Rank Stranger - learn lead, harmony and play along - Bluegrass 101

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Written by Albert Brumley. Albert was born in 1905 near Sprio Oklahoma. In 1926 he enrolled in the Hartford Musical Institute of Hartford, Arkansas. Albert would purchase the Institute in 1948. In addition to writing “Rank Stranger,” Brumley also wrote “I’ll Fly Away,” “Turn Your Radio On,” and “He Set Me Free.” All told, he wrote more than 800 songs through his life. His son, Tom Brumley, was a pedal steel guitar player that played with Buck Owens and Ricky Nelson.

The Stanley Brothers recorded this song in 1960 as the A-side (the B-side was “The Master’s Bouquet (Gathering Flowers)”). Starday reissued the song for the 1963 album “The Mountain Music Sound. It is considered The Stanley Brothers best-selling song.

Ricky Skaggs recorded a version with Kentucky Thunder for his 1997 album “Bluegrass Rules!.” Hot Rize recorded a live version on their 1996 album “Hot Rize Presents Red Knuckles & The Trailblazers / Hot Rize in Concert.”

The song is typically sung with full harmony throughout. The verses have a held tone by the harmony singers as the lead sings over top. While the chorus has a call and response-type harmony.


Key of F# 150 BPM 3/4
Albert Brumley (ver. The Stanley Brothers- 1960)

I V I
I wandered again to my home in the mountains
V
Where in youth's early dawn I was happy and free
I V I
I looked for my friends, but I never could find them
V I IV I
I found they were all rank strangers to me

Everybody I met (everybody I met)
Seemed to be a rank stranger (seemed to be a rank stranger)
No mother nor dad (no mother or dad)
V
Not a friend could I see (not a friend could I see)
I
They knew not my name (they knew not my name)
And I knew not their faces (and I knew not their faces)
I found they were all (I found they were all)
V I IV I
Rank strangers to me (rank strangers to me)

"They've all moved away, " said the voice of a stranger
"To a beautiful home by the bright crystal sea"
Some beautiful day I'll meet 'em in heaven
Where no one will be a stranger to me

Chorus