1 March 2006
FARON FIFTY-FOUR YEARS AGO: Faron’s first Capitol Records recording session took place in the Castle Recording Studio in Nashville’s Tulane Hotel on Saturday, March 1, 1952. Floyd Cramer and Jimmy Day, Faron’s bandmates in Shreveport, came to Nashville, as did Faron himself. They were all members of Webb Pierce’s band and they had to get back to Shreveport to be on the Hayride. It’s too bad the Capitol session wasn’t filmed for historical purposes, but who knew at the time what fame this group of men would achieve? Chet Atkins, Lightnin’ Chance, and Tommy Jackson were three of the sidemen.
INTERVIEW: One of the songs Faron recorded on that first session was “What Can I Do With My Sorrow.” I called Tommy Hill, the song’s writer, in 2000. He said Faron recorded the song “probably because he liked it.” Tommy pitched Faron about twenty songs, and had to give half writer’s credit for Faron to record it. “That was the thing back in those days,” Tommy said. “You couldn’t get it done unless you’d give half of it away.” I always ask if there’s a story behind writing a song. Not for this one, there wasn’t. “I just set down and write,” Tommy said. “Me and a bottle of Jim Beam wrote most of ’em. I’ve had 182 songs recorded. I had the song of the year with Webb Pierce in 1954–Slowly.”
LETTERS: Moragh Carter writes from the UK, “I have been reading with great interest your articles about Faron Young on Doug Davis’ newsletter. Then yesterday I was reading through some of Jack Blanchard’s back essays on his website http://www.jackandmisty.com/.” He found a story about Faron on the Essays page. It’s called “A Quick Faron Young Story” by Jack Blanchard, and is dated January 20, 2001.
WEB SITE: The Alabama Music Hall of Fame has a biography of Jimmy Day at http://www.alamhof.org/dayjim.htm. While I’m thinking of steel players, Cal Sharp, who played steel for Faron for almost a decade, has a Deputy photo album posted at http://www.calsharp.com/music/Photos3.html.