Tommy Blake (musician)
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Tommy Blake (musician)
Tommy Blake (born Thomas LeVan Givens, September 14, 1931 – December 24, 1985) was an American rockabilly singer and songwriter active in the 1950s to the 1970s. Regarded as a skilled writer, Blake penned several songs that were later recorded by rock and country music artists, including Johnny Horton, George Jones, and Johnny Cash among others. He also achieved modest success as a recording artist for Sun Records, but failed to record a national hit himself, a fact that frustrated Blake later in his life. Retrospectively, he has received praise for his contributions to rockabilly and was inducted in the Rockabilly Hall of Fame. Early life Blake was born Thomas LeVan Givens in Dallas, Texas in 1931. He never knew his father nor did he develop a healthy relationship with his mother. His troubles continued into his teen years when Blake was imprisoned on statutory rape charges. In 1951, he joined the United States Marine Corps. During his service, he lost an eye, either, as Bl ...
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Dallas, Texas
Dallas () is the third largest city in Texas and the largest city in the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex, the fourth-largest metropolitan area in the United States at 7.5 million people. It is the largest city in and seat of Dallas County with portions extending into Collin, Denton, Kaufman and Rockwall counties. With a 2020 census population of 1,304,379, it is the ninth most-populous city in the U.S. and the third-largest in Texas after Houston and San Antonio. Located in the North Texas region, the city of Dallas is the main core of the largest metropolitan area in the Southern United States and the largest inland metropolitan area in the U.S. that lacks any navigable link to the sea. The cities of Dallas and nearby Fort Worth were initially developed due to the construction of major railroad lines through the area allowing access to cotton, cattle and later oil in North and East Texas. The construction of the Interstate Highway System reinforced Dallas's prominen ...
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AllMusic
AllMusic (previously known as All Music Guide and AMG) is an American online music database. It catalogs more than three million album entries and 30 million tracks, as well as information on musicians and bands. Initiated in 1991, the database was first made available on the Internet in 1994. AllMusic is owned by RhythmOne. History AllMusic was launched as ''All Music Guide'' by Michael Erlewine, a "compulsive archivist, noted astrologer, Buddhist scholar and musician". He became interested in using computers for his astrological work in the mid-1970s and founded a software company, Matrix, in 1977. In the early 1990s, as CDs replaced LPs as the dominant format for recorded music, Erlewine purchased what he thought was a CD of early recordings by Little Richard. After buying it he discovered it was a "flaccid latter-day rehash". Frustrated with the labeling, he researched using metadata to create a music guide. In 1990, in Big Rapids, Michigan, he founded ''All Music Guide' ...
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Tender Years
"Tender Years" is a song written by American country music artist George Jones and Darrell Edwards. It became Jones' second #1 country hit. Background "Tender Years" spent seven non consecutive weeks at #1 and a total of 32 weeks on the country chart. "Tender Years" also made it to the Hot 100, peaking at number 76. Like his previous singles "Family Bible" and " Window Up Above," the recording displayed a more mature, restrained vocal approach from the one that had established him on earlier honky tonk hits such as "Why Baby Why" and "White Lightning". In the liner notes to the 1994 Mercury compilation ''Cup of Loneliness: The Classic Mercury Years'', country music historian Colin Escott argues that "Tender Years" "just about defined the territory he carved out as his own in the years ahead. 'Window Up Above,' ' Color of the Blues,' and 'Accidentally on Purpose' had all hinted at the same direction, but on 'Tender Years' the song, the production, and the performance came toget ...
