Background
Sonny Osborne began playing the banjo at the age of eleven when his father bought him one.
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Sonny Osborne
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With a little help from Larry Richardson, he soon found out how to play. Bobby enlisted in the Marine Corps., and Sonny went on to work with Bill Monroe"s Bluegrass Boys for a couple of months between June and September 1952. Only fourteen years old, he recorded nine tunes with the "Father of Bluegrass".
Meanwhile, the same year, he recorded, on Gateway Records, together with guitarist Carlos Brock, fiddler Billy Thomas, mandolin player Enos Johnson and Smokey Ward on bass, calling themselves "Stanley Alpine".
By now, his family had moved to Dayton, Ohio and Bobby returned from the Marines. Sonny and Bobby appeared together on WROL in Knoxville, Tennessee on November 6, 1953.
They had a recording contract on Radio Corporation of America Victor and together with Jimmy Martin, the Osborne Brothers made their first recordings on November 16, 1954. Sonny Osborne was inducted into the International Bluegrass Music Hall of Honor in 1994 and retired in 2003.
