FEATURED ARTISTS – JACK BLANCHARD & MISTY MORGAN “Things are kind of quiet with us right now,” Jack Blanchard told me last week over the phone. “We’re not doing any traveling.” Jack and his wife, Misty Morgan, are best known for their 1970 hit, “Tennessee Birdwalk.” They aren’t touring right now because they haven’t found […]
NEWS Bobby Vee (1943-2016) Robert Velline, 73, known as Bobby Vee, died October 24 of advanced Alzheimer’s disease, the Associated Press reports. Born in Fargo, North Dakota, he was 15 when a plane crash in Iowa killed Buddy Holly, and a call went out for local acts to do the scheduled show at the Moorhead […]
NEWS Al Dean (1931-2016) Al Dean, 85, leader of Al Dean & the All Stars, passed away in hospice care in San Antonio, Texas, on October 3. “Al had been battling cancer,” Heart of Texas Records president Tracy Pitcox announced. Al formed his first band in 1952 and played dances all over Texas. He is […]
REMEMBERING MARTY ROBBINS ON HIS 91ST BIRTHDAY Martin David Robinson was born September 26, 1925, in a shack on the desert at the edge of Glendale, Arizona. When he died of a heart attack in 1982, he was a 57-year-old country music star known as Marty Robbins. Now, on what would have been his 91st […]
NEWS Hoot Hester (1951-2016) Hubert Dwane “Hoot” Hester, a founding member of The Time Jumpers band and fiddle player with the Grand Ole Opry staff band, died of cancer on August 30. Born on a small Kentucky farm, he spent 43 of his 65 years making music in Nashville. In addition to being a session […]
NEWS Country Music Nation reports, “Only one day after her 59th birthday, we have some heartbreaking news to report about Holly Dunn. The country music icon has been diagnosed with cancer.” The article then quotes from a June 19 interview with Hallels and adds, “News about it didn’t really start circulating until August 22. Country […]
FEATURED ARTIST – SHERWIN LINTON Sherwin Linton is running for President of the United States. His slogan is “You Do Have a Choice” and his platform is “Stop Child Abuse.” He ran once before, in 1980, during the Reagan-Carter faceoff. Although not on the ballot, he received more than thirty write-in votes in his home […]
NEWS TG Sheppard reported on Facebook that last week’s “Stars Behind The Stars” benefit for the Dallas Police raised over $148,000. He posted this photo of himself and Randy Travis:
FEATURED ARTIST – FREDDIE HART “One of the greatest things that ever happened to me” was time in the Marine Corps, Freddie Hart told me when I called him several weeks ago. He was 14 when his parents signed the papers for him to enlist in 1942. He’d already spent a year in the Civilian […]
NEWS Ralph Stanley (1927-2016) On June 23, Ralph Stanley, 89, died peacefully in his sleep at his home in Coebun, Virginia. He had been suffering from skin cancer. Born and raised in southwest Virginia, Ralph and his brother Carter formed a group called the Stanley Brothers and their Clinch Mountain Boys. Carter died of liver […]