One day, more than 30 years ago, Darrell Scott, pre-eminent singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist, was visiting the grave of his great-grandfather and he noticed on a gravestone nearby, the phrase “You’ll Never Leave Harlan Alive”. It was written to reflect the difficulty for coal miners to escape the hardships, illnesses and ultimate sometimes early deaths from working the coal mines of Eastern Kentucky.
So he wrote the song to highlight the conditions men faced when working these mines; the song was semi-autobiographical “Oh my grandfather’s dad crossed the Cumberland Mountains /
Where he took a pretty girl to be his bride / Said, “Won’t you walk with me, out of the mouth of this holler / Or we’ll never leave Harlan alive” and referenced his grandfather’s difficult life, having to return to Kentucky from his failing tobacco farm ” But the times they got hard and tobacco wasn’t selling / And old granddad knew what he’d do to survive / He went and dug for Harlan coal / And sent the money back to grandma / But he never left Harlan alive”.
The song appeared on Darrell Scott’s self-produced album Aloha from Nashville, where he had moved to by that time (1997). The song struck a chord with listeners and fellow artists alike and over the years has been recorded or performed live by dozens of artists. Country music artists such as Brad Paisley and Kathy Mattea recorded fine versions, as did Dave Alvin and the Ruby Friedman Orchestra, whose version was specially made for the popular TV series Justified. But the most famous version was by the outstanding country and bluegrass singer Patty Loveless, who hailed from Elkhorn City, Eastern Kentucky and whose father was hospitalised with black lung disease derived from inhaling coal dust in the mines nearby. Her version appeared on a bluegrass album she released in 2001 called Mountain Soul.
At the 2022 CMA Awards Patty Loveless joined forces with Chris Stapleton (who was also born in Eastern Kentucky) to perform the song, not just for victims of coal mining in Kentucky but as a tribute to Kentuckians who had suffered from devastating floods in July of that year. They were joined on stage by Morgane Stapleton (a brilliant singer in her own right but known as a constant harmony vocalist with her husband) and by Darrell Scott who played dobro on this occasion. Whilst it may not be a classic clip in the sense of the age of the performance, it certainly qualifies as classic due to the age of the song and the longevity and continuing relevance to the coal mining industry in Kentucky. You can feel the emotion in this performance. In the meantime, Darrell Scott has gone on to a successful solo career, releasing 15 albums (including three duets with bluegrass star Tim O’Brien) but it is unlikely he will write another song to rival this one, despite writing songs that a considerable number of artists have recorded.
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