Paul Colt's Blog

We know Merle Haggard singer, songwriter, guitar player, and fiddler extraordinaire. A country music icon and founding force in the Bakersfield Sound with thirty-eight number-one hits sprinkled over a fifty year career. Quite the finish for a guy with a rough start.

Juvenile delinquent might be the best way to describe the rough start leading to a stint in reform school. He could sing and strum though that didn’t look like much in terms of a way out. Rough carried over to adulthood, financial problems, and a 1957 robbery attempt that landed Merle in San Quentin. Prison changed things. Bad company and a disciplinary time in solitary led to encounters with two death-row inmates. Perhaps a scared-straight glimpse around a bend in the road he was on. Then in 1960, Johnny Cash played San Quentin. Moved by Folsom Prison Blues, Haggard saw a singer-songwriter fork in the road.

Released from Prison, Haggard followed his dream, playing and singing the Bakersfield scene. In ’69 Merle and his backup band, The Strangers, released what became their signature song, Okie from Muskogee. A new voice was born, rooted in traditional values and old fashioned patriotism, drawn in sharp contrast to Viet Nam era antiwar sentiment. The message caught on. Stardom followed. Merle Haggard never looked back.

Merle Haggard’s music lent itself to collaborations and tributes, with and to other artists. One among them stood out for this post. The collaboration was with Asleep at the Wheel. The tribute to The Best Damn Fiddle Player in the World; or My Salute to Bob Wills and the Texas Playboys. A collaboration and tribute to revive the heady days of Texas Swing.

Merle Haggard died of pneumonia April 6, 2016, his seventy-nineth birthday. Along the way of his storied career he collected a goodly share of honors – Kennedy Center Award, Grammy’s Lifetime Achievement Award, with inductions into the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame, Country Music Hall of Fame, and of course the Oklahoma Music Hall of Fame. Not a bad wrap for an Okie from Muskogee with a rough start.

Next Week: Roy Acuff
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Paul

Hank Williams had fifty-five songs reach Billboard’s Country Top Ten, twelve No. 1’s. Hank wrote songs we remember. Songs like Your Cheatin’ Heart, Hey Good Lookin’, I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry. Those songs would serve Hank well along with a who’s who of vocalists who covered various versions of Hank’s classics. Artists like Chuck Berry, Johnny Cash, Bob Dylan, Waylon Jennings, Rolling Stones, and some guy named Presley … Elvis Pressley. All those memories from a man who never learned to read music.

Cowboy Country legend learned guitar from Roy Acuff with blues influences courtesy of Rufus Payne. Born and reared in Alabama, Hank got his musical start in Montgomery in the ‘30’s playing radio with a group he called Drifting Cowboys. The ‘40’s brought a recording contract with MGM records and marriage to Audrey Sheppard. She would give birth to Randall Hank Williams (Hank Jr.). It was about this time Hank had an accident destined to have a profound affect on his life and career. Competing in a rodeo he was thrown from a bull, injuring his back. Pain pills added substance abuse to a budding dependency on alcohol. Abuse problems would follow him throughout the remainder of his short career.

World War II took a toll on the Drifting Cowboys. Williams reconstituted the band around Hillous Butrum on base, Bob McNett on guitar, Don Helms steel guitar, and Jerry Rivers fiddle. The group scored a show on WSFA radio and regular appearances on the Grand Ole Opry. Hank’s alcohol problems dogged him to the point his friend Roy Acuff tried to intervene telling him, “You’ve got a million-dollar voice … and a ten-cent brain.” Would it would have worked. Sadly Hank would be fired from both WSFA and the Opre.

Hank Williams died of heart failure New Years Day 1953 at age twenty-nine. His all to brief career cut short by an abusive lifestyle, yet a career to mark him as an iconic force in country music’s rise to popularity. His achievements would follow him in posthumous recognitions – Country Music Hall of Fame ’61, Song Writers Hall of Fame ’70, Rock and Roll Hall of Fame ’87, not to mention a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame and a Special Pulitzer for craftsmanship in song writing. All for a guy who couldn’t read music.

