Fred Shannon
From:
Rocking "S" Ranch, Comancheria, Texas, R.I.P.
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Posted 10 Dec 2003 5:09 am |
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This player found himself breathing Southwestern Oklahoma air in 1931. Born in the country that spawned folks that were written about in such books as Steinbeck's novel "Grapes of Wrath", the family settled between the forks of the Red River once claimed by Texas. But a Supreme Court decision decided the locale belonged to Oklahoma. This player said Oklahoma lost the case and had to take it. In any case his grandparents were pioneers in the Indian Nation.
He bought his first guitar at age 14 for the heavy sum of 5 bucks. It didn't take long for him to 'upgrade' the little axe to a 'slide guitar' by adding a steel-nut and a flat bar. He had heard the 'steel guitar' sound on the family's battery powered radio and loved it. He tells me he almost had to make the choice between the steel and regular guitar, because the neck was so bowed a horse could have been ridden between the strings and the neck fretboard.
He first had the luxury of electricity in 1945 after the family moved to town and he ordered a "real steel guitar" from a catalogue, Wards or Sears he's not certain. He says "---probably Wards 'cause only the 'uppity folks' used Sears." He also found out very quickly, after my asking him to provide me some info, the memory fades rapidly, and dimness replaces names, places, and dates. It's called a 'Senior Moment' or perhaps it's synonymous with "Alzheimers or Somepin'" LOL.
From 1946 through most of 1949 at the ripe old age of 16, this cat was already playing music on weekends with local bands for pay. Pretty young for a professional debut. He played on a Saturday night music show at the Day General Store Music Show, in Russel, Oklahoma, and also did duty, stage shows and such, with a radio personality, Jack Wickizer, on KTJS radio in Hobart, Oklahoma. Of course the band made all the veterans' clubs and most of the 'tonks'.
Although he was pretty young, there was another player there, by the name of Roger Miller, who was even younger. He was playing in the same clubs throughout the area, including the Red, White, and Blue Ballroom, better known as the "Red, White, & Fight", in Sayre, Oklahoma.
In 1949 after graduating from high-school, he auditioned and was hired as the steel player for one of the best and most recognized western swing bands in Amarillo, Texas, The Rogers Twins and the Prairie Sons. They had a daily radio show, and played for dances all over the Texas Panhandle and the adjacent part of Oklahoma. Bernie and Boyd Rogers took the chance on a green 18 year old kid and never regretted it. The Rogers Twins were, and still are legends in the state of Texas and California, being inducted into the Western-Swing Hall of Fame in California. Fantastic group, and stiff competition for the band I was playing in at the time, Hoyle Nix and the West Texas Cowboys, another recognized western swing group.
In 1950 he joined the army after the Korean War began and went to Fort Leonard Wood Missouri where he played steel with the Mac Byrd Band for 5 nights a week at the old Wagon Wheel, a club out on Highway 66.
In 1951, after being reassigned to Mineral Wells, Texas he played with a local band at the old Winter-Garden Ballroom. He told me the last night there the crowd was so bad, the bandleader paid him with his 5X Stetson hat because there was no money, and someone stole that before he could get loaded up. Ah, for the life of a musician.
After being discharged in 1952, and a year and a half of stressful civilian jobs, which allowed no time for music, he decided Army life wasn't too bad so he re-enlisted and was immediately transferred to Japan.
In 1955 his group was looking for someone to represent them in the All-Army Far-East Talent Show and he and another soldier by the name of Harold Jenkins put a band together and after auditions won the privilege of representing their Command. They competed as The Cimmarons. They eventually won first place in the Recorded Musical Group category and second place in the Live Performance Musical Group category for the US Army Far-East Command which included Japan, Guam, Korea and the Phillipines. The Cimarrons also recorded a series of programs for the Armed Forces Radio Network.
The Cimmarons, then added more instruments to become a 6 piece band and worked all over the islands. The Cimmarons had become well known because of the All-Army and the Armed Forces Radio shows, so there were more opportunities to work than time available.
