Bobby Black (musician)
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Robert Lee Black | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Background information | |
| Born | 1934 (age 89–90) Prescott, Arizona |
| Genres | Western, Country Western Swing, Hawaiian, Bop, Rock, Americana |
| Occupation(s) | Musician |
| Instruments | Steel guitar, pedal steel guitar, piano |
| Years active | 1950–present |
| Labels | Dot/Paramount, MGM, United Artists, Dolton, Warner Brothers, Arista |
| Website | www |
Robert L. Black (born 1934)[1] is an American pedal steel guitarist. He was inducted into the California Western Swing Society Hall of Fame in 1992[2] and the Steel Guitar Hall of Fame in 2004.[3] He was named California Country Music Association's "Steel Guitarist of the Year on four separate occasions, with the last two years being 1986 and 1994.[4] In 2021, Black received the Arhoolie Foundation's Arhoolie Award celebrating America's roots music.[5] He has backed more than 100 major artists in concerts, recordings, radio, television, and stage productions.
As one of the first generation of pedal steel guitar players, Bobby Black is a major contributor to the musical styles of the instrument and one of its primary innovators, expanding the traditional Hawaiian and Western genres in which pedal steel was used to include jazz and rock and roll. During the years he spent playing with Asleep At The Wheel, Commander Cody and His Lost Planet Airmen,[6] and New Riders of the Purple Sage.
Black's first genre was country western music; he also plays rock, pop, jazz, Western swing, West Coast swing, bop, and Hawaiian music. He was a widely sought session musician.[7] He has performed on television and radio programs including the Grand Ole Opry, Prairie Home Companion with Garrison Keillor and West Coast Live (PBS)
Early life[edit]
Black was born in Prescott, Arizona in 1934. His father Robert Black worked for Woolworth's department store. His mother, Ruth, was a homemaker and played piano. Bobby's brother Larry was born in 1936. Both brothers took piano lessons. During his childhood, Black listened to pop and big-band music on the radio. Upon hearing Harry Owens and His Royal Hawaiians, he was taken with Eddie Bush's steel. He was struck by the sound and its sliding notes and decided he wanted to learn how to play the instrument.[1] Black also listened to Western swing as played by Bob Wills and his Texas Playboys and Spade Cooley, whose steel guitar player Earl "Joaquin" Murphey caught Bobby's attention.
In 1947, the family moved to San Mateo, California. In 1948, on his 14th birthday, Bobby received a six-string Rickenbacker steel guitar and amplifier. He took two lessons from a local man who used a Hawaiian tuning different from that used by Bush and others. In 1949, he heard Jerry Byrd's recording, "Steelin' The Blues." Formerly with Grand Ole Opry star Ernest Tubb's Texas Troubadours Ernest Tubb, Byrd at the time was America's most visible, influential country steel player. Black wrote a letter to Byrd, saying that he'd bought Byrd's record. Byrd wrote back and gave Black his C6 pedal steel tuning.
Black tuned his steel guitar according to Byrd's directions and started playing by ear, copying the solos on the records.[1] Thus equipped, Bobby Black convinced his younger brother Larry to learn guitar so that they could play together as an act. He quickly began playing a short-scale Fender Dual 8 Professional, with two eight-string necks and a 22 1/2″ scale.
Career[edit]
1950s–1970[edit]
In 1950, Bobby and Larry Black were invited to join the Double H Boys, playing swing music for dances in San Jose and around Palo Alto. Bobby was 16, Larry 14. This was the first band with whom they played with professionally. The Double H Boys had a band and a weekly radio show in San Jose. They had accordion, trumpet, electric mandolin, but no guitar and no steel. Bobby and Larry's father introduced his sons to the band and told them the boys played steel and guitar. They were invited to sit in and play with them at Austin's Barn out in a field, playing for Stanford students. At least 1,000 people were there, and it was the first gig they ever played live. The boys were offered work with the band immediately, so they were heard by other bands and made a name for themselves before they were 21.
They played regularly in the south Bay Area. In 1951, they joined Shorty Joe Quartuccio and his Red Rock Canyon Cowboys,[8] the house band at Tracy Gardens, a large dance hall where almost anyone of note in the hillbilly/Western swing field played at one time or another. The brothers recorded two singles with the band, the opening act when touring stars played Tracy Gardens. The brothers accompanied local amateurs like a serviceman stationed at nearby Moffett Field known as "Little Georgie Jones, the singing Marine.".
