From its roots, country music has been associated with simplicity – in melody, in subject-matter and in instrumentation, and it is this that has perhaps ensured its longevity. However, all good musicians make their craft look simple, and the history of country music is packed with virtuosos, from the pioneering banjoist Earl Scruggs, through ...
Country music has been euphemistically called ‘white man’s blues’ or ‘the poetry of the common man’. While both descriptions have elements of truth, neither is quite accurate. It is, in fact, a broad, nebulous, over-reaching category with no exact boundaries or parameters. Over the decades country music has grown to encompass a greatly varied assortment of ...
(Vocals, comedian, author, 1919–91) A native of Bristol, Tennessee, Ernest Jennings Ford began his career on the West Coast as a dj after military service, catching the attention of Cliffie Stone, who made him a regular on the Hometown Jamboree radio and television shows. He began recording for Capitol in 1948 and initially made ...
(Vocals, guitar, bandleader, 1916–2000) Adolph Hofner successfully combined the musical heritage of his Texas-Czech youth with hillbilly, pop and swing influences in a career that stretched from the mid-1930s to the late 1990s, with his steel guitar-playing brother Emil (nicknamed ‘Bash’) at his side throughout. Equally influenced by Milton Brown and Bing Crosby, Hofner was ...
(Vocals, songwriter, 1905–84) Born Clarence Albert Poindexter, in Troup, Texas, Dexter recorded a string of hits that were part of the early foundation of honky-tonk, including ‘Pistol Packin’ Mama’ (1944), ‘So Long Pal’ (1944), ‘Guitar Polka’ (1946), ‘Wine, Women And Song’ (1946) and ‘Honky-Tonk Blues’ (1936). Styles & Forms | War Years | Country ...
Alabama, who appropriately came from Fort Payne, in Alabama, emerged into the spotlight in 1980, when ‘Tennessee River’ topped the Billboard country charts. Three group members – Randy Owen (guitar, lead vocals, b. 1949), Teddy Gentry (bass, vocals, b. 1952) and Jeff Cook (keyboards, fiddle, vocals, b. 1949) – were ...
(Vocals, songwriter, guitar, b. 1958) Georgia-born Jackson moved to Nashville in 1985. His rise to fame came after a chance meeting between his wife, Denise, and Glen Campbell, and before long, he was a staff songwriter at Campbell’s music-publishing company. A traditionalist blue-collar act, he was the first signing to Arista’s Nashville branch ...
(Guitar, vocals, songwriter, b. 1943) Englishman Albert Lee first attracted attention playing with British R&B singer Chris Farlowe in the mid-1960s, and played in several British bands before working as a ‘hired gun’ for legendary acts like The Crickets, Jerry Lee Lewis and most notably The Everly Brothers. In 1976, he replaced his hero, ...
(Vocals, guitar, b. 1951) Escovedo had played in the country-rock bands Rank And File and The True Believers, but his 1992 solo debut album Gravity unveiled an unexpected talent pursuing an unprecedented sound. Using acoustic guitar, steel guitar and cello to create the quiet intimacy of chamber music, his brooding original songs blended alt.-country, ...
In 1995, Alison Krauss (vocals, fiddle, b. 1971) achieved a level of success no other bluegrass act had ever matched. Her 1995 retrospective album, Now That I’ve Found You: A Collection, went double platinum, and she won the CMA Awards for Single, Female Vocalist, Vocal Event and Emerging Artist as well as the ...
(Vocals, songwriter, b. 1972) Moorer moved to Nashville after college and started songwriting after she met Oklahoma musician Doyle ‘Butch’ Primm, whom she later married. Moorer’s debut album, Alabama Song (1998) included ‘A Soft Place To Fall’, as featured in the soundtrack to the movie The Horse Whisperer. After four major-label albums, she was released from ...
(Vocals, b. 1945) Arguably one of Canada’s finest vocal exports, over 25 of Murray’s 50-plus country hits between 1970 and 1991 crossed over to the pop chart. Ten country No. 1s in that period curiously did not include her two million-selling pop chart-toppers – ‘Snowbird’ (1970) and ‘You Needed Me’ (1978). Apart from these, Murray delivered 1980’s ‘Could ...
(Vocals, songwriter, b. 1954) Aged 12, Norwegian Arly Karlsen bought his first guitar, and played with numerous bands in his native country during the 1970s, before forming The Western Swingers with Arne Løland and Liv Jurunn Heia. Their 1983 debut album, Sin Egen Stil, sold over 20,000 copies in Norway, and they ...
(A&R man, 1889–1986) Arthur Satherley was a pioneering A&R man for several important record companies from the 1920s, responsible for scouting and recording a vast array of country and blues performers. Among these were two important figures whose careers the British-born Satherley helped particularly to shape and steer – Bob Wills and Gene Autry. A legend himself by the ...
(Vocal/instrumental group, 1970s–present) The most impressive and most successful of the western-swing revival bands was co-founded by a couple of hippies from the Philadelphia suburbs. Ray Benson (vocals, guitar, b. 1951) and Reuben ‘Lucky Oceans’ Gosfield (pedal steel guitar, b. 1951) fell in love with the records of Bob Wills and formed the band in 1969, ...
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