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Gibson Guitars declared 2013 as the Year of Les Paul, so here is a jaw-dropping discovery with a Detroit connection to the famous guitarist and Mary Ford early in their careers.
As the singer closed a set of pop tunes sprinkled with country-western hits, she noticed a sharply-dressed older man striding confidently toward her from a center table. For the next several nights, Mary Ford, her husband guitarist Les Paul, and their bassist, were to call a Detroit restaurant lounge their home, performing as the Les Paul Trio. As the gentleman waved down the singer, he revealed expensive cufflinks on his shirtsleeves while inviting her and her husband to join him and his wife at his table.
Les Paul had recorded instrumental hits for Capitol Records since 1948, including pop standards such as “Lover” and “Nola” featuring groundbreaking multiple (overdubbed) guitar tracks. With Ford singing, the couple scored their first top ten vocal hit in early 1951 with the country-western song “Tennessee Waltz” (shut out of the number one spot by Patti Page‘s version for Mercury Records). They had more in store for ’51, including the number one “How High The Moon.” It is likely they met Detroit composer/publisher/record label owner Lou Parker before then.
At Parker’s table, Paul and Ford dined at his expense. Parker and his wife returned night after night, eventually persuading the musicians to visit his office at the Music Hall building on Madison Street. During their booking in Detroit, the trio recorded two of Parker’s songs. Although unconfirmed, it sounds as though Paul overdubbed his guitar, producing two guitar parts trading solos. As with her Capitol recordings, Ford sang with her mouth very close to the microphone.
Listen to: The Humdingers – Remember Me
In late 1951, Parker issued a disk of the Les Paul Trio’s Detroit recordings on his Citation label, calling the performers The Humdingers. The record received an above-average score from Billboard magazine on December 29. As was the case with other productions on Citation (often due to less than adequate promotion), the record didn’t sell well.
In 1953, Detroit guitarist Al Allen met Lou Parker at a recording session for cowboy singer Bob Quinn. Among other songs, they were scheduled to cut “The Things You Used To Say,” which appeared on The Humdingers disk. Parker casually mentioned that Les Paul and Mary Ford also cut the song for him. Allen, a longtime and devoted fan of Paul’s, questioned Parker further, and he brought him a copy of The Humdingers record. (As far as we know, Parker did not issue Quinn’s version of the song.)
Listen to: The Humdingers – The Things You Used To Say
We don’t know if Parker hired Les Paul and Mary Ford to make demonstration recordings, or if they understood Parker intended to issue a commercial record. In any case, after their string of major hits in 1951, Les Paul and Mary Ford probably didn’t make recordings such as these while contracted to Capitol Records again.
Postscript
Around the same time as Les Paul and Mary Ford, Detroit country act Roy Hall and the Cohutta Mountain Boys recorded three records for Citation, under the alias “The Eagles.” Detroit bandleader Jack Luker (who used his own name) made two with members of the Cohutta Mountain Boys. The Cohutta Mountain Boys’ and Al Allen’s stories appear in the book “Detroit Country Music – Mountaineers, Cowboys, and Rockabillies” from University of Michigan Press.
Fans of longtime Detroit resident and country music bandleader Forest Rye are smiling at the thought of recordings they hadn’t heard before.
A record I’d never seen on the short-lived Alben label turned up recently. Detroit juke box and vending machine operator Ben Okum and his business partner Al Smith created the Alben Records Company in 1948. Okum issued the first version of Jimmy Work’s “Tennessee Border” on Alben 501 late that year (see “Detroit Country Music: Mountaineers, Cowboys, and Rockabillies” for Work’s story). Alben pressed a couple of other records, with red and silver labels, for the Rhythm and Blues market, but the label of the record in question had the blue and silver color scheme of Work’s record, and a catalog number of 601.
The artist’s name, Uncle Ruye, caught my eye because it appeared to be an alternative spelling of “Rye” – and Forest Rye was known to record under another name, Conrad Brooks, for records on Universal, Hot Wax, and Mellow. Furthermore, one side was titled “Crying My Eyes Out,” a song that Mercury Records issued in 1951 by Rye.
I Smiled At Her – Uncle Ruye and his Sage Hollow Boys
Crying My Eyes Out – Uncle Ruye and his Sage Hollow Boys
“The ‘I Smiled At Her (She Smiled At Me)’ song was sung to me by my cousin Katherine … She remembered it from when she was a young girl,” she said. [1]
Probably recorded in 1949, the Alben disc may have been an audition of sorts for Rye. Ben Okum developed ties with Mercury Records around that time, and Rye recorded a new version of “Crying My Eyes Out” along with three other originals for the Chicago-based label around 1950-51. [2]
Click here to read my original account of Forest Rye in Detroit.
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Notes
- Linda (Rye) Austin interviewed March 3, 2014
- “Crying My Eyes Out” b/w “After All These Years” Mercury 6328; “Midnight Boogie Blues” b/w “Won’t You Give Me A Little Loving” Mercury 6329
- Source: Advertisement for Boy Scouts benefit show at Saline High School in Saline, Michigan. Saline Observer. (Thursday, April 24, 1947. Vol. 64, No. 29) 2.
Thanks to everyone who attended the party for the Detroit Country Music book at Club Canton on Jan. 19! A packed house kept proprietors Emmett and Autumn and their crew busy, but they too enjoyed the live music played by Behind The Times, Dave Beddingfield, Brian Ferriby, Mitch and Jesse Manns, Hugh Nix, Keith Cady, and myself, along with singers Andy Barron, Jay Haynes, and others. The musical variety from the stage sounded like a soundtrack to the book, as patrons were treated to old-time, bluegrass, western swing, rockabilly, and honky-tonk songs. Guitarist Mitch Manns even worked in some fast picking numbers.
The legendary Club Canton and its bandstand, dating from the 1950s, hosts live C&W music several nights a week, so stop in and say “hello” some time. By the way, Emmett pointed out to me the tables closest to the dance floor date from sixty years ago. “I can’t get rid of them,” he said with a smile, “because they represent the history of this place.”
We sold out of our stock of books at Club Canton, but plan to bring more when we make a presentation at the Livonia Library Civic Center branch on Tuesday, March 4, at 7 p.m.
