The 9513 - Country Music Blog

Thus far, the thrust of the Forgotten Artists series has been artists whose salad days occurred before 1980. While Brady tells me that many of the articles have received a lot of hits, relatively few comments have been left. I suspect that this is because few of the readers actually recall the artists of whom [...]

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Disclaimer: Expect no objectivity at all from me with this article. Along with Webb Pierce and Merle Haggard, Ernest Tubb is one of my all-time favorite country artists. Yes, I know he started out most songs a quarter tone flat and worked his way flatter from there, and yes, I know that 80% of The [...]

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I Hear Little Rock Calling, Homesick Tears Are Falling I’ve Been Away From Little Rock Way Too Long Gonna Have A Troubled Mind, Til I Reach That Arkansas Line I Hear Little Rock Calling Me Back Home From “I Hear Little Rock Calling” — music and lyrics by Dallas Frazier In a career in which [...]

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If anyone in Country Music can truly be said to be a “renaissance man” that person would be Billy Edd Wheeler. Poet, playwright, author, songwriter, singer, artist, lecturer and ecologist would be but a few of the hats that accurately (and comfortably) fit onto his head. Billy Edd Wheeler fits into the realm between folk [...]

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During the early 1970s the airwaves of country radio electrified listeners with the sound of “Gwen (Congratulations)” and “I Don’t Know You Anymore,” records that did not sound like anything else playing on radio at the time. Tommy Overstreet was born September 10, 1937, in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, but raised in Houston and Abilene, Texas. [...]

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Jim Ed Brown has had three separate and distinct recording careers within country music. The first career ran from 1952 to ’54 and found him paired initially with sister Maxine and later with sisters Maxine and Bonnie (1955-67). After the Browns disbanded (Bonnie and Maxine left to raise families), he had a successful career as [...]

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Fans of the long running television show Hee Haw may remember Kenny Price. He played various roles in Hee Haw’s skits, including the over-protective father of a pretty teenage daughter (whose suitor, Billy Bob, did not meet his approval), a backwater sheriff and a country bumpkin lounging on the lawn in front of the general [...]

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For a brief period in the late 1970s to mid 80s, Ed Bruce seemed to be everywhere–hit songs as a songwriter, hit records as a recording artist and regular appearances on the television show Bret Maverick. Like many other artists, Ed Bruce got his start as a rockabilly singer signed to Sun Records; however, for [...]

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Jody Miller is best remembered for “Queen of The House,” an answer song to Roger Miller’s “King of The Road.” This is unfortunate since Miller was a top-notch talent with vocal chops equal or superior to any female singer performing today and does not deserve to be tagged as a novelty singer. Like her contemporary [...]

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Kitty Wells may have had the first number one single for a solo female country artist, and she undoubtedly deserves her crown as the “Queen of Country Music,” but she was not the first country female to sell a million copies of a single release. That honor belongs to Patsy Montana, who in 1935, during [...]

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