Black Hills Waltz

An old-time waltz in A major, played in AEAE cross-tuning, associated with Kenner C. “K.C.” Kartchner (1886–1970), a fiddler from Snowflake in northern Arizona. Kartchner himself said the tune “goes at least back to 1890,” suggesting he learned rather than composed it, though it is preserved almost entirely through his playing. The cross-tuning gives it a distinctive loping, resonant character that sets it apart from most old-time waltzes repertoire in the old-time canon. A separate “Black Hills Waltz” was composed in 1877 by H.R. Marcyes, but it is a different melody entirely. Notable recordings include Rafe Stefanini on Glory on the Big String (County 2730), Skip Gorman on Lonesome Prairie Love (Rounder CD 0359, 1996), and Kenner Kartchner himself on The New Beehive Songster Vol. 1: Early Recordings of Pioneer Folk Music (Okehdodee OK75003); the Deseret String Band also recorded it on Utah: Songs of Statehood.

Kartchner was born in 1886 to a Mormon pioneer family in Snowflake, Arizona, and worked variously as a cowpuncher, forest ranger, and federal fish and wildlife official; his reputation as an old-time fiddler endeared him to most people he met. His autobiography, Frontier Fiddler, was published by the University of Arizona Press in 1990 and includes transcriptions of his tunes; the book’s final chapter contains 17 transcriptions, with “Black Hills Waltz” appearing first.