In 1952, Black joined Blackie Crawford and his Western Cherokees while brother Larry stayed at home. Black toured widely during the 1950s with Crawford, traveling in Texas and all over the mid-west. The band, who'd backed Lefty Frizzell and Webb Pierce, relocated to Beaumont, Texas in 1953. As they played Houston and Gulf Coast dance halls, Black bought his first pedal steel – a triple-neck, four-pedal Bigsby (A6, C6, and E13 tuning) with his name inlaid on the front.
Neva's, a Beaumont, Texas club, became the Cherokees' home base. Owner Jack Starnes had just co-founded Starday Records, and used them as house band on the label's early recordings. Black was showcased on a Western Cherokees' single titled "Cherokee Steel Guitar." They also backed singer Arlie Duff on "You All Come," Starday's first national hit, and accompanied George Jones on the Starday session that kicked off Jones' career. Black, homesick, left Texas and returned to California to get married.
Black and his wife settled in San Mateo, and he went to work for Pacific Bell. Larry married soon after and worked at Lockheed. The brothers joined fiddler Big Jim DeNoon's band on the local "Hoffman Hayride" TV show (later renamed "California Hayride"). Hosted by Cottonseed Clark, one of the biggest live shows on television in the Bay Area at that time. DeNoon's band backed local and national acts. As featured instrumentalists, the Blacks played the latest Jimmy Bryant tunes.
The Black brothers put together a band they called the West Coast All Stars, including Jack Greenback, drummer, pedal steel player Pee Wee Whitewing, his wife Doye Whitewing on vocals, bass and guitar player Jimmy Stewart, and later joined by fiddle and saxophone player Louie Tierney from Bob Wills and the Texas Playboys. This created an untenable situation. Both men were holding down day jobs, supporting their families, and working in two bands. The brothers were fired from the California Hayride, and the All Stars disbanded. Western swing's fading popularity led to a temporary loss of popularity for the pedal steel. Rock and roll was becoming the successful popular music, and in 1959, steel guitar's popularity recovered somewhat with the release of Santo and Johnny's guitar-steel pop hit "Sleepwalk."
The Blacks, both divorced, and ex-DeNoon drummer Jack Greenback began writing songs and recording on a two-track Ampex in Larry's bedroom. They shopped the tape around Los Angeles in 1960, and in early 1961, Dore Records issued several vocal singles by The Tides, and the instrumental "Gently My Love" by The Triplets. Gently My Love reached #15 in San Francisco. In an era when disc jockeys routinely demanded that local acts with singles perform shows for free as payback for airplay, "Gently" brought them popularity – and problems. Asked to play a San Francisco concert gratis, the band refused. In one week the single was taken off the air. Black said the band knew nothing about payola.[1]
Dolton, the Ventures' label, issued three instrumentals under the name the Five Whispers from 1962 to 1964, and their eerie rendition of Lionel Hampton's ballad "Midnight Sun" hit #1 in Bakersfield.
When they visited Nashville in 1965, Pete Drake, then one of Nashville's top pedal-steel players, got them signed to United Artists Records. Renamed by the label as U.S. 6, they blended instruments and vocals, and backed up singers in the Bay Area. However, Black was not happy with the material the band was playing and he and his brother took the band back to playing clubs, ultimately becoming the house band at Cowtown.
1970–2000[edit]
At Cowtown, Wednesday Amateur Nights offered a $50 prize. In 1971, contestants included the Lost Planet Airmen, consisting of Bill Kirchen, John Tichy, and fiddler Andy Stein. Stein played a particularly enthusiastic and drag-race winning "Orange Blossom Special". Stein urged Black to join them, to replace the departing steel player Steve Davis (The West Virginia Creeper). He gave Black a copy of their first album, Lost in the Ozone.
Initially Black thought the Cody band was not a good fit. But Stein persisted, and Black joined the band, transforming it from a bar band to a highly polished and professional troupe of musicians.
"When Bobby came in, as far as I'm concerned, that made the classic lineup of the band," said Billy C. Farlow, the Airmen's lead singer. Vocalist John Tichy calls Black's playing "super tight, accurate, professional, and everything perfectly in tune. Every lick, he nailed." Bill Kirchen said of Black "Bobby, for me, was the living link to the past. But he also was the most advanced player in the band.. He was the guy who met Hank Williams, started playing in the '40s on a straight (lap) steel… And on the other hand, he was the best bebop player in the band. It was just extraordinary."[1]
In 1974, Black left the Cody band and moved to Nashville. He played steel for Barbara Mandrell, and then the New Riders of the Purple Sage from 1978 to 1980. He played with Asleep At The Wheel from 1980 to 1981. He then played with the Moonlighters, a Commander Cody spinoff band, and Commander Cody and His New Western Airmen.
2000–present[edit]
Black has worked with the California Cowboys, Robert Gordon, Garrison Keillor's Prairie Home Companion, Bill Kirchen and The Saddle Cats.
Discography[edit]
Albums[edit]
- 1978: California Freedom
- 1980: Honky Cat
- 1984: Skull Orchard by The Black Brothers
- 2001: The Steel Guitar Of Bobby Black
- 2011: Steel Swingin' with Paul Anastasio, Black, Tony Marcus
- 2022: Bobby Black, 70 Years Of Swinging Steel
- Date Unknown: Steel Guitar Paradise
Notable Concerts[edit]
- 1972 Ann Arbor, Michigan with Commander Cody, sharing the bill with John Lennon, Stevie Wonder, and Chuck Berry.
- 1973 Palm Springs, California with Commander Cody, Jerry Reed, & Kris Kristofferson.
- 1973 Harlem, New York City with Commander Cody, opening for the Eagles, and Earth, Wind & Fire
- 1974 New York City, Carnegie Hall, with Doug Sahm
- 1975 Played for President Nixon in Huntsville, Alabama with Barbara Mandrell.
- 1976 Winterland, San Francisco, with New Riders of the Purple Sage, sharing the billing with The Blues Brothers and The Beach Boys.[9]
- 1977 Oakland, California, "A Day on the Green" concert with Commander Cody, opening for Elton John & The Eagles.
- 1978 Meadowlands in New Jersey, with New Riders of the Purple Sage, sharing billing with Willie Nelson and The Grateful Dead.
- 1987 With Jerry Byrd at the annual Hoolaulea in Hawaii for the "Best of the Hawaiian Steel Guitarists."
Movie Appearances and/or Soundtracks[edit]
- 1976: "Hollywood Boulevard" (appeared in the movie and on the soundtrack)[citation needed]
- 1977: "Thunder & Lightning" (soundtrack) starring David Carridine[citation needed]
- 1980: "Roadie" (starring Art Carney, Blondie, Meat Loaf (appeared in the movie and on the soundtrack)[citation needed]
Television Appearances[edit]
- Grand Ole Opry
- Don Kirshner's Rock Concert Don Kirshner's Rock Concert - Aired Order - All Seasons - TheTVDB.com, Midnight Special with Wolfman Jack
Radio Shows[edit]
- Big D Jamboree[10]
- Louisiana Hayride[11]
- Prairie Home Companion[citation needed]
- West Coast Live[citation needed]
- Grand Ole Opry[citation needed]
Musical Stage Productions[edit]
- "Cumberland Blues" (1998)[citation needed]
- "Chaps" (1998)[citation needed]
Awards[edit]
- 1992: Inducted into the California Western Swing Society Hall of Fame[2]
- 2004: Inducted into the Steel Guitar Hall of Fame[3]
References[edit]
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 Kienzle, Rich (December 2011). "BobbyBlack: Steel Before and After Commander Cody". Vintage Guitar Magazine. Retrieved 14 April 2022.
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 "Last Name B". www.westernswingsociety.net.
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 "The Steel Guitar Hall Of Fame". www.scottysmusic.com.
- ↑ "Hippies," Hopefuls, and the Hall of Fame : The Steel Guitar Forum". bb.steelguitarforum.com.
- ↑ "The Arhoolie Awards – 2021".
- ↑ Willman, Chris; Willman, Chris (September 28, 2021). "Commander Cody, aka George Frayne, Roots-Rock Band Leader and 'Hot Rod Lincoln' Singer, Dies at 77".
- ↑ https://www.thebalancecareers.com/what-does-a-session-musician-do-2460935#:~:text=A%20session%20musician%20is%20someone,be%20recorded%20at%20that%20session in Nashville
- ↑ Researcher, Hillbilly (March 29, 2010). "HILLBILLY-RESEARCHER: SHORTY JOE".
- ↑ "The Winterland Ballroom - "The Last Waltz" By The Band Recorded Here". History Of Rock Music. December 19, 2015.
- ↑ "TSHA | Big D Jamboree". www.tshaonline.org.
- ↑ "The Louisiana Hayride Show - Most Successful Stage in Music History?". Louisiana Official Travel and Tourism Information.
External links[edit]
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