In the 1950s, country music legend Charlie Daniels got his start playing at clubs in the greater D.C. area, including along Route 1 where he played a regular gig for an entire year.
The North Carolina native moved to D.C. along with members of his band after their summer gigs ended, joining a circuit of local bars and clubs that were hotspots for everything from country to rock ‘n’ roll and jazz.
In his 2017 memoir “Never Look at the Empty Seats,” the musician behind songs such as “The Devil Went Down to Georgia” reminisced about his time on the local music scene.
“Washington had a lot of clubs, and once you broke into the circuit, there were plenty of places to work,” he wrote. “We joined a nucleus of other bands that moved from club to club, playing six nights a week and staying for two weeks or longer. Once we stayed at the Dixie Pig in Bladensburg, Maryland, for a whole year.”
According to a history by journalist Mark Opsasnick, the Dixie Pig opened in 1927 as a roadhouse saloon at 4500 Annapolis Rd. in Bladensburg, the site of a saloon that dated back to the 1800s. After it burned down in 1952, the Dixie Pig reopened in 1953 at 3804 Bladensburg Rd., quickly becoming one of the area’s most popular country and western clubs, hosting acts like Roy Clark, Jimmy Dean and Patsy Cline.
At the time, the area around Route 1 had a vibrant live music scene that included places such as Jimmy Comber’s Supper Club, Waldrop’s and the 4400 Club.
The time spent on this circuit was a formative period for Daniels and his rockabilly band, during which they added new influences and released their first records.
In a 2017 interview, he said he played at the Dixie Pig nearly every night for a year.
“It was a great time,” he said. “The Dixie Pig was a great club. It had its own culture. Clubs used to do that. They had their regulars and a culture grew up around it and the people who were the regular ones, gave it personality.”
Still, he said it was “rough,” noting that “there were fights every night at that place.”
Daniels died in 2020 in Tennessee where he lived.
Help the Wire grow in 2024!
Make a one-time donation or become a regular supporter here.