In 1956, He and Harold Jenkins returned to the United States together on a USN Troop Transport where they performed the final shows performed by the Cimmarons..
In 1856 Jenkins took a discharge and our player was stationed at Fort Sill, Oklahoma for a time. While there he played steel for the now famous, in Texas and Oklahoma at least, Bill Mack Show in Wichita Falls, Texas. If you were a trucker you would instantly recognize Bill Mack as radio's Midnight Cowboy, the announcer on radio's Country Crossroads, and finally Mack became known as the writer of the songs "Blue", and one of my favorites "Drinking Champagne". These shows were really like a classic tent show. The musicians would walk through the audiences hawking Mack's records.
One of the shows was at Craterville Park, Lawton, Oklahoma, and the "star" appearing with them was one Smilely Burnett, aka as "Frog Millhouse" in the old Gene Autry movies. The gentleman was a very talented pianist and vocalist and wrote several of the songs recorded by Autry. Burnett sold them to Autry for 5 bucks apiece according to our player.
After being "washed" from pilot training because of a high frequency hearing loss, (that'll teach him to play with the volume set lower), he went to the Armed Forces Examining and Recruiting Station in Oklahoma City. A blessing in disguise because he began playing with some bands there which expanded his musical prowess. Some of those folks included: Lloyd Rogers and The Western Swing Masters at the Palladium Ballroom, Glen Eddy and the Nightriders at the Trianon Ballroom, Tommy Bynum and the Southwesterners at the Aragon Ballroom, Tex Wayne, Charlie Shaw, Red Zellner, and Leon "The Demon" Wright Combo.
The Elvis Rockabilly era hit in the middle 50's and steel guitar requirements became scarce. In 1957 our player put his steel in the closet and started playing bass with Leon Wright. They had a tenor sax, piano, bass, drums and the vocalist of the century "Little Miss Clay the Steamheat Girl" on the program. One of the first integrated bands on the circuit, they would generally return to Oklahoma City after any gig out of town because blacks weren't welcomed in most of the hotels/motels. No problems, however, between white and black musicians. That respect is shown nearly everywhere I've played though.
In 1959 he was transferred to Korea and helped form a band known as the Country Gentlemen and they too won all the annual competitions for the 1959 US Army Pacific Entertainment Contest. Their vocalist was one Mac Curtis who after leaving the Army continued with an entertainment career and is currently a radio personality on one of the FM radio networks in Texas. A little "lagniappe" (that's Cajun for "something extra without pay") Curtis is also a member of the Rockabilly Hall of Fame.
In 1959 our player, while reading a trade magazine, recognized one "Harold Jenkins", with a million seller rock and roll song, as being now famous CONWAY TWITTY. They would later rejoin their friendship and playing abilities in Oklahoma City. The two remained good friends until Conway's untimely death.
After returning to Oklahoma City, our player filled in with Merl Lindsay's Oklahoma Night Riders, but because of his Army affiliation, he was unable to be with them full time. But the impression he made as a steel guitarist would provide for a later opportunity with the group, which he grabbed.
In 1961, the Army took him back overseas to Okinawa where he worked with several bands, but primarily with staff band at the Topper NCO Club Grand Ole Opry, and seven nights a week with Pat Patterson and the Sons of the South. Here, too, he traded in his old Fender Custom three neck steel, and bought a Fender 1000 from a dealer in the states. His first pedal steel guitar.
It was also here in Okinawa he played with a great guitar player, Jerry Haddock, who returned to the states and was touring with the Merl Lindsay Ozark Jubilee Band. Our guy returned to Oklahoma and started playing with the Lindsay group. This was in November 1963, and Merl's headquarters was at his club---Lindsay-Land---in Oklahoma City, but the group toured from El Paso, Texas to Sioux City, Iowa, and all points in between. They also played many package shows with such folks as Jimmie C. Newman, Homer & Jethro, Billy Walker, and many others. They also worked some of these shows with Hank Thompson, although Thompson always used his own band. In '64 Merl was diagnosed with cancer and couldn't travel so the band completed the remaining dates and eventually disbanded in 1965. Merl also died that year.