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Johnnie And Jack
Johnnie & Jack were an American country music duo, composed of Johnnie Wright (1914–2011) and Jack Anglin (1916–1963). The duo became members of the Grand Ole Opry in the 1940s. Between 1951 and 1962, the duo released several singles on the RCA Victor Records label, including their version of "Goodnite, Sweetheart, Goodnite" which peaked at No. 4 on the Best Seller charts, and the No. 1 "(Oh Baby Mine) I Get So Lonely". Following Anglin's death in a car accident in 1963, Wright became a solo artist, topping the country charts in 1965 with "Hello Vietnam". Discography Albums Singles References * * Johnnie & Jack biographyat Allmusic AllMusic (previously known as All Music Guide and AMG) is an American online music database. It catalogs more than three million album entries and 30 million tracks, as well as information on musicians and bands. Initiated in 1991, the databas ... Notes {{DEFAULTSORT:Johnnie and Jack American country music groups Country music d ...
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Carl Belew
Carl Robert Belew (April 21, 1931 – October 31, 1990) was an American country music singer and songwriter. Belew recorded for Decca, RCA Victor, and MCA in the 1950s through 1970s, charting 11 times on Hot Country Songs. He also wrote singles for Johnnie & Jack, Eddy Arnold, Jim Reeves, and others. Career Born in Salina, Oklahoma, Belew's musical career began in the 1950s when he performed on the Louisiana Hayride. He signed to Decca Records by the end of the decade, reaching number 9 on the country music charts with "Am I That Easy to Forget", which was later recorded by Skeeter Davis, Debbie Reynolds, Esther Phillips, Engelbert Humperdinck, Jim Reeves, and others. Also in this period, Johnnie & Jack recorded Belew's "Stop the World and Let Me Off", while Andy Williams recorded " Lonely Street". Belew's only other chart entry for Decca was the Number 19 "Too Much to Lose", followed by the Number 8 "Hello Out There", his first RCA Victor release, in 1962. He continued to write ...
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Jerry Ross (record Producer)
Jerry Jan Ross (May 1, 1933 – October 4, 2017) was an American songwriter, A&R man, record producer, and record label owner. As a writer, his greatest success was with "I'm Gonna Make You Love Me," which he co-wrote with his protégé Kenny Gamble. His greatest successes as a producer include " Sunny" by Bobby Hebb, and he also released "Venus" by Shocking Blue in the United States. Jerry produced The Mob on their self-titled first album in 1970. Biography Ross was born in Philadelphia, and grew up with aspirations to be a trumpeter and singer before deciding to become a songwriter and record producer. After a period in Armed Forces Radio, he studied at Temple University, and began working at WFIL-TV (later WPVI). When Dick Clark began hosting the TV show ''American Bandstand'', Ross became his booth announcer, and also started hosting Clark's WFIL radio show, ''Caravan of Music''. He set up his own record production and promotion business, Ross Associates, in Philadelphi ...
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RCA Studio B
RCA Studio B was a music recording studio built in 1956 in Nashville, Tennessee by RCA Victor. Originally known simply as "RCA Studios," Studio B, along with the larger and later RCA Studio A became known in the 1960s for being an essential factor to the development of the musical production style and sound engineering technique known as the Nashville Sound. In the two decades the studio was in operation, RCA Studio B produced 60 percent of the ''Billboard'' magazine's Country chart hits. The studio closed in 1977. The studio is located centrally in the Nashville's historic Music Row district. Since 1992 the studio has been under the ownership of the Country Music Hall of Fame, which offers scheduled tours of the facilities. Early history After years of using portable equipment to record projects in various recording facilities around Nashville, in 1954 Steve Sholes and Chet Atkins established RCA Victor's first Nashville recording facility within the Methodist Television Radi ...
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Sam Philips
Samuel Cornelius Phillips (January 5, 1923 – July 30, 2003) was an American record producer. He was the founder of Sun Records and Sun Studio in Memphis, Tennessee, where he produced recordings by Elvis Presley, Roy Orbison, Jerry Lee Lewis, Carl Perkins, Johnny Cash, and Howlin' Wolf. Phillips played a major role in the development of rock and roll during the 1950s, launching the career of Presley. In 1969, he sold Sun to Shelby Singleton. Phillips was the owner and operator of radio stations in Memphis; Florence, Alabama; and Lake Worth Beach, Florida. He was also an early investor in the Holiday Inn chain of hotels and an advocate for racial equality, helping to break down racial barriers in the music industry. Early life Phillips was the youngest of eight children, born on a 200-acre farm near Florence, Alabama to Madge Ella ( Lovelace) and Charles Tucker Phillips. Sam's parents owned their farm, though it was mortgaged. As a child, he picked cotton in the fields with ...