It’s been 65 years since Little Jimmy Dickens made his debut on the WSM “Grand Ole Opry” barn dance. While the “Opry” has changed over the years, the 92-year-old Dickens seems as spry and witty as ever. While living in Saginaw, Michigan, in 1947-48, Dickens was invited by none other than Roy Acuff, the King of the Hillbillies, to be his guest on the show, after Dickens impressed Acuff during a Michigan appearance.
Dickens’ time in Saginaw revolved around a new radio station, WKNX, where he performed with his band, served as a radio announcer, and assisted with programming. Fiddler Casey Clark worked in similar capacities for the station managers, and Clark and Dickens often shared musicians in the days before they organized their own bands. Tex Ferguson arrived a few months later, and all three groups played shows together in schools, social halls, and a roller rink in Bad Axe. After his guest appearance at the “Opry,” Dickens moved to Nashville with encouragement from Acuff.
The complete story of Jimmy Dickens at WKNX radio Saginaw is covered in Casey Clark’s biography in the book: “Detroit Country Music – Mountaineers, Cowboys, and Rockabillies,” which includes quotes from Dickens himself.
In 1993 Bear Family Records assembled all of Jimmy Work’s records in a double compact disc package, including his earliest efforts made in Detroit for the Trophy and Alben labels. Work also cut all of his Dot records (1954 to 1956) in Detroit. Liner notes author Rich Kienzle and Bear Family’s Richard Weize made some very good guesses at the personnel on these sessions.
From personal conversations with Jimmy Work, as well as a timeline of Casey Clark’s Lazy Ranch Boys assembled from interviews with various members of the band, I’ve pieced together some information that’s probably as close to the truth as a body can get without being there. This information concerns just Work’s activities in Detroit, as I don’t have anything to add to his better documented Decca, Bullet, London, and Capitol sessions. Work’s story appears in the book “Detroit Country Music – Mountaineers, Cowboys, and Rockabillies.”
1945, unknown studio, Detroit, Michigan
Trophy T14 “Those Kentucky Bluegrass Hills” backed with “You’re Gone, I Won’t Forget”
Trophy T15 “Rainy Rainy Blues” b/w “Heart That Steamboat Whistle Blow”
Jimmy Work: vocal/guitar; Dorris Woodruff: electric guitar
Autumn 1948, unknown studio, Detroit, Michigan
Alben 501 “Tennessee Border” b/w “Your Jealous Heart Is Broken Now”
Jimmy Work: vocal/guitar; Dorris Woodruff: electric guitar; unknown: rhythm guitar; unknown: bass
Listen to: Jimmy Work & his Border Boys – Tennessee Border
Circa August 1954, United Sound Systems, Detroit, Michigan
Dot 1221 “Making Believe” b/w “Just Like Downtown”
Dot 1245 “That’s What Makes The Jukebox Play” b/w “Don’t Give Me A Reason To Wonder Why”
Jimmy Work: vocal/guitar; Casey Clark: fiddle; Bronson Reynolds: bass; Buddy Emmons: steel guitar; Chuck Carroll: electric guitar
Ca. August 1955, United Sound Systems, Detroit, Michigan
Dot 1267 “Don’t Knock, Just Come On In” b/w “Let ‘Em Talk”
Dot 1277 “My Old Stomping Ground” (paired with “Hands Away From My Heart”)
Unissued “Blind Heart”
Jimmy Work: vocal/guitar; Casey Clark: fiddle; Bronson Reynolds: bass; Terry Bethel: steel guitar; Donnel Hemminger: electric guitar
Ca. September 1955, United Sound Systems, Detroit, Michigan
Dot 1272 “There’s Only One You” b/w “When She Said You All”
Dot 1277 “Hands Away From My Heart” (paired with “My Old Stomping Ground”)
Unissued “Puttin’ On The Dog (Tom Cattin’ Around)”
Jimmy Work: vocal/guitar; Casey Clark: fiddle; Bronson Reynolds: bass; Jimmy Murrah: steel guitar; Donnell Hemminger: electric guitar
Ca. February 1956, United Sound Systems, Detroit, Michigan
Dot 1279 “Rock Island Line” b/w “That’s The Way It’s Gonna Be”
Jimmy Work: vocal/guitar; Casey Clark: possibly bass; Dick McCobb: piano; Donnel Hemminger: electric guitar; Ted Bay: drums
Ca. April 1956, United Sound Systems, Detroit, Michigan
Dot 1284 “You’ve Got A Heart Like A Merry-Go-Round” b/w “Blind Heart”
Dot 1287 “That Cold, Cold Look In Your Eye” b/w “Digging My Own Grave”
Jimmy Work: vocal/guitar; Casey Clark: fiddle; Bronson Reynolds: bass; Billy Cooper: steel guitar; Donnel Hemminger: electric guitar
It’ll be down-to-earth music the boys will want, and there’ll be longing in the hearts of everyone for the simple, restful melodies of our land. – Smilin’ Red Maxedon [1]
Born August 31, 1910, and originally from Illinois, Maxedon spent some of his youth in Wisconsin and Washington State. [2] Surrounded by a family that included six brothers and four sisters who played guitar, fiddle, and banjo, Maxedon performed at community functions for many years, before leaving home during his teens.
He first broadcast over KFLV radio Rockford, Illinois, northwest of Chicago. From there, he breezed into the Windy City – first at WCFL radio, and then at clear channel WLS, home of the “National Barn Dance” Saturday night jamboree. Maxedon specialized in western songs, inspired by early singing cowboy stars who appeared on the “National Barn Dance” such as Gene Autry, Eddie Dean, Rube Tronson, and Max Terhune. A left-handed musician, Maxedon taught himself to play left- or right-handed guitar and often switched mid-performance for his audience.
