Gabby's Gold: Anecdotes of Classic Country Music Artists, Writers and Musicians

Gabby’s Gold:

Anecdotes of Classic Country Music Artists, Writers and Musicians

by Ken Tyson

Copyright 2003 by Ken Tyson

Smashwords Edition, License Notes

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

Introduction

The Man

The Radio

The Music

The Writers and Musicians

The Artists

Friends of Gabby

Tom T. Hall

Jesse McReynolds

Ronnie Reno

Billy Dean

Dave Williamson

John Hughey

Doug Jernigan

Russell Sims

Randy Harrell

Johnny K

Ron Patrick

Buck Jones

Larry Bullock

Wayne Martin

Jimmy Miller

Jim Hobbs

Jay Newsom

Joe Smith

Bob Sims

Rudy Jones

Fred Butch Burns

Charles E. Miner, Jr.

Tom and Sherry Tointigh, Sr.

Gospel Encore

INTRODUCTION

I often felt I was in a Norman Rockwell painting. I’d turn on the radio, sit on the floor in awe next to his chair, and listen with eager ears as my grandfather would recount stories and anecdotes of the lives and careers of the writers and singers whose melodies flowed out of the radio speakers. I was bewildered the way music, and life in general, has changed since the good ol’ days.

This became a regular vision of mine for several years as I listened to the refreshing sounds emanating from a locally owned radio station in the small northwest Florida city of Quincy. I found myself anxiously waiting for the next night when I could be transformed into an era of my youth where rapidly fading memories were quickly being replaced by the process of aging.

I relived the many Saturday nights of my childhood that I visited the crossroads town of Miccosukee, Florida, my first experience with sawdust-covered floors, dancing, bands, and singers. I idolized the musicians. I would take a ladder-back chair and sit amongst the band hoping the audience would think I was a band member.

Memories, nearly forgotten until a few years ago, rekindled by a disc jockey known on the radio as Gabby. His homey voice enlightened my life with entertaining tales and tidbits of the singers, writers and musicians he shared with his listeners between playing the songs.

Gabby’s love of classic country music is evidenced by his tireless promotion of a style of music that appears in recent years to have been transforming into a newer form of country music greatly influenced by rock and roll writers and musicians.

His loyal listeners call in their song requests and are frequently rewarded as Gabby mentions the requestor’s name on the air before he plays the song. It may be Miss Blue Eyes on her way home from shopping, the gang at such-and-such hunt club sitting around the campfire listening to the golden oldie classic country songs, or for the high sheriff, the county sheriff who is on the streets serving the public that night.

Gabby is sometimes so touched by the words of a song, the musicians doing the pickin’, or just the fact that a particular song would be unlikely to find its way into the play list of today’s country music stations that he will sometimes play the same song twice in a row. He may play the same song done by two different artists, or he may play different tunes by the same performer two, three, or even fours songs in a row, a practice virtually unheard of in today’s corporate-owned radio stations.

His shows are mostly arranged around either listener call-in requests or a spotlight artist, where he focuses on a particular artist for the night.

Gabby’s immense family of listeners to his radio show is treated twice weekly to Gabby’s Gold, and Saturday nights are filled with Bluegrass Country. He has an extraordinary library of classic country albums and is rarely unable to fill a listener’s request. If a listener has trouble recalling a song title, Gabby will ask them to sing or recite a line or two from the song. With his extensive knowledge of country music he has an astonishing track record of filling requests.

His rapport with his loyal listeners is unparalleled and evidenced by the constant ribbing between himself and the morning disc jockey at the radio station, as well as life-long friends, musicians, frequent callers and others in the country music business. If he experiences an equipment malfunction, he jokingly blames the morning disc jockey for eating potato chips and getting crumbs and grease on the equipment.

Gabby may play a song ahead of previously unplayed requests because he knows the caller is in his jammies preparing for bed and he wants to make sure the listener hears the song before retiring.