Needing job security because of a growing family, and looking into the retirement aspect of his life our player went to work for the Oklahoma City Fire Department where he rose in the ranks to be a super supervisor before his retirement. Music had to be part time and finally after playing several gigs , including the Diamond Ballroom Staff Band---largest in Oklahoma City--where such notables as George Morgan, Roy Drusky, Stonewall Jackson, and others heleft the Diamond, he hooked up and played with the now "Famous Amos Hedrick" and the Western All-Stars at the Aragon Ballroom. As some of you might know, Amos was the band manager and fiddle player with Hank Thompson's Brazos Valley Boys. He was also one of the arrangers on many of Thompson's albums.
Later in 1964 he joined the Henson Cargill local television show and he worked on many of Henson's out of town shows. Henson offen referred to the band as the "Comanche County Car-Strippers, real live musicians---come see 'em in their cages."
Never a dull moment around Cargill.
In 1965, his friend Harold Jenkins, now known as Conway Twitty, and who had now been a successful rock & roll personality for several years, decided to return to country music and he moved to Oklahoma City to make a new start. Our player worked with his band, The Lonely Blue Boys, while he was making the transition, but since our guy had recently begun a new career with the Oklahoma City Fire Department, his freedom to travel with the band was limited.
As Twitty's new country records became popular, and he became more in demand for bookings, our player eventually had to make another decision, i.e., whether to stay with his career with the Oklahoma City Fire Department, or whether he wanted to be a full time musician. Ah yes, a point I'm sure many or you have also faced. Boy am I glad I made the right choice--I would have hated to have to compete with some of you as a touring pro. Conway eventually moved to Nashville and in 1968 hired steel-player John Hughey, whose style became the identifiier of Conway’s records. It was a decision that worked out well for everyone.
In 1966 Gene Sullivan, of the Wiley & Gene comedy team who wrote and recorded the song, “When My Blue Moon Turns To Gold Again”, owned a recording studio in Oklahoma City, and our player was called occasionally to record with some of his clients. On one of those sessions he played on a demo for a young vocalist named Jack Lee that began a long time friendship and one of our guy's longest working relationships. He played steel with Jack Lee & The Drivers until 1970 when he stopped playing music altogether to focus on his career with the Oklahoma City Fire Department, and to attend college during his off-duty hours. The shame of it, he was not involved in music in any way from 1970 until 1984 when he retired from the Fire Department.
In 1984, after retiring from the Oklahoma City Fire Department, he began playing again. Some of the bands he started playing with were: Gene Dorrough and his Cherokee Valley Boys, The Oklahoma Land Band, Russell O’Neal & The Western Strings,
The Klopfensteins Family Band, The Back-Porch Jamboree in Kingfisher, Oklahoma, The Saturday Nite Jubilee in Harrah, Oklahoma, The Preservation Playhouse Theater in Guthrie, Oklahoma, and has appeared in many shows in the Oklahoma area.
Some of those shows are: "Country Cool & Classic" Branson style music show, "Take Me Back To Tulsa" a musical/drama production about the life of Bob Wills,. "Hot Country" Branson style music show, Kandi Johnston, a Los Angeles based recording artist, The Trolley Town Music Hall, a country & gospel music show, El Reno, Oklahoma.
Finally I must inform you that in 2003 he has recorded two albums, both available from Bob Lee here on the Forum, and better steel guitar you'll not hear for a long time. You'll also be impressed with the back up band involved.
Well, it's a long one, but it is only indicative of the long career this fantastic person, both on and off the stage, has had. I hope you enjoyed reading it, and in reality I can tell you I have never had the pleasure of shaking this gentleman's hand, but as a Texan facing an Okie, I can tell you it would be a pleasure. And before I see the Great One, I swear it will be a happening. Too many things and people in common to keep us apart. We're both frustrated cowpokes who happen to love the same instrument.
Any Guesses??
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The spirit be with you!
If it aint got a steel, it aint real
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