Mountain Pete’s Mountaineers
By 1940 the Mountaineers performed daily over WJBK radio Detroit, and every night at restaurants and showcases. Maxedon’s brother Roy, ten years his junior, visited him for a couple of weeks around that time. [4]
“Me and John worked at some tavern in some suburb there. … South of the Border was the name of the tavern. We played there … must have been every night. … We just went around, table to table, singin’. We didn’t have a band or anything. We’d do requests,” he said. [5]
Maxedon, his wife, and their two young boys lived in an apartment downtown. On Thanksgiving Day, 1941, the red headed baritone joined WJR staff with a fifteen-minute solo program that aired mornings at quarter-past five. (Mountain Pete and his Mountaineers remained at WJBK.) By fall 1944, Maxedon also sang with long-time WJR favorites Tim Doolittle and his Pine Center Gang over the radio, three times a week. [6] Perhaps the first folk music singer in Detroit radio, Doolittle had performed on WJR since 1924, when the station’s call letters were WCX. [7]
Listen to: Smilin’ Red Maxedon – I Fell In Love (Arcadia AO-600)
Goodwill Frolic
In October 1944, WJR “the Goodwill Station” introduced “The Goodwill-Billies,” another early morning program. Along with several musicians recently arrived from the South, Maxedon performed Monday through Saturday from five to six o’clock. The group included vocalist Ernie Lee, Bronson “Barefoot Brownie” Reynolds on bass, steel guitarist Jerry Byrd, and fiddler Casey Clark. Lee, Reynolds and Byrd came directly from the Renfro Valley show in Kentucky. Clark moved from WIBC radio Indianapolis, Indiana. WIBC vocal duo the Blue Mountain Girls also joined the show. [8]
In 1945, the Goodwill-Billies started a Saturday night program called the “Goodwill Frolic,” adding “Pee Wee” Linden on accordion. While working with the Goodwill-Billies, Maxedon created a female alter ego, Melba, who appeared in comedy routines with Reynolds’ female alter ego, Barefoot Bonnie.
The Goodwill-Billies proved a popular draw to radio listeners and for personal appearances at fairs and showcases across Michigan. When WJR ended the show in September 1946, Ernie Lee left Detroit for Cincinnati’s WLW radio and its “Midwestern Hayride” Saturday night barn dance. Reynolds and Byrd joined Red Foley’s Cumberland Valley Boys at the “Grand Ole Opry” at WSM radio Nashville, and Clark retired back home to Kentucky. (Clark returned to Michigan the following year.) Maxedon, who began making records for the Arcadia company of Detroit in 1946, returned to WJBK radio.
Next week in part two: Red Maxedon’s recordings, and we answer the question, “What ever happened to Smilin’ Red?”
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Notes
- “John ‘Smilin’ Red’ Maxedon” Mountain Broadcast and Prairie Recorder (September 1944. New Series, No. 1) 23. “The boys” refers to active U.S. soldiers.
- Ibid.
- “Detroit’s WXYZ Wins Showmanship Award” LIFE (December 27, 1937. Vol. 3, No. 26) 50. Original photo cutline read: The WXYZ Mountaineers are heard from coast to coast. No hillbillies, they are city-bred musicians. Director Pete Angel (left) is a former concert violinist, was born in France. His mates hail from Canada, Indiana, Pennsylvania, Russia.
- Mountain Broadcast and Prairie Recorder (September 1940. Vol. 2, No. 1) 11. Maxedon’s early career was documented in a letter he wrote to the magazine.
- Roy “Smiley” Maxedon interviewed by Keith Cady in 2001.“American Folk Tunes” Billboard (Sept. 20, 1947. Vol. 59, No. 37) 121. Mountain Pete’s brother Al played bass. World War II broke up the band, but according to the September 20, 1947, edition of Billboard, “Mountain Pete and His Country Cousins returned to WJBK, Detroit, September 15, and are heard five times weekly …” Band included guitarist, clarinet/saxophone player, accordionist, pianist and vocalist.
- See note 1.
- “American Folk Tunes” Billboard (September 2, 1944. Vol. 56, No. 36) 62. After his original group broke up in 1942 (due to the draft), Tim Doolittle’s Pine Center Gang in 1944 included Al Sager, bass, organ (for hymns) and fifteen other instruments; Paul Henneberger and Joe Pullin, fiddles; Pete Baltrusz, accordion; and vocalist Dottie Leader.
- A more complete story of the WJR Goodwill-Billies appears in the book “Detroit Country Music: Mountaineers, Cowboys, and Rockabillies.”
Following the publication of “Detroit Country Music: Mountaineers, Cowboys, and Rockabillies” at the end of 2013, last year was filled with truly golden times. From musical parties at Club Canton and United Sound Systems, to presenting at the International Country Music Conference in Nashville, Tennessee; from hosting programs at the Detroit Historical Museum and local public libraries to appearances at the Henry Ford; from nice reviews in the Detroit News, Metro Times, Hour Detroit, Bluegrass Unlimited, and Vintage Guitar to radio interviews and an appearance on Channel 4 TV, the reception of the book exceeded our expectations.
Thanks to everyone – and we mean EVERYONE – who wrote, called, met us, and paid any kind of attention to this project.
Visit the Press page for links and details on media coverage.
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We were sad to hear Jimmy Dickens passed away Jan. 2, at the age of 94.
The man’s charisma, heart, and expression combined into a giant personality who everyone loved. When Keith Cady called Mr. Dickens to follow up a short interview he granted backstage at the “Grand Ole Opry” more than a dozen years ago, Dickens was out mowing his lawn. Mr. Dickens climbed off his tractor just to speak with Keith for as long as he pleased, contributing stories about Casey Clark, Buddy Emmons, and Okie Jones, and talking about his gigs with the Mel Steele band, and WKNX radio in Saginaw.
Our sympathies go out to his family, friends, and fans.
Speak with any steel guitar fan, and one name they always know is Buddy Emmons. On Saturday, Sept. 21, starting at 2:30 p.m., the Country Music Hall of Fame in Nashville will host a “concert and conversation” with “the Big E.” If you can’t make the scene in person, check out the live video stream on the Hall of Fame’s website. Although Emmons isn’t planning to perform, the great Duane Eddy, Dan Dugmore, and Hargus “Pig” Robbins will be there for the program.
In 1954, Casey Clark hired Emmons to play with his band in Detroit. Clark had seen him at Buck Lake Ranch in Angola, Indiana, working with Joe Taylor and his Red Birds.
At that age, Emmons was “ready to play any time, anywhere,” he said. [1] Indeed, many veteran Detroit musicians recalled jamming with the teen-aged steel guitarist at jamborees, barn dances, and private homes throughout Detroit.