Wherever he goes Gabby spreads warmth with a smile and a kind word and shares love through music, a medium all cultures reverently treasure. His passion for classic country music is his life. He is a walking encyclopedia of tidbits and anecdotes in all areas of the industry from that era.

This book is a project I did not want to end. Each person interviewed was very approachable and enthusiastically talked to me about a topic that is, or was, his life. Not one person refused an interview, had an inflated ego or appeared too busy to talk, as is frequently the case when trying to approach a person after a show while they’re surrounded by managers and security personnel. And, of the scores of people interviewed, there was not a single negative or derogatory comment about Gabby.

Surely, it’s impossible for Gabby to recall a lifetime of experiences in just a few short months of being interviewed for this book. As daily conversation and activities unleash stories lapsed from consciousness, I hope he, and others with similar encounters, will take time to record these enlightening tales for the enjoyment of others and help bring a richer understanding to an art form so entertaining, culturally significant and often spiritually revealing.

So let’s tune in to Gabby’s Gold.

THE MAN

I was born and raised on a 120-acre farm right outside of Chattahoochee, Florida. My dad ran an appliance store and sold outboard motors and appliances and washing machines. He fixed televisions and was an electrician - a local, single-man operation store. I worked with him while growing up and that’s where I learned electronics and engineering.

I went to school in Atlanta, (Georgia) to the Atlanta School of Electronics from the time I graduated (high school) in nineteen fifty-nine until sixty-one. That’s when I really started getting involved in the country music field.

To me, the golden era of rock and roll was the fifties. When the sixties came along, and the Beatles came along and all that influence from England, you started getting a change in the way music sounded. I started listening more and more to country music. That’s where my interest led me.

Through the years I worked at various stations all over the place. Most of it was part-time work. I’ve been in and out of (radio) since 1957. A little small station in Marianna, (Florida) wanted to do some stuff out of Chattahoochee back before we had a radio station. I auditioned and that’s where I really got involved in radio.

When I went to college I started hanging around those guys at the Opry in Eastpoint, (Georgia). I got to meet a lot of those people and it just became so interesting that it’s always been a love.

When I first started in radio I felt like anyone could play a record or be a disc jockey and play music. But if you really wanted to make it interesting you need to say something about the music itself or about the artist. If nothing else, then give the title. A lot of times, you’ve heard on the radio, they’ll play a song and you never know who does it or what’s going on or anything about it.

I was working in a station in Atlanta and one of the guys up there that taught me how to run the control board said, You know, you’ve got a good gift to gab.

I said, Well, you know, it’s just a part of my nature.

And I just got to thinking about it. You need a hook in any business. And I just figured that people would remember Gabby quicker than they would my real name. So I just started using Gabby on the air and it stuck. Everybody that listens says, Well, you’ve got a good handle stuck on you ‘cause you love to talk about it. It’s a gift of gab and I’m talking about something I love which is country music.

When I’m off (work) I listen to a lot of music. People send me albums by the skads. I try to listen to stuff to pick out if there’s some real country involved. Some of it is rockabilly, but some of it is good country music.

I’m a bass picker. As a matter of fact, I’ve been picking bass since I was in high school. I’ve got an old (nineteen) sixty-six model Music Master, which is the short-scaled Fender. I’ve got the strings real low ‘cause I roll it. I thumb pick it to make it sound like a stand up (bass).

When I was about six or seven years old my (uncle) came to visit one weekend and he brought this Silvertone guitar with him. It was an arch top (guitar) and he left it with me to learn to play it. The neck was warped on it and I never could play it - it hurt my fingers. I kept that thing for, I don’t know, ten or twelve years. I don’t know what ever happened to it. I’d just like to have it back because those old late forty, early fifty vintage Silvertone’s are collector’s items now. They were big guitars with a big sound. Some of the artists used 'em back in those days.

Then everybody went to the Martin (guitar) with the round hole. But the arch top was a different kind of guitar all the way around. It was sold by Sears Roebuck. I bought one back in the early seventies and I believe I paid about twenty-eight or twenty-nine dollars for it.

