About This Song

Avalon Quickstep comes from Willie Narmour and Shell Smith, a fiddle and guitar duo from Carroll County, Mississippi. They recorded it in San Antonio in June 1930 and named it for Avalon, the small Mississippi town that was also home to John Hurt. Narmour once played with Hurt and later recommended him to OKeh Records. The tune also goes by "New Charleston No. 1." That title points to Charleston, Mississippi, near where the two men lived, though it may also have been meant to cash in on the Charleston dance craze. Southern Illinois fiddler Mel Durham played the same melody as "Going to the Free State," so you may hear it under either name.

The B part runs five bars where the A runs four. Cut-time transcriptions write this as a ten-measure B instead of the usual eight.