“I ended up living in Belle Isle park – or a place close to there, because that’s where I tipped a canoe over one time, and lost an expensive watch and rings and all that. So it was close to Belle Isle park,” said Emmons, who settled on the east side, near Clark’s home. “I lived a couple blocks from Casey, for a while. I guess I moved into a house where the tenants were going on vacation for a few months, so I had to stay there until I got on my feet and started looking for another place.”
Emmons lived in Detroit, working with the Lazy Ranch Boys, through mid-1955, when Jimmy Dickens hired him. Read all about the Lazy Ranch Boys, including other stellar steel guitarists such as Jim Baker, Terry Bethel, and Chuck Rich, in the book “Detroit Country Music: Mountaineers, Cowboys, and Rockabillies.”
Congratulations, Buddy!
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Notes
- Buddy Emmons interviewed by Keith Cady in 2007.
What’s the deal with the arts, and specifically music? A person gets interested in the music others are making, learns chords and scales, seeks out training, and with practice and performance, may reach a point where their abilities are recognized as having value, contributing to a community of music makers and music lovers. A few musicians come up with a personal way of playing that sounds different from what’s been played before … Whether that helps or hinders the artist is hard to tell in advance, but with perseverance, some succeed beyond expectations.
During his life, guitarist Al Allen (1927–2020) demonstrated unbridled curiosity combined with grit — although the man often played it cool, in person — and indeed, developed a unique style of touch and tone that his contemporaries regarded with open and friendly admiration. According to Al, it all came together for him when he began playing his “Black Beauty” 1955 Les Paul custom Gibson guitar.
According to Keith Cady’s research, Al’s work in Detroit included playing in clubs, radio, TV, and Detroit-based recording studios with the likes of Chief Redbird, the Lonesome Pine Fiddlers, Boots Gilbert and Chuck Hatfield, Bobby Sykes, Tommy Cantrell, the Davis Sisters (whose hair was often done before performances by Al’s wife Kathy at her salon), May Hawks, Casey Clark (briefly), Danny Richards, Lonnie Barron … You get the idea how popular he was!
Perhaps the earliest recorded example of Al’s picking with his Black Beauty available on a commercial record was Pete DeBree and his Wanderers’ “Hey, Mr. Presley” sung by Jimmy Franklin on Fortune (200). In this rocker, you hear Al’s blend of percussive swing and his guitar’s tremolo. He also recorded during the mid-1950s for Fox Records with the Lucky Lee band, and also with vocal groups the Larados (“Bad, Bad Guitar Man”), and the Romeos (“Fine, Fine Baby”).
Al combined his picking technique, influenced by Les Paul, Tony Mottola, Chet Atkins, as well as Detroit jazz guitarist Bob Mitchell, with the dials on his guitar and amp, as well as a vibrato bar he and Detroit machinist Jack Matthew (1916–1999) created, and eventually patented in 1958. Gibson Guitars ended up licensing and manufacturing the accessory for their guitars.
Here’s an excerpt from a conversation Keith Cady and I had with Al in 2005:
Craig Maki: I wanted to ask you about the [guitar] vibrato [arm]. Were you always a tinkerer? How did you come up with that?
Al Allen: Probably the only guys I seen back then – in the late ’40s and early ’50s – that had one was Chet Atkins and Les Paul. Now, Chet Atkins had one that worked like the one that we made … But what was different about it [Al and Jack’s invention] was, if you pulled the arm up, the strings went up. And you had to push the arm down to make the strings go down. I’m trying to get this right in my head now … Well anyway, it was the opposite of how I thought a vibrato should work. Rickenbacker had a small vibrato – It was either for a banjo, or a four-string guitar, because … you hook up only four strings. Me and Jack started on that one, and we modified that one. And that’s the one I have on my guitar, yet.
CM: That’s the prototype?
Keith Cady: You took it off your [Les Paul] gold top and put it on the black?
AA: After we modified it. I’ve got a picture of it on the gold guitar – a little bitty thing with a handle up there. … I don’t know if you ever heard of Jack L. Matthew? He was my partner on the vibrato. I met him when I first came to town. He was absolutely the best repairman there was (on instruments), in the city of Detroit.
KC: Did you meet him at a show, or did you take something to him for a repair?
AA: I probably took something for him to work on. We got to be very good friends. We had parties and would go out to dinner almost every week. … He was a genius at that stuff. He was in charge of four plants that his brother owned. Honing stuff. … So help me, I’ll swear to you: He could have been a Leo Fender on guitar stuff. He made some guitars and sold them in Detroit. He put pedals on Don Tannison’s steel [guitar], and a whole lot more.
CM: What led you guys to get a patent and go into business [together]?
AA: He did most of the work, and I did most of the paying for the patent papers and everything. … I would try it out, and if there was something I thought was wrong, he’d be able to fix it.
CM: So you were the guy who tested it, and he would make adjustments to it.
AA: More or less, yeah. After we licensed that vibrato to Gibson, we came up with one even better than that one. Much, much better! But there was a span of about five or six years, I think … and we took that one up to Gibson. But they didn’t want to change, because they spent a lot of money on building the one they had going. … Well, they sold them from ’59 until about ’63.
In 1958 Al began a collaboration with local singer and songwriter Jack Scott, for Carlton Records. Al’s guitar featured prominently on the recordings, and Jack’s first single, “Leroy” backed with “My True Love” became a hit gold record. Al and Jack both had unique approaches to making music, and when one heard a Jack Scott record come on the radio, the vocal and guitar parts made it identifiable almost immediately. Between 1958 and 1960, Jack had fifteen tunes in the Billboard Hot 100, including four in the Top Ten, and a total of nine in the Top 40 charts. Al played his Black Beauty on all of these sessions.
In 1959, Al cut an instrumental single for Carlton (511) featuring his compositions “Egghead” backed with “I’m Beat.” In the age when instrumental guitar pop dominated teen-ager playlists (think Duane Eddy, Link Wray, and so on), Al’s “proto-surf” music received great reviews and earned him and his band “The Sounds” radio and TV appearances around Detroit.