Next Week: Merle Haggard
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Paul

From his classic “Hello my name is …” introduction to life and love, there is only one Johnny Cash. If you close your eyes and listen you can see The Man in Black and hear those signature songs sung in that distinctive raspy baritone. Listen. I walk the Line, Ring of Fire, Jackson, and who can forget, A Boy Named Sue. Memories from a legend who got his start selling appliances, hoping for a radio DJ gig.

Cash caught a break in Memphis and a recording contract with Sam Phillips’ tiny Sun label. Things started falling into place. Like that day in 1956 Elvis Presley dropped in at Sun studio while Johnny sat listening to Carl Perkins laying down tracks with Jerry Lee Lewis. An impromptu four part jam session broke out with the tapes running on a Million Dollar Quartet.

Johnny began touring with the Carter Family in the early 60’s. Family included mom Maybelle with daughters Anita, Helen, and a certain June. These were good times for Cash. Time to over celebrate with whiskey and prescription drugs – weaknesses that would dog him to addiction and divorce from his first wife. Five years later he did his first duet with June Carter. Jackson won a Grammy. June won Johnny’s heart. He proposed on stage. She accepted provided he cleaned himself up. He did, for a time in what became a pattern of addiction, rehab, and relapse.

Cash cultivated his Outlaw image doing prison concerts at Folsom and San Quentin. The albums, recorded live became big hits. Johnny Cash never did time in prison, though he had more than his share of one night jail stands courtesy of his alcohol and drug life style. Still, The Man in Black was hot. Remember the Johnny Cash show on ABC? Originating from the Ryman Auditorium in Nashville, The Statler Brothers, one of my favorites, opened for him along with Carl Perkins and Carter family regulars. And guests? How about Louis Armstrong, Ray Charles, Neil Diamond, Bob Dylan, Roger Miller, Joni Mitchell, Roy Orbison, Kenny Rogers and the First Edition, and James Taylor. Remember any of those?

June Carter Cash can be credited with keeping Johnny coming back to clean all those years. The love of his life, she passed away May 15, 2003. Four months later, September 12th, they reunited.

Next Week: Hank Williams
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Paul

My near memory of Willie Nelson came courtesy of a concert he gave at Red Rock Canyon in the Rockies west of Denver. We were visiting a ranch at around nine thousand feet. Some forty years later I tell myself it was the altitude. After a long day in the saddle on the mountain, evening came with an invite to hear Willie in concert at Red Rock Canyon. We were just too tired. Regretted it ever since.

Willie Nelson wrote his first song at age seven, joined his first band at age ten. Auspicious start to a career that went nowhere near thirty years. Those years Nelson pursued his dream supporting himself on radio DJ work while selling vacuum cleaners and bibles door to door. His music career got started writing songs that might conjure up a memory or two - Hello Walls, Pretty Paper, and who could forget ... Crazy.

In 1960 Willie moved to Nashville, signing with Atlantic Records, Columbia, and eventually RCA, recording albums including Shotgun Willie and Red Headed Stranger. Nashville led him to befriend Waylon Jennings and collaborations that produced outlaw country hits we’ll never forget. Remember Blue Eyes Crying in the Rain, To All the Girls I’ve Loved Before, Stardust, Good Hearted Woman, Mammas Don’t Let Your Babies Grow Up to be Cowboys, and Willie’s signature On The Road Again.

Willie next lent his song writing, vocals, and guitar named Trigger (Yeah that Trigger) to the super group known as the Highwaymen. Remember Waylon, Willie, Kris Cristofferson, and that man in black, Johnny Cash? Farm Aid when needed. Recognition caught up with Willie following Always on My Mind. That hit won Grammies for Best Country Song, Song of the Year, and Best Male Vocal. Can anyone say Red Rock Canyon?

Willie had his share of challenges over the years with marriages, the IRS, financial misfortune, and a miscellaneous demon or two; but music and a long line of friends who loved him were always there to bring the Red Headed Stranger back home.

Next Week: The Man in Black
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Paul

Tex Ritter grew up on a family farm in Panola County, Texas. An honor student, after graduating High School, Ritter enrolled at the University of Texas Austin to study pre-law and political science. Music was a sideline interest that led Ritter to Chicago and Northwestern University Law School. Law soon took a backseat to the siren song of show business.

