Posted On: Saturday - April 6th 2024 7:25PM MST
In Topics: Music Race/Genetics
The impetus for this music post tonight, instead of (of course!) something from Chrissie Hynde and the Pretenders, is a headline I recently read about one Beyonce saying she is the first Black! country singer. Truly I have never knowingly heard a song by this woman, was not sure if her name is pronounced with 2 syllables or 3, and had no idea what she looked like till I saw the thumbnail picture. I will say, black or not, most women look cute in cowboy hats. That doesn't make them country.
Beyonce may or may not be a country singer, but she surely wasn't the first black one. Alarmist, in the comments, mentioned Darius Rucker, former singer of Hootie and the Blowfish ("Hey, you Hootie?") making country music. OK, that's already one point in rebuttal. Maybe the Beyonce fans and internet writers don't know that the 1st famous black country singer was a guy named Charlie Pride. Unlike this Beyonce, who I imagine is all blackety-black in outlook, Charlie Pride came up a regular hard-working guy in White America. He worked in a lead smelter and played pro baseball in the Negro League in highly White 1960s Montana, You had to fit in in Helena and Great Falls, Montana, and Charlie Pride did.
His musical talents led him to a very successful career singing country music. I don't know about Beyonce's music, but Charlie Pride sounds like any other White country singer. Without looking at an album cover, you wouldn't know he was black.
Though