.

;^)

quote:

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Originally posted by southerndrifter

Ya'll can shoot me if you want, but FotR didn't gain widespread popularity until Tom T Hall released it in 1976. It got quite a bit mainstream Country radio airplay back then. That exposure really increased the fanbase for the song.

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Of course Tom T Hall brought the song to people who wouldn't have heard it off a bluegrass record or bluegrass bar band. But I would imagine that Tom himself got the song from one of the bluegrass versions and knew it was by then an established bluegrass song. It seems unlikely to me that in 1975 he would have independently decided to cover a 1968 Manfred Mann song he had never heard done by anyone else.

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Originally posted by Ira Gitlin

 

Yeah. In the bluegrass world we usually don't start hating on a song until the rest of the world starts to know about it.

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I played it in my first rag-tag country-ish band in college, spring of '72. It was new to me through my bandmates.

Was not solidly in favor of doing it in my much better bluegrass band 10 years later. But we did. And people loved hearing it.

We also played Wait a Minute, which as a third tier DC area band covering the Seldom Scene's version of someone else's song is something else I wasn't happy about. I don't recall how we agreed on repertoire. Our vocalist was excellent, so we did a fine job with it. Maybe I'll add it to my MP3s someday.

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Originally posted by Old Hickory

quote:

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Originally posted by southerndrifter

Ya'll can shoot me if you want, but FotR didn't gain widespread popularity until Tom T Hall released it in 1976. It got quite a bit mainstream Country radio airplay back then. That exposure really increased the fanbase for the song.

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Of course Tom T Hall brought the song to people who wouldn't have heard it off a bluegrass record or bluegrass bar band. But I would imagine that Tom himself got the song from one of the bluegrass versions and knew it was by then an established bluegrass song. It seems unlikely to me that in 1975 he would have independently decided to cover a 1968 Manfred Mann song he had never heard done by anyone else.

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Oh no, I never suggested that Hall decided to record the song independently of any bluegrass version. IMO, he probably took it from the Country Gents version (being that he was a big fan of bluegrass too!) , but he did change the arrangement a bit. And his arrangement is what we used to hear alot from parking lot pickers at bluegrass festivals in the late 70s-earlier 80s. But the Tom T Hall version took the song from being bluegrass festival crowd favorite, to a request at about any party you would go to.........bluegrass people or otherwise. 

Back in the day (late ‘70s), Winchester, a fine regional band whose members included future Monroe biographer Richard Smith on mandolin and Broadway pit musician (and future bandmate of a young Bela Fleck), the late Marty Laster on fiddle, would often sing the chorus like this (I may have the order wrong):

Like a fox
Donald ducks
Hockey pucks
Disco sucks
On the run