Ritter moved to New York in 1928 where he parlayed his western roots and music into Broadway and radio work. He starred in a New York City radio western The Lone Star Rangers, singing cowboy tunes and telling tales set in the Old West. He played cowboy Cord Elam on Broadway in Green Grow the Lilacs, a production that later morphed into the popular musical we know as Oklahoma. This pioneer pattern would follow Ritter’s work throughout his career, breaking ground that would then blossom for others.

Tex moved to Hollywood in 1936 to take up a movie career that had him appear in seventy films and on seventy-six sound tracks. His most notable soundtrack, The Ballad of High Noon from the classic western starring Gary Cooper and Grace Kelly. In yet another example of Ritter ground breaking to blossom for another, he did the original sound track for the film, but the recording we all know, love, and remember went to Frankie Laine. By way of a consolation prize, Ritter did pick up the 1953 Oscar for Best Original Song.

Tex Ritter’s recording career got going in 1942 when he signed on with the newly minted Capitol Records with the hit, I’m Wastin’ My Tears on You. Billboard called it the song that established his style. Ritter hit the small screen in 1955 with ABC’s Ozark Jubilee. He became one of the rotating hosts when the show spun off to NBC as Five Star Jubilee.

Nashville beckoned in 1965 with Grand Ole Opry radio work. In other examples of groundbreaking destined to bear greater fruit, Ritter became one of the founding members of CMA and was instrumental in building the Country Music Hall of Fame where he was inducted in 1964. He was awarded a lifetime membership in the Grand Ole Opry in 1970.

Next Week: Willie Nelson
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Paul

Contemporary country music embraces a number of sub-genre sounds from traditional, to swing, Bakersfield to blue grass, pop, and more. Cowboy music has a sound all its own. George Strait has that sound. Ranch raised he comes by it naturally. Early in his music career, George supported his singing habit working the family ranch by day while performing nights and weekend with his band Ace in the Hole. After being rejected by every major record label in Nashville, he nearly quit. His wife persuaded him to give it one more year. In 981 all that changed on a one record contract with MCA records. The song Unwound did well enough to earn a second contract, showcasing talent country radio discovered.

Breaks come in all shapes and sizes. The Houston Live Stock Show and Rodeo comes in on the large size. When headliner Eddie Rabbitt (remember him?) got the flu, George took over with Amarillo by Morning. Decades of hits followed. Titles that make for a special trip down memory lane. Savor these samples … Ocean Front Property, All My Exes Live in Texas, Love Without End Amen, You Know Me Better Than That, I Just Want to Dance With You, Check Yes or No, Write This Down, and Give it Away. George Strait brought traditional cowboy sound back to country charts dominated by country pop.

George took to the tour scene, introducing new country talents with his concerts. You may have heard of Tim McGraw, Faith Hill, Kenny Chesney, and Alan Jackson. By the time George took his The Cowboy Rides Away Tour in 2014, touring with George became career tonic for the likes of Martina McBride, Jason Aldeen, Eric Church, Miranda Lambert, Little Big Town, Vince Gill, Lee Ann Womack, Merle Haggard, Ronnie Dunn, Luke Bryan, along with Asleep at the Wheel, and Ace in the Hole. Ever hear of any of them? Who was left in Nashville?

Awards and recognition rolled in to honor George Strait. His albums and singles garnered 20 multi-platinum, 33 platinum, and 24 gold certifications on the way to selling 120 million records. Nominated for 16 Grammy’s he won one - who gives a Grammy anyway? Honored as CMA Entertainer of the Year in 1989, 1990, and 2013, George was elected to the Country Music Hall of Fame. Named Artist of the Decade for the 2000’s by the Academy of Country Music. Cowboy sound for the ages.

Next Week: Tex Ritter
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Paul

When you look back over Frankie Laine’s musical career you can’t put him in any category and expect him to stay there. He did pop, jazz, R&B, folk, rock, and oh yah, western. In short if they could put a melody to it, Frankie Laine could sing it in his own uniquely distinctive style. That accounts for all the varied duets and collaborations Laine did as a singer songwriter with a veritable who’s who of the music industry from the ‘40s to the 80’s. Some of it classic western.