After he left Jack’s band in favor of settling back into his domestic life, Al continued playing this guitar with Detroit-based country acts. He remained much in demand, and had the luxury of choosing the gigs he played … all the way into the early 2000s.
For a more complete story about Al Allen’s music career, look up the chapter about him in “Detroit Country Music – Mountaineers, Cowboys, and Rockabillies.”
I was born to be a bluegrass picker and I really don’t know why I done that [rock’n’roll sessions in Detroit]. [Jack Brown] liked my singin’ and he called in a voice lady to train my voice a little bit. He told me, “Now go in there and sing just like you always sing.” I sang high and low … and she said, “I can’t teach him nothin’! He knows more about it than I do.” — Jimmy Lee Williams [1]
When Jimmy Lee Williams took a job in an auto factory in 1955, he was known among country musicians for playing mandolin with the Stanley Brothers, Mac Wiseman, and the Lonesome Pine Fiddlers. In Detroit, his friends called him “Big Jim Williams” due to his tall stature, but decades later, the name on his records for Michigan’s Fortune and Clix labels made him famous around the world as “Jimmy Lee.”
* * * *
Born on Leap Day, 1932, in Wythe County, Virginia, near the Tennessee border, Williams listened to the region’s string band music on his grandparents’ battery-powered radio, and it inspired him to learn fiddle, mandolin and guitar. His cousin Paul Humphrey (a.k.a. Paul Williams) lived a mile up the road, and the boys often got together to pick and sing. After winning a talent contest at their high school in 1949, WMEV radio host Cousin Zeke hired Williams and Humphrey to perform at his station, located one county over in Marion, Virginia. Late in 1950, the boys rode a bus north to Bluefield, West Virginia, where Ezra Cline was holding auditions for his Lonesome Pine Fiddlers. When Cline asked what they called their act, the boys replied, “The Williams Brothers.” According to Humphrey: “We were on WHIS [radio]. It was 5,000 watts … which was pretty good. … We was on there every morning. Jimmy and Paul, the Williams Brothers, and Ezra Cline and the Lonesome Pine Fiddlers. We did that almost two years. [Then] Jimmy went to work with Mac Wiseman. [The Lonesome Pine Fiddlers] had already auditioned for RCA-Victor and got the contract. That’s why it hurt so bad when Jimmy left, ’cause we had some stuff worked up.” [2]
Wiseman held a show at Bluefield’s Glenwood Park, and Williams replaced Ted Mullins on mandolin a few days after Wiseman’s appearance. Williams performed and recorded (for Dot Records) with Wiseman’s Country Boys until 1952, when he joined the Stanley Brothers (Carter and Ralph) at WCYB radio in Bristol, Tennessee. Besides working the road and radio, the Stanley Brothers cut several sides for Mercury Records while Williams was on board.
Halfway rock’n’roll
In 1955, Williams tired of traveling with the Stanley Brothers and called his brother, who worked for General Motors’ Cadillac factory in Detroit. With his wife and young son, Williams moved to Michigan and started work the morning after he arrived. Outside of the factory, he looked for opportunities to pick with local musicians and jammed with Jimmy Martin, the York Brothers, Frank Wakefield, Ford Nix, Bill Napier [3] and others, but didn’t join any groups.
One day in 1956, Williams met Fortune Records owner Jack Brown and cut a record for the label. Shortly after that session (possibly later that year, or in early 1957), Williams cut another two songs and handed that tape to John Henson of Troy, Michigan, for the earliest-known record issued on his Clix label.
Earlier that year, East Tennessee native Buster Turner cut an unorthodox bluegrass record with electric guitar for Brown (“That Old Heartbreak Express,” Fortune 187) in Detroit. [4] A few weeks later, Brown issued Williams’ first solo record, which sounded like bluegrass musicians playing rhythm and blues. Williams said the musicians he recorded with — at both sessions — were unknown to him, and the music on his records surprised his friends.
At the Fortune studio, located in a seedy section of Third Street, Williams set aside his mandolin for a flattop guitar, and recorded his songs “You Ain’t No Good For Me” and “Sad And Lonely.” Drenched in tape echo, both songs featured electric guitar and a snare drum. In the previous two years, rock’n’roll records steadily gained ground in popularity, and some country musicians, usually with encouragement from their record companies, experimented with the trend. In 1954, Elvis Presley’s first record included a remake of bluegrass monarch Bill Monroe’s “Blue Moon Of Kentucky” with a boogie beat, and rockabilly musician Charlie Feathers, Presley’s neighbor in Memphis, Tennessee, once declared that the rockabilly style was a combination of bluegrass and “cotton patch blues.” [5]
“I knew rock’n’roll was goin’ real big,” said Williams. “I said, ‘Well, mine’s halfway rock’n’roll … and I don’t know what the rest of it is!’ I had a big ol’ guitar with leather wrapped around, and I had my name wrote on it (Jimmy Lee). That record played pretty good there, in Royal Oak [on WEXL radio]. One of the announcers (I think he was pulling my leg a little bit) said, ‘Hey man, that sounds a whole lot like Elvis!’ But I got better sense than that. I just cut the record, and on the side I was pickin’ bluegrass. I never did try to do anything with it.”
In October 1956, a record reviewer at Detroit’s Teen Life newspaper wrote the following: “Another recording artist joining the Elvis Presley gold rush is Jimmy Lee on Fortune. Jimmy is a little high for Elvis. He hits some real high soprano notes that sound like Nolan Strong.” [6]
In lyrics and feeling, his songs express emotions related to separation and isolation, feelings that he may have experienced when he left the Stanley Brothers and moved from the South to work within the confines of a Detroit factory. Compared to mainstream music of 1956, Williams’ performances sound introspective and dark. Williams’ vocal begins low and hits the ceiling during the refrain of “You Ain’t No Good For Me.” The song presents a dialog between a man and a woman (all sung by Williams), with her defiant response to his menacing verses sung as the high part in the refrain.
Second verse:
If you don’t want a lickin’ better sit right down,
Stop that lookin’ at me with that fra-ha-hown
Refrain:
[low] Baby
[high] I-I-I-I don’t wanna
[low] Baby, you ain’t no good for me [7]
Listen to the entire song here.
