Day 22 · Monday, July 27, 2026
Will The Circle Be Unbroken by Nitty Gritty Dirt Band album cover
bluegrass · 1972

Will The Circle Be Unbroken

Nitty Gritty Dirt Band

Why it matters

In 1972 a band of long-haired California kids talked country music's founding generation into a Nashville studio, and the result is a three-record document of young rockers deferring to their elders one take at a time.

The proof isn't in any single solo but in the talk left on the tape: on "Doc Watson & Merle Travis: First Meeting," two guitar giants who'd never shaken hands work out their mutual admiration on mic, and Roy Acuff's grumbling instructions in "Warming Up for 'the Opry'" show a legend running the room. Around those moments the playing stays loose and live — Maybelle Carter's autoharp under "Keep On the Sunny Side," the fiddle tearing through "Orange Blossom Special" — recorded fast, mistakes and all. What could have been a museum piece breathes because nobody polished the seams. The title hymn closes it as a literal answer to its own question: the circle held, and here is the recording that proves the old players trusted the young ones to keep it turning.

Listen

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Tracklist

  1. 01Grand Ole Opry Song3:11
  2. 02Lonesome Fiddle Blues2:44
  3. 03Keep On the Sunny Side4:27
  4. 04Cannonball Rag1:16
  5. 05Nashville Blues3:15
  6. 06Avalanche2:52
  7. 07You Are My Flower3:39
  8. 08Flint Hill Special2:13
  9. 09The Precious Jewel4:09
  10. 10Togary Mountain2:29
  11. 11Dark As a Dungeon2:47
  12. 12Earl's Breakdown2:37
  13. 13Tennessee Stud4:51
  14. 14Orange Blossom Special2:13
  15. 15Black Mountain Rag2:41
  16. 16Wabash Cannonball2:03
  17. 17Wreck On the Highway3:26
  18. 18Lost Highway3:48
  19. 19The End of the World3:54
  20. 20Doc Watson & Merle Travis: First Meeting (Dialogue)1:52
  21. 21I Saw the Light4:22
  22. 22Way Downtown3:36
  23. 23Sunny Side of the Mountain2:51
  24. 24Down Yonder3:46
  25. 25Nine Pound Hammer2:53
  26. 26Pins and Needles (In My Heart)2:54
  27. 27Losin' You (Might Be the Best Thing Yet)2:49
  28. 28Honky Tonk Blues2:24
  29. 29Honky Tonkin'2:32
  30. 30Sailin' On to Hawaii2:10
  31. 31You Don't Know My Mind2:48
  32. 32I'm Thinking Tonight of My Blue Eyes4:26
  33. 33My Walkin' Shoes2:53
  34. 34I Am a Pilgrim3:55
  35. 35Wildwood Flower3:34
  36. 36Soldier's Joy3:33
  37. 37Will the Circle Be Unbroken4:48
  38. 38Both Sides Now2:26
  39. 39Foggy Mountain Breakdown2:39
  40. 40Warming Up for 'the Opry' (Talk)2:43
  41. 41Sunny Side (Talk)4:06
  42. 42Remember Me1:33