Back in the forties and fifties when we all starting picking, every dime store had Black Diamond strings. They were $2.95 a whole set for a guitar. That’s why we all played Black Diamond strings. And they would turn your fingers green! Back in those days that was a lot of money. I’ve known a couple (of pickers) that took that ol’ wire they used to have on those ol’ wire recorders and they’d string guitars with it. The last two strings - one would sound good and the other one would sound flat because it was too big to tune that high. It wouldn’t last long before it’d break. I’ve done that, too.

I had always wanted to play guitar but I couldn’t get my fingers to work. And I always had sore fingers from trying to mash them strings. So, I got to listening to the bass side of (music). The backbone of a band is the bass or a good set of drums. And I just started playing the bass. I’d sit at home at night and play the bass along with the radio or the record player. That’s how I learned it, self-taught.

I’ve always played by ear. I could play some lead guitar. But I’d rather play the bass because it’s one string at a time and they’re big strings and they don’t hurt your fingers so bad! I don’t like lead bass in a song and I don’t like the bass to be predominant. I think it should be the backbone of a group and keep the beat going.

Back in the early sixties when I was still going to college up in Georgia Tech, I decided to go to Nashville and pick my bass up there with them session players, ‘cause I said that’s a good thing to do. So I took a weekend and went up there to meet some of the people. I met Owen Bradley. And, oh, he was just a super nice guy. To have that magnitude and the clout he had in Nashville! He was just a great person, just an ol’ down-to-earth boy.

And back in, I guess fifty-four or fifty-five, Owen and his brother, Harold, and the people at Decca Records put in a building on Sixteenth Avenue. It was called The Hut. It was a military, old round-top Quonset Hut. And that’s where Decca Records recorded some of the first stereo country songs in Nashville. Before Nashville became Music City USA, Decca Records was one of a few that was there recording in town. A lot of them were still recording out of New York.

Anyway, I stopped in there and I walked in the front, asked the secretary, Is the boss man here, or somebody I can talk to about playing?

She said, Well, there’s Mr. Bradley back there. And I didn’t know Owen Bradley from Adam’s housecat. I had heard the name but I didn’t know him, and it didn’t ring a bell. So I walked in the back and there was a guy sitting at the piano. I found out later that he was an extremely good pianist. He was the director of the NBC Orchestra at WSM that played on all the sessions where you hear the Nashville Strings. And I went back and told him who I was and what I was doing.

He said, Well, you know, we’ve got a lot of good pickers up here in Nashville, and we’re always looking for more. The session people don’t have too long a longevity because they’re working all them long hours. A lot of the stars record at night, from midnight ‘til five in the morning. They live a different life than you and I do. They do their shows at night, they live at night, and they sleep in the daytime.

I told him what I did, and I said, I don’t have a guitar with me or nothing.

And he said, Well, there’s one right over there plugged in to the console. Let me see what you can do. So he put on a track and I played along with it.

He said, Well, that’s not too bad. But let me show you how we do it up here.

And when he got through picking the bass, I said, I better go back home for about ten years and learn.

And he said, Yeah, I would agree. You need a little more polishing. That’s what he said, polishing.

I saw him years later, and his brother, Harold, the one that was top lead guitarist in Nashville and the president of the musician’s union. I talked to him about that day, and he said, Yeah, I remember that old long-legged boy coming in here. Whatchu doing now?

I said, I’m still in radio, still playin’ good music. But, I’ve give up tryin’ to pick with you guys ‘cause y’all are just too good.

He said, Aw, don’t ever give up.

I said, "I’m good enough to play along with the locals and all that. But up here you guys are so tight, and so close on everything. Unless you’ve really got the talent, you don’t need to be going up there."

I was doing MC (Master of Ceremonies) work, working at the radio station and in and out of country music one way or another all the time. I’ve always loved to do MC work. I feel comfortable in front of an audience and I know how to do it. I did that for a couple of summers up at Holiday Isle before they closed it down. And I met a lot of nice people.