Welcome to Noted Stories: True and Tall Tales, Set to Music. Every week, this podcast features musical journeys down memory lane—primarily the memory lane of host David Ray Skinner, who has been crafting story songs for over half a century. Born in Nashville, Tennessee—Music City, USA—during the 1950s, David grew up surrounded by local lore. Back then, the legend went that delivery rooms handed a tiny guitar to every newborn Nashvillian, expecting them to be a musician from day one. That was likely the first of many tall tales and family stories David would encounter.
It seemed only fitting, then, that he began weaving musical notes and melodies into these narratives. David started writing songs at just eight years old. Rather than letting his massive collection of music lay buried on a shelf in dusty old notebooks, he launched this podcast to share both the songs and the rich history behind them. Skinner assembled musicians of all kinds to bring these stories and songs to life.
The Roots of a Songwriter
Long before it became the bustling metropolis of today, the Nashville of David’s youth was a provincial town that felt like a community where everybody knew your name. His parents were raised during the Great Depression on farms in western middle Tennessee, near the Kentucky border. Though they didn’t meet until after World War II, both served their country as teenagers. His mother was a “Rosie the Riveter,” working in a distant Detroit tank factory, while his father served even further away as a B-24 tail gunner in the South Pacific with the famous Jolly Rogers Heavy Bomb Group.
Growing up, David’s father lived in the only household in their farming community that owned a radio. Because the area lacked electricity, listening was no simple task. Every Saturday night, David’s grandfather would haul the battery out of the tractor or pickup truck, bring it into the parlor, and hook it up to the receiver.
The living room instantly transformed into a community gathering place. Neighbors packed the house to catch the Grand Ole Opry, broadcast live from Nashville over WSM’s powerful, nation-spanning, 50,000-watt clear channel signal at 650 on the AM dial. Raised on the sounds of the Carter Family and Roy Acuff, David’s father learned to play the guitar in the iconic Carter picking style.
While the farm lacked modern utilities, entertainment was rich. Alongside the radio broadcasts, the family kept the southern oral tradition alive, gathering on Saturday nights to pass down stories through generations. As a child visiting his grandparents, David would constantly beg to hear those old family tales.
When Bluegrass Met the British Invasion
As a young boy, David loved the Grand Ole Opry, Bill Monroe, and Flatt & Scruggs—especially since his father regularly played that style of music with friends. However, everything changed when David was 11 years old and the Beatles burst onto the scene. Like the rest of the world, Nashville’s youth were instantly smitten.
Suddenly, David found himself creatively torn between the traditional roots of “Will the Circle Be Unbroken” and the rock-and-roll energy of “I Want to Hold Your Hand.”
Ultimately, his writing style became a unique hybrid of the two. While he penned a love song or two over the years, the vast majority of his catalog consists of story songs—musical adaptations of the very tales he grew up listening to.