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Hot Country Songs
Hot Country Songs is a chart published weekly by ''Billboard'' magazine in the United States. This 50-position chart lists the most popular country music songs, calculated weekly by collecting airplay data from Nielsen BDS along with digital sales and streaming. The current number-one song, as of the chart dated December 24, 2022, is "You Proof" by Morgan Wallen. History ''Billboard'' began compiling the popularity of country songs with its January 8, 1944, issue. Only the genre's most popular jukebox selections were tabulated, with the chart titled "Most Played Juke Box Folk Records". For approximately ten years, from 1948 to 1958, ''Billboard'' used three charts to measure the popularity of a given song. In addition to the jukebox chart, these charts included: * The "best sellers" chart – started May 15, 1948, as "Best Selling Retail Folk Records". * An airplay chart – started December 10, 1949, as "Country & Western Records Most Played By Folk Disk Jockeys". The juk ...
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Columbia Records
Columbia Records is an American record label owned by Sony Music, Sony Music Entertainment, a subsidiary of Sony Corporation of America, the North American division of Japanese Conglomerate (company), conglomerate Sony. It was founded on January 15, 1889, evolving from the Graphophone#Commercialization, American Graphophone Company, the successor to the Volta Laboratory and Bureau#Commercialization of phonograph patents, Volta Graphophone Company. Columbia is the oldest surviving brand name in the recorded sound business, and the second major company to produce records. From 1961 to 1991, its recordings were released outside North America under the name CBS Records International, CBS Records to avoid confusion with EMI's Columbia Graphophone Company. Columbia is one of Sony Music's four flagship record labels, alongside former longtime rival RCA Records, as well as Arista Records and Epic Records. Artists who have recorded for Columbia include AC/DC, Adele, Aerosmith, Julie And ...
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Session Musician
Session musicians, studio musicians, or backing musicians are musicians hired to perform in recording sessions or live performances. The term sideman is also used in the case of live performances, such as accompanying a recording artist on a tour. Session musicians are usually not permanent or official members of a musical ensemble or band. They work behind the scenes and rarely achieve individual fame in their own right as soloists or bandleaders. However, top session musicians are well known within the music industry, and some have become publicly recognized, such as the Wrecking Crew, the Muscle Shoals Rhythm Section and The Funk Brothers who worked with Motown Records. Many session musicians specialize in playing common rhythm section instruments such as guitar, piano, bass, or drums. Others are specialists, and play brass, woodwinds, and strings. Many session musicians play multiple instruments, which lets them play in a wider range of musical situations, genres an ...
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Chet Atkins
Chester Burton Atkins (June 20, 1924 – June 30, 2001), known as "Mr. Guitar" and "The Country Gentleman", was an American musician who, along with Owen Bradley and Bob Ferguson, helped create the Nashville sound, the country music style which expanded its appeal to adult pop music fans. He was primarily a guitarist, but he also played the mandolin, fiddle, banjo, and ukulele, and occasionally sang. Atkins's signature picking style was inspired by Merle Travis. Other major guitar influences were Django Reinhardt, George Barnes, Les Paul, and, later, Jerry Reed. His distinctive picking style and musicianship brought him admirers inside and outside the country scene, both in the United States and abroad. Atkins spent most of his career at RCA Victor and produced records for the Browns, Hank Snow, Porter Wagoner, Norma Jean, Dolly Parton, Dottie West, Perry Como, Floyd Cramer, Elvis Presley, the Everly Brothers, Eddy Arnold, Don Gibson, Jim Reeves, Jerry Reed, Sk ...
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