While his Fortune disk received little attention, the Clix record fared worse. However, it represents an imaginative exploration of rock’s combinatorial possibilities, being one of the first mixed-race rock’n’roll sessions in town. A black vocal group backed Williams and his bluegrass vocal style, along with saxophone, drums, electric guitar, bass, and piano. [8]
One song, “She’s Gone,” features a danceable, uptempo beat, but Williams begins with a startling wail of despair. The refrain ends with, “I’ll never see my darling / She left me all alone.” [9] Listen to the song here.
The flip side, “Baby, Baby, Baby” is a slow blues with a desperate, pleading delivery by Williams trying to convince his woman to return to him. He sings softly, but with a nervous energy that sounds barely contained.
From here to yonder
After the sortie into rock’n’roll, Williams continued building Cadillac cars and picking bluegrass. Then his life took another abrupt turn: “My health got real bad and a preacher came to visit me at the hospital there, in River Rouge. He invited me to come to his church. I told him I didn’t have good enough clothes. He said, ‘You don’t have to worry about that. Just come on.’ I went to his church and gloriously got saved. From that I started writing songs, and went from here to yonder,” said Williams.
Williams listened regularly to country disk jockey and musician Red Ellis on WHRV radio Ann Arbor. One afternoon Ellis aired a Stanley Brothers record on which Williams had played mandolin, so Williams gave him a call. Soon after, the two men teamed up to play and write religious music. From 1958 to 1961, they performed all over Southeast Michigan. With Ford Nix on banjo and Bob Stiltner on bass (who Williams met during his time with the Stanley Brothers), the group recorded more than 30 songs for Starday Records, issued on several extended-play singles and two albums. They also cut singles for local labels such as Pathway, and Happy Hearts.
Williams said he “tore the sheet with brother Ellis” in 1961, and moved back to Bluefield. “I felt the callin’ to go out and preach,” he said. He started a group called Jimmy Williams and the Shady Valley Boys at WHIS radio. From there, he began his evangelistic work. Eventually Williams moved his family to Florida, but he returned to Michigan and cut a couple of high-energy bluegrass gospel albums with Ellis in the early 1970s for Jessup Records of Jackson, Michigan.
By now, Williams’ solo efforts for Fortune and Clix have reached the ears of rock’n’roll and rockabilly music fans around the world. While those records seemed full of raw, emotional yearnings for better times, Jimmy Lee Williams spent his later life communicating spiritual joy with a contagious fervor in his performances, which he kept up until his passing in 2012.
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Notes
- Jimmy Lee Williams interviewed by Keith Cady in 2002.
- Paul Williams interviewed by Keith Cady in 2002. After the Williams Brothers episode, Paul Humphrey was known as Paul Williams for the rest of his career.
- Bill Napier moved to Detroit in 1954 and played mandolin with Curly Dan Holcomb (he later formed an act with his wife: Curly Dan and Wilma Ann) while working in the auto industry. Williams suggested that Napier try out for the Stanley Brothers band, and four months after his first audition, Napier joined them for a spell that lasted until 1960. He went on to work with several others, including Charlie Moore during the 1960s. Napier died in 2000.
- In a 2001 interview, Buster Turner told Keith Cady about playing bluegrass music in Detroit. “We had an electric guitar added in, to play a little more country … slow dancing. Up there [in Detroit], you couldn’t hardly get a job in a bar where they had dancing, if you played bluegrass. But if you had an electric guitar … you could play a little slower music like ‘Tennessee Waltz’ and stuff. That’s the way it was back then, with bluegrass.”
- “Now let me tell you where rockabilly comes from. It comes from the cotton patch blues, and from bluegrass.” Charlie Feathers quoted by Ben Sandmel from his liner notes to the “Charlie Feathers” Elektra Nonesuch (American Explorers) 9 61147-2, 1991 compact disc.
- “Variety Key In New Crop Of R&R Tunes” Teen Life (Oct. 19, 1956) 3. Nolan Strong was the lead singer of a Detroit-based rhythm and blues vocal group called the Diablos, who also recorded for Fortune Records.
- “You Ain’t No Good For Me” (Jimmy Williams) Trianon Publications (Fortune 191, 1956)
- Detroit-based record collector Cappy Wortman once speculated that Williams’ Clix sides were made at the Fortune Records studio with the Five Dollars vocal group.
- “She’s Gone” (Jimmy Williams) True Tone Publishing (Clix 100, 1957)
- Bond, Marilyn, and S. R. Boland. The Birth of the Detroit Sound: 1940-1964. Charleston, SC: Arcadia, 2002.
Click here to read part one. Harold Thomason Harry Thomas Odom was born in Paris, Tennessee, in 1923. A gifted guitarist, his take off (or lead) playing on records was comparable to the best western swing pickers on recordings. He learned his licks from local jazz guitarist Bob Mitchell, playing jazz standards and country throughout his career. Although he played guitar in Detroit for more than three decades (1940s through 1970s), younger generations recognized Odom for his vocal on a risqué novelty called “She Won’t Turn Over For Me,” which first appeared as a jukebox single on Fortune Records subsidiary Renown, performed by Floyd Compton’s Western Troubadours in 1951 (see discography below). In 2001, when this interview was done at his apartment in Detroit, Odom had suffered a stroke and no longer played guitar. He died in September 2010. The following features excerpts from a lengthier conversation. [1]
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Do you remember making those records with Roy Hall?
Yeah. There was a studio and a guy with the records. I played there sometimes with Roy Hall, and sometimes with Freddie Bach. We made some good records. Five or six, and I just heard them. I never did get one of them, for some reason or another. I never did know what happened to them. There was a woman and a man. That woman, she played them for me. He died first.
Fortune Records.
Yeah, down there on Third Street. …
Listen to: Roy Hall and his Cohutta Mtn Boys, feat. Tommy Odom – Freckle Face Gal
Your playing on some of those records was really hot. It had a lot of punch, and it was clean.
I played different with every band. Every band has different music. You gotta learn … The band where I played better was when I was playing twin guitars with Tommy Craig. Boy, we had some good ones. … I worked every damn bar all over. On Third, Second, Woodward. I used to work that bar over there, where Eddie Jackson used to play a lot.
