But as a result of the 1941 royalties disagreement between Broadcast Music, Inc. (BMI) and American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP), he was fired by WSM and stopped making his living as an entertainer.

He returned to sporadic public performances in 1974 when he was invited to participate in the Opry's first Old-Timers show and in 2005 was posthumously inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame.

His style of playing the harmonica took root during that time, as he imitated the sounds of the natural world around him and of the trains traveling through the countryside.

[10] His foster father, Clark Odom, was hired as a manager for a farm near Nashville, and in 1908 the family made the move from Smith County.

In 1918, the family moved to Nashville when Clark Odom got a city job, and Bailey started to perform locally there as an amateur.

[12] Bailey's first radio appearance was apparently in September 1925[2][13] on Fred Exum's WDAD, a Nashville station that only lasted from 1925 until sometime in 1927.

[16] On December 10, 1927, he debuted his trademark song, "Pan American Blues" (named for the Louisville and Nashville Railroad's Pan-American), on a program then known as the WSM Barn Dance.

[2][3] Bailey was a pioneer member of the WSM Grand Ole Opry and one of its most popular performers, appearing on the program from 1927 to 1941.

[21] During this period he toured with major country stars, including Uncle Dave Macon, Bill Monroe, and Roy Acuff.

[23] Bailey was fired by WSM in 1941 because of a licensing conflict between BMI and ASCAP, which prevented him from playing his best-known tunes on the radio.

Bailey then spent the rest of his life running his own shoeshine stand and renting out rooms in his home to make a living.

Bailey died from kidney and heart failure on July 2, 1982, at his daughter's home in Nashville,[6][1][29] and is buried in Greenwood Cemetery there.

[2] His family members had played a variety of instruments, including a grandfather who had been a well-known local fiddler in Smith County, Tennessee.

The DeFord Bailey Tribute Garden at the George Washington Carver Food Park in Nashville was dedicated on June 27, 2007.