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Ron Hall Interviews

Bishop Ron Hall played a significant role in the formative years of several Detroit, Michigan steel guitarists and contributed to establishing the presence of the steel guitar at the House of God, Keith Dominion annual General Assembly in Nashville, Tennessee.  His parents migrated from Douglas, Georgia to Detroit in the late 1930s, where his father found employment at Ford Motor Company.   They were members of the Church of the Living God, Jewell Dominion, but in 1953, left to join the House of God, Keith Dominion when Ron was ten years old. The Hall family lived four doors down from Felton Williams, who became young Ron’s musical mentor he fondly remembers as “Uncle Felton.”   Bishop Lorenzo Harrison impressed teenage Ron with the clear, singing tone his Fender steel guitar.  Unable to persuade his father to buy him a Fender, using a few hand tools, Ron fashioned his own eight-string lap-steel that he played in church for almost a decade.  In 1995, he lost both his legs in a terrible automobile accident, a life-changing event that ultimately served to strengthen his faith in God.  Bishop Hall left the House of God to serve as pastor of an independent Pentecostal church in Ecorse, Michigan, the Mount Carmel Full Gospel Assembly.

– Robert Stone

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Interviewee: Ron Hall
Interviewer: Robert Stone
Date: 9/1/2003
Location: 
Language: English

For the archive overview:
The Robert Stone Sacred Steel Archive

This is an interview originally recorded for research purposes. It is presented here in its raw state, unedited except to remove some irrelevant sections and blank spaces. All rights to the interview are reserved by the Arhoolie Foundation. Please do not use anything from this website without permission. info@arhoolie.org

Ron Hall Interview Transcripts: