Monday, June 18, 2012

Red Garrett - Popa Joe's Place


More hillbilly Country style tune-age from Red Garrett. Again 1956 is the year. This has a real Hank Williams Jambalaya on the Bayou thing going on.

Below taken from hillbilly-music.com

Red Garrett was born in Barston, Tennessee. He developed a fondness for the music with a country flavor early in his life. Later, he formed a band called the "Tennessee Pioneers". He started his singing career in 1945.

A late 1953 magazine article, Cowboy Songs magazine included him as one of the "Stars On the Horizon". It also indicated he was working broadcasts back in Vincennes and Princeton, Indiana. In 1951, folks from the WSM Grand Ole Opry in Nashville had heard of him and sent for him. By 1953, he was still a member of the Opry. During his time with the Opry, he appeared on the same billing with such stars as Cowboy Copas, Eddy Arnold, Elton Britt, Slim Whitman and Webb Pierce among others. He also gathered a following up in Canada.

Around that same time, he signed a recording contract with RCA Victor. His first release for them was "Blame It On The Moonlight" b/w "Don't Be Ashamed of Your Past".

But, shortly after that it seems, another article mentioned he had disappeared from the music scene, but by about 1955, he had come back to performing.

In 1956, he had a record out on the Decca label entitled, "May You Never Be Alone - and A Bed of Roses". The song was a tribute to Hank Williams - it was said he actually imitated Hank when he sang the tune "May You Never Be Alone" but in the middle of the tune, he does a recitation, "and a Bed of Roses". The article that mentioned this tune also told us that the flip side, "Clear Sailing" was "weak."

It appears he also did some songwriting, too as we found he co-wrote a tune with Boudleaux Bryant called "Moon Tan".

We found a hint as to the type of artist he was for they wrote in the article, "..never refused to play in a town just because it was small and lacked celebrities to take notice of him."

http://www.hillbilly-music.com/artists/story/index.php?id=12736


Red Garrett - Popa Joe's Place

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