Francesco Paolo LoVecchio was born and raised on the westside of Chicago in an area they call Little Italy. His father was Al Capone’s barber, one among a rumor mill of mob connections. The remarkable part of Laine’s early singing story is that he didn’t starve to death the first fifteen years. Good as he was, he kept his hopes alive on candy bars, park benches, and factory work. In 1938 while working radio in New York he changed his name to Frankie Laine in honor of Lane Tech High he attended in Chicago. That’s My Desire hit in 1946. Laine never looked back.

The 1950’s were the golden age of western film and TV; sound tracks made for Laine’s vocals. He made his cowboy creds on Gun Fight at the OK Corral, the original 3:10 to Yuma, and a couple of iconic themes Rawhide and High Noon. Ironically Laine didn’t sing High Noon for the Gary Cooper classic film. That honor went to Tex Ritter. No, Laine covered the record release which became the popular version we remember today.

Films weren’t Frankie’s only western work. He released singles including Mule Train with it’s distinctive bullwhip cracks and Cool Water. His western themed albums included Hell Bent for Leather, Duces Wild, and Call of the Wild. The 70’s saw him back on the big screen with Mel Brooks spoof Blazing Saddles.

Frankie Laine’s contributions to cowboy music bring him to these pages, but we can’t do him justice here without mention of hits like That Lucky Old Sun, The Cry of the Wild Goose, Your Cheatin’ Heart, Georgia on My Mind, and one of my all-time favorites I Believe.

Frankie Laine lived 90 years, leaving a 50 year musical legacy made all the more remarkable for the star studded singers and musicians with whom he made music for generations.

Next Week: George Strait
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Paul

My rule for requests on these pages is we have to find enough research material to make a post. Much as we love their music, not much research result for the Sons of the San Joaquin. Since this one is my choice (and I make the rule), we’ll do this group with a dose of memories that go with them. It all started in a place we love, Cody Wyoming.

We spent three wonderful vacations on a ranch in the Little Big Horns just east of Cody. That first summer we wandered into a shop in town, playing cowboy music. The Sons of the San Joaquin were love at first sound. Roy Rogers once said the Sons of the San Joaquin were the closest group alive to the sound of the original Sons of the Pioneers. I bought the CD.

That trip was about the time my first book finished. Thought I was ready for an agent or publisher. Back home, I stumbled on a website for Western Writers of America. There I found contacts for a number of published authors. Sent introductory emails to six of them asking for words of wisdom. Four asked to read a chapter or two. All of them got back to me with politely worded variations of “Not ready for prime time.” One of them, Dusty Richards, offered some tips and asked me to do a rewrite. I did; and for the next year this man, I didn’t know from Adam, beat on my writing until that ‘ah ha’ moment arrived. I rewrote the book. “Done with authority,” Dusty wrote, “I wouldn’t change a thing and I never say that.” I still have the email.

Two years later WWA had its convention in … Cody. We went. Bought the Sons of the San Joaquin CD as a thank you for the mentor I met there. Over the years and conventions that followed we became “Pards” as Dusty said. Dusty Richards made a writer out of story teller. We lost Dusty and his wife Pat to a car accident four Christmases ago. There aren’t enough words. Think of him every time we pop in that Sons of the San Joaquin CD, 15 Years a Retrospective.

Not as well-known as most of those we feature in this series, the Sons of the San Joaquin are a family band. Jack and Joe Hannah are brothers. Lon Hannah is Joe’s son. They were elected to the Western Music Association Hall of Fame in 2006. Great American Cowboy (1990) leads Dusty’s CD. A stockman down to his boots he likely connected with Horses, Cattle, and Coyotes (1999). We own four of their CD these days. Wyoming on my Mind never fails to take me back to Cody and memories of a giant of a man with a heart just as big. Privileged to call Pard.

Next Week: Frankie Lane
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Paul

Some say Bob Wills fathered Western Swing, the rest of us would likely see Bob as one unique entertainer. Imagine a cigar smokin’ fiddle player, belting out ballads and one liners around that stogie, punctuated by his signature "Ah Hah!” whenever the music moment moved. Don’t believe it? You can find Wills and his Texas Playboys recorded on YouTube.

