fbpx

Early Influences

  • Carter Family
  • Monroe Brothers
  • Blue Sky Boys
  • Callahan Brothers

Came to Fame With

Came to fame with

  • The Lilly Brothers & Don Stover, 1948-1996

Performed With

  • The Lonesome Holler Boys, 1938
  • Molly O’Day & the Cumberland Mountain Folks, 1945
  • The Smiling Mountain Boys, Knoxville, TN, 1940s
  • Red Belcher’s Kentucky Ridgerunners, 1948-1950
  • The Confederate Mountaineers, Boston, MA, 1952-1956
  • The Lilly Brothers & Don Stover, 1956-1996
  • The Lilly Brothers and the Lilly Mountaineers, 2001-2002

By the Way

  • When asked to spell his first name at the U.S./Canadian border, reportedly responded, “Jist a big ol’ B.”
  • Accused by younger brother Everett of “going modern” when he added a few Lefty Frizzell and Hank Snow songs to the group’s otherwise-well-aged repertoire.
  • Performed in 1959 with Merle Travis in the first all-country program at Boston’s prestigious Jordan Hall
  • Driving through the mountains of West Virginia, a visitor can’t help but notice how many mailboxes display the names Lilly and Stover (a popular bumper sticker reads: “West Virginia: 1 million people and 15 last names”). Bea began life in the beautiful but remote community of Clear Creek, across Spruce Mountain from Beckley, dominated by a railroad trestle

Led the Way

  • Bridged the brother duet style of the 1930s into the emerging bluegrass genre of the 1940s and 1950s. A kind of “iving encyclopedia,” the Lilly Brothers evoked for modern audiences the sounds and performance techniques of earlier decades.
  • Influenced a generation of country, bluegrass, and folk artists in New England, including Joe Val, Bob & Grace French, Herb Applin, Louis Arsenault, Jim Rooney, Bill Keith, Peter Rowan, and Joan Baez.
  • Appeared in the movies Festival (1967) and Bluegrass Country Soul (1971) and the West Virginia Public Television documentary True Facts in a Country Song (1979).
  • Massachusetts Country Music Hall of Fame, 1986.
  • Bluegrass Hall of Fame, 2002.
  • West Virginia Music Hall of Fame, 2008.

Early Influences

  • Carter Family
  • Monroe Brothers
  • Blue Sky Boys
  • Callahan Brothers

Came to Fame With

Came to fame with

  • The Lilly Brothers & Don Stover, 1948-1996

Performed With

  • The Lonesome Holler Boys, 1938
  • Molly O’Day & the Cumberland Mountain Folks, 1945
  • The Smiling Mountain Boys, Knoxville, TN, 1940s
  • Red Belcher’s Kentucky Ridgerunners, 1948-1950
  • The Confederate Mountaineers, Boston, MA, 1952-1956
  • The Lilly Brothers & Don Stover, 1956-1996
  • The Lilly Brothers and the Lilly Mountaineers, 2001-2002

By the Way

  • When asked to spell his first name at the U.S./Canadian border, reportedly responded, “Jist a big ol’ B.”
  • Accused by younger brother Everett of “going modern” when he added a few Lefty Frizzell and Hank Snow songs to the group’s otherwise-well-aged repertoire.
  • Performed in 1959 with Merle Travis in the first all-country program at Boston’s prestigious Jordan Hall
  • Driving through the mountains of West Virginia, a visitor can’t help but notice how many mailboxes display the names Lilly and Stover (a popular bumper sticker reads: “West Virginia: 1 million people and 15 last names”). Bea began life in the beautiful but remote community of Clear Creek, across Spruce Mountain from Beckley, dominated by a railroad trestle

Led the Way

  • Bridged the brother duet style of the 1930s into the emerging bluegrass genre of the 1940s and 1950s. A kind of “iving encyclopedia,” the Lilly Brothers evoked for modern audiences the sounds and performance techniques of earlier decades.
  • Influenced a generation of country, bluegrass, and folk artists in New England, including Joe Val, Bob & Grace French, Herb Applin, Louis Arsenault, Jim Rooney, Bill Keith, Peter Rowan, and Joan Baez.
  • Appeared in the movies Festival (1967) and Bluegrass Country Soul (1971) and the West Virginia Public Television documentary True Facts in a Country Song (1979).
  • Massachusetts Country Music Hall of Fame, 1986.
  • Bluegrass Hall of Fame, 2002.
  • West Virginia Music Hall of Fame, 2008.

From the Archives

“[During their 15-minute segment on WWVA radio in 1948] Bea would list the songs to be performed. Everett did not concern himself with Bea’s selection. Without warm-up, rehearsal, or discussion, they went on the air, and their music was dynamic.”
Mac Martin in liner notes to The Lilly Brothers and Don Stover: Live at the Hillbilly Ranch, Hay Holler Records, 1996.
“Bea, with his quietness and stubborn sincerity, is a good counter to Everett’s impulsiveness. He spent a year carving a guitar out of a piece of wood with a penknife and sandpaper, put strings on it, and uses it every night at the club, without feeling any necessity to tell anybody about it.”
Sam Charters, “The Lilly Brothers of Hillbilly Ranch,” Sing Out!, July, 1965.
“On countless slower nights at the Hillbilly Ranch the band would sit in this one particular booth during our 30 minutes off. The talk almost invariably turned to things Appalachian and the old folks back home. Bea reflected, promoted, and even preached Appalachian values in his conversations. He could be quite forceful and effective when he wanted to. Had the economic situation in West Virginia been different, I imagine Bea would have played that role on my grandparents’ porch back in Clear Creek. We were all in Boston because of the devastating impact of the economic depression in our part of Appalachia. The city was not Bea’s world – he just found himself there, as did the rest of us.”
Everett Alan Lilly, personal communication, 2009
close