The Roxy?
Yeah. His bass player was …
Bob Norton?
Bob Norton. I went down there to stay with him one night, and two or three days later … Bob Norton used to play with me, over at the West Fort when I was playing over there. … He went to the theater and fell dead. [2]
At the movie theater.
Yeah. It was just two or three days [later]. … I knowed Bob Norton’s younger brother. He used to play sax. But he never did work some. He worked at that big company down there … He was an electrician. He made good money. I used to work with Chief [Redbird], he used to work down there. I used to play down on Third with a guy who went back to Texas. His name was … There was so many guys I played with, I just can’t remember all of them.
You sang on one record, “She Won’t Turn Over For Me.” Do you remember that?
Probably that’s me and Frankie [Brumbalough] singing on that.
It was on a guy’s record named Floyd Compton and his Western Troubadours. It was on Renown Records.
Floyd Compton. I remember that name, but I can’t place what he looks like. …
Listen to: Floyd Compton, feat. Tommy Odom – I Can’t Get Her Started
Another guy that played in Detroit for years and years … He played fiddle and steel. Roy Hall played with him, too. I’ll think of it. A car fell on him, out in the garage, when he was working on it.
Oh, Eddie Jackson told me about him, too.
… Well, his wife put her boyfriend up to it. He pulled the … car off onto him. … They never did prove it, but they knew damn well it was so. She’d go out and stay about eight hours, and you know if she’s going out for eight hours, she ain’t “going out.” It was a put-up job. What the hell is his name? I almost said it. He played all over. He played fiddle at first, then he played steel. He played on 8 Mile. He was playing in Detroit when I was still working at White Castle. That’s how long ago. [3]
Danny Richards used to tell me about him, too.
Danny Richards. Is he still living? … When I played over at the Roosevelt Lounge, Danny was playing there. And this [other] guy who was playing steel guitar, when he died, we went to his funeral. His brother, he came over here …
Was it Whitey Franklin?
Yeah. He died [in 1974]. I played with him. He was a nice guy. …
[About pianist Freddie Bach …] He really got good on that piano. He could play every damn thing … modern songs. … When we first started at Rose’s Bar, he was playing there and we just couldn’t keep him. And then, later on I saw him, and he was like Liberace. It’s like me. Bob Mitchell taught me all them runs and everything. But his fingers was twice as long as mine. Bob would make a chord, and my fingers could make just half of it. Bob, he’d make them long reaching chords, and I’d have to jump back and forth [on the frets]. I couldn’t play it like him, ’cause he could reach it all. But I could reach some of them. I learned to stretch my fingers.
Last five years, I’d go to [my brother’s] and he’d say, “You can strum on my guitar.” I hurt my fingers when I tried to mash the strings down. I said, “That guitar ain’t no good.” He said, “I can play it.” He could play it okay, and he could mash ’em down. He plays some every day. I couldn’t play it like I wanted to, so I said, “To hell with it.” I could play anything I wanted until that damn stroke. …
For how long did you play with Frankie Brumbalough? Did you guys play together for a few years?
We played together … We went to work at that … eventually it was the Caravan, but it used to be another place out there. I used to go up Livernois and turn right. … They got that highway there.
The Davison?
Davison. There used to be a bar down there. That’s where a lot of them used to play. I think that’s where Eddie Jackson played.
Six Mile and Davison.
Yeah. I played out there. … A brother of mine (he’s dead now), he went in there one time, and he told the [bartender], “Tommy told me to come by here and get fifty dollars.” “Okay.” He didn’t know my brother, but he just give it to him. I didn’t know a thing about it. When he complained to me, “I’m short fifty dollars,” I said, “What the hell are you talking about?” He said, “You sent your brother out here after it.” I said, “My brother? Who?” He said, “Lewis.” I said, “Lewis? I didn’t send him.” I didn’t say a thing, but I knew what was up. He needed fifty dollars [to take a woman out for a date]. And he knowed where to get it. [laughs]
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Discography
Roy Hall and his Cohutta Mountain Boys “The Dirty Boogie” b/w “No Rose In San Antone” (Fortune 126, 1949)
Roy Hall and his Cohutta Mountain Boys “The Dirty Boogie” b/w “Okee Doaks” (Fortune 126, 1949) [4]
Roy Hall and his Cohutta Mountain Boys “Never Marry A Tennessee Gal” b/w “We Never Get Too Big To Cry” (Fortune 133, 1949)
Roy Hall and his Cohutta Mountain Boys “Five Years In Prison” b/w “My Freckle Face Gal” (Fortune 139, 1950)
Roy Hall and his Cohutta Mountain Boys “Mule Boogie” b/w “Old Folks Jamboree” (Bullet 704, 1950)
Roy Hall and his Cohutta Mountain Boys “Turn My Picture To The Wall” b/w “Ain’t You Afraid” (Bullet 712, 1950) [5]
Floyd Compton and his Western Troubadours “She Won’t Turn Over For Me” (vocal by Tommy Odom) b/w “Careless Lover” (vocal by Floyd Compton) (Renown 5002, 1951) [6]
May Hawks “Jealous Love” b/w “Year After Year” (Fortune 173, 1953) [7]
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Notes
- Tommy Odom interviewed by Keith Cady and Craig Maki in 2001.
- Eddie Jackson said he thought that Norton had a heart problem that caused his death.
- The musician’s name was Taft “Rosebud” Blevins.
- Fortune 126 was issued twice, with different songs backing “The Dirty Boogie.”
- In Keith Cady’s 2001 interview with Bud White, White said Odom traveled with the Roy Hall band to Nashville for the recording session for Bullet.
- It sounds as though Tommy Odom also played guitar on the Compton record, when he wasn’t singing (between verses, and on the song by Floyd Compton). Around 1941 the Detroit-based Universal label issued “She Won’t Turn Over For Me” (masters 114/115 together on one 78 rpm disc) by local pop singer Chick Fowler, backed by a hot jazz band. The guitarist on Fowler’s record sounded very much like Odom’s friend Bob Mitchell, who may have introduced the song to him. Bob Mitchell’s story is included in the book, “Detroit Country Music: Mountaineers, Cowboys, and Rockabillies.”
