Angel Band

"Angel Band" began as a poem by Jefferson Hascall, sometimes spelled Haskell, titled "My Latest Sun Is Sinking Fast", first printed in J. W. Dadmun's The Melodeon in 1860 with Dadmun's tune. William B. Bradbury's tune, "The Land of Beulah", appeared in 1862 in his Golden Shower of S.S. Melodies, and the song was printed in William Walker's Christian Harmony in 1866.

The Stanleys recorded it for Mercury on December 19, 1955, at 2:18, and it was issued on Country Pickin' and Singin' (Mercury MG 20349). The band that day was Carter and Ralph with Art Stamper on fiddle, Curley Lambert on mandolin and Bill Lowe on bass; the same session produced "Clinch Mountain Blues", "Will He Wait a Little Longer" and "Big Tilda". Whether it is on the 2003 set The Complete Mercury Recordings is disputed: Clinch Mountain Echo's listing includes it and PopMatters does not. The song was heard over the end credits of the O Brother, Where Art Thou? soundtrack (2000), and Emmylou Harris named an album Angel Band (1987).