It all started in 1933 when Wills organized a musical ensemble he dubbed the Texas Playboys. The group included Wills fiddlin’ to Tommy Duncan’s piano and vocals, June Whalin strummin’ guitar, backed by Eldon Shamblin’s base guitar, Lee Wills tenor banjo, and Kermit Whalin on steel guitar. The group debuted in Waco Texas, though with a nose for the paying public that would hallmark the groups success, Wills moved the group to Tulsa Oklahoma early in 1934 where the Texas Playboys hit it big on KVOO Radio. Turned out Okies liked the sound of Texas as long as it didn’t come wearing shoulder pads and helmets.

The 1940’s were good to Wills and the Playboys. They recorded San Antonio Rose which sold two million records – in those days. Even the war years played in Wills favor. A brief enlistment ended in a medical discharge, allowing Bob to reconstitute his band. He move to Hollywood and a radio gig on what is today KLAC. The band toured up and down the coast to great success, with Bob finding time to appear in 19 films. By 1944 Bob Wills and the Texas Playboys were playing to bigger box offices than the Dorsey brothers, Benny Goodman, and Harry James.

In those heady years Wills began tinkering with the band’s signature sound. The group increased in size to as many as twenty-three performers. He added and subtracted brass, drums, and electric guitars to go along with the original classic sounds. A 1944 national tour hit Nashville and a gig at the Grand Ole Opre, a harbinger of things to come. It started when Opre officials informed Bob he couldn’t do drums on the Opre stage. The dispute appeared resolved with the drums relegated to a place off stage. Resolved until the curtain went up with drum set center stage.

The fifties dawned on the music scene with the advent of rock ‘n roll. Radio stations went to sound formats. Bob Wills and the Texas Playboys didn’t fit country or pop. Wills lavish lifestyle and heavy drinking took a toll. By the ‘60’s two heart attacks and a stroke ended Wills performing career. He was inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame in 1968 – “Ah Haw!”

Next Week: Sons of the San Joaquin
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Paul

Didn’t think I knew much about Red Steagall when we started down the research path for this post courtesy of a favorite follower of these pages from Oklahoma no less (Thanks Montez). Turns out I knew more than I thought with an owe-Red-a-lot thrown into the bargain.

Those who know Red Steagall know him for a radio, television, singer, songwriter, poet, author and iconic ambassador for all things western lifestyle. You might have run into Red as a Hee Haw guest or been in attendance when he hosted the National Finals Rodeo or the National College Rodeo Finals. More likely you know him from his radio program Cowboy Corner. The syndicated show airs on 160 stations in 34 states, celebrating western songs, stories, poems, and humor with a guest list that includes the likes of Charlie Daniels, Baxter Black, Buck Taylor, and one of my favorites. More on that later. All those entertainment accomplishments aside, Red is the real deal when it comes to rancher and stockman. Some say Red’s best performances are given around a cow camp campfire.

So what did I find out I knew I didn’t know before? Bit over three years ago Grasshoppers in Summer received a Will Rogers Medallion Award. I was fortunate enough to attend the awards dinner at the historic Stockyards in Fort Worth, Texas. Our hotel was stockyard central where the long horns walk twice a day. Signs everywhere promoted something called the Red Steagall Cowboy Gathering. I thought maybe this Steagall guy knew Will. Turns out Red Steagall’s Cowboy Gathering gathers annually right there in the stockyards. I should have known.

If there is a western heritage award, recognition, or hall of fame somewhere Red Steagall hasn’t received or been inducted into it probably doesn’t deserve its western salt. The list is long, starting with the Texas State Legislature, naming him the official state Cowboy Poet Laureate. Add to that the Charles Goodnight Award given to those who personify ideals of the old west. The Hall of Great Westerners at the National Cowboy and Western Heritage Museum in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, to name a few, brings us back to Oklahoma and why I owe Red.

While attending the 1974 NFR in Oklahoma City, an unknown female vocalist stepped to the microphone to sing the national anthem. Red signed her to a recording contract, cementing his claim on having discovered one of my favorite recording artists … Reba McEntire.

Next Week: By Request – Bob Wills and the Texas Playboys
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Paul