- Due to his association with Roy Hall at the time, Odom could have played on Fortune 173. The band sounds like Hall’s.
According to Skeeter Davis, she and Betty Jack made several recordings as demonstrations for Dorothy and Jack Brown of Fortune Records in Detroit. To her surprise, the Browns issued records of these (see below). [2] In addition, a WJR engineer cut radio broadcast transcriptions of the Davis Sisters on disc, and sent several to Skeeter Davis following Betty Jack’s death August 2, 1953. [3] Working with Skeeter Davis, in 1993 Bear Family Records of Germany issued a double compact disc set, complete with the Detroit and RCA Victor recordings. [4]
Based on our research and interviews, here is a list of the musicians involved in the Davis Sisters’ Detroit recordings, which we believe is more accurate than the Bear Family discography included in their compact disc set. The stories of these musicians (as well as Casey Clark) are included in “Detroit Country Music: Mountaineers, Cowboys, and Rockabillies.”
More “that” you’ll ever know
We also present a sample from a home recording of a radio broadcast of “I’ll Never Be Free,” a C&W hit by Tennessee Ernie Ford and Kay Starr when the Davis Sisters performed it on the “Big Barn Frolic” in 1953. As far as we know, the Davis Sisters did not record the song in a studio.
Late 1952, Dairy Workers Hall, 15840 Second Avenue, Highland Park, Michigan
Betty Jack Davis: vocal; Mary Frances “Skeeter Davis” Penick: vocal; Roy Hall: piano; Bud White: rhythm guitar; Harvey “Flash” Griner: bass; Myrl “Rusty” McDonald: fiddle
“It Wasn’t God Who Made Honky Tonk Angels”
“Jambalaya”
“Just When I Needed You”
“Tomorrow’s Just Another Day”
[WJR radio broadcast transcriptions]
Late 1952, possibly WJR radio studio, 3011 West Grand Boulevard, Detroit, Michigan
Betty Jack Davis: vocal; Mary Frances “Skeeter Davis” Penick: vocal; Roy Hall: piano; Bud White: rhythm guitar; Harvey “Flash” Griner: bass
“Tomorrow I’ll Cry”
Late 1952 or early 1953, possibly WJR radio studio, 3011 West Grand Boulevard, Detroit, Michigan
Betty Jack Davis: vocal; Mary Frances “Skeeter Davis” Penick: vocal; unknown: guitar
“Takin’ Time Out For Tears”
Listen to: Davis Sisters – Crying Steel Guitar Waltz
Early 1953, Dairy Workers Hall, 15840 Second Avenue, Highland Park, Michigan
Betty Jack Davis: vocal; Mary Frances “Skeeter Davis” Penick: vocal; Chuck Hatfield: steel guitar; Betty Lee “Boots” Gilbert: bass; Al Allen: electric guitar; Myrl “Rusty” McDonald: fiddle
“Crying Steel Guitar Waltz”
“Rag Mop” (vocal trio, with Boots Gilbert singing lead)
“Your Cheatin’ Heart”
[WJR radio broadcast transcriptions]
Early 1953, Fortune Records, 11629 Linwood Street, Detroit, Michigan
Betty Jack Davis: vocal; Mary Frances “Skeeter Davis” Penick: vocal; Roy Hall: piano; Leon Benson: rhythm guitar; Cliff Southers: steel guitar
“Jealous Love”
[Issued on Fortune 170, backed with “Going Down The Road Feeling Bad” by Roy Hall. “Jealous Love” also appeared on 4-Star 1630, backed with “Firecracker Stomp” by Jimmie Lane (not a Detroit artist)]
Early 1953, Fortune Records, 11629 Linwood Street, Detroit, Michigan
Betty Jack Davis: vocal; Mary Frances “Skeeter Davis” Penick: vocal; Chuck Hatfield: steel guitar; possibly Ezra Cline: bass; Paul Williams: rhythm guitar; Curly Ray Cline: fiddle; Al Allen: electric guitar
“Heartbreak Ahead” (Undubbed Version)
[Issued on Fortune 175, backed with “Steel Wool” by Chuck Hatfield and his Treble-Aires]
Listen to: Davis Sisters – I’ll Never Be Free
Early 1953, Fortune Records, 11629 Linwood Street, Detroit, Michigan
Betty Jack Davis: vocal; Mary Frances “Skeeter Davis” Penick: vocal; Chuck Hatfield: steel guitar; Betty Lee “Boots” Gilbert: bass; Dorothy “Dee” Cardis: rhythm guitar; Victor Cardis: fiddle; Al Allen: electric guitar
“Kaw-Liga”
“Sorrow And Pain”
[Both songs issued on Fortune 174.]
Early 1953, unknown studio (possibly United Sound Systems), Detroit, Michigan
Betty Jack Davis: vocal; Mary Frances “Skeeter Davis” Penick: vocal; Chuck Hatfield: steel guitar; Betty Lee “Boots” Gilbert: bass; Dorothy “Dee” Cardis: rhythm guitar; Victor Cardis: fiddle; Al Allen: electric guitar
“Sorrow And Pain” (Fast Version)
“You’re Gone” (Swinging Version)
Postscript
A couple of Detroit musicians and fans have stated the Davis Sisters recorded “I Forgot More” in Detroit. A copy of the song pressed on a Detroit label (such as Fortune Records) remains elusive. Perhaps a demonstration record was made in Detroit, before the girls cut the song in Nashville at their first session for RCA Victor.
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Notes
- “I Forgot More Than You’ll Ever Know” backed with “Rock-A-Bye Boogie” by the Davis Sisters (RCA-Victor 5345, 1953)
- Skeeter Davis. Bus Fare to Kentucky, the Autobiography of Skeeter Davis (Secaucus, N.J.: Carol Pub. Group, 1993)
- After Betty Jack’s death, Skeeter continued the Davis Sisters act with Betty Jack’s older sister Georgie.
- Davis Sisters Memories. Bear Family BCD15722BH, 1993. Compact disc.
- Photos from “The Singing Sweethearts – Story of the Davis Sisters” Hoedown magazine. Artist Publications, Inc. Cincinnati, Ohio. (Oct. 1953. Vol. 1, No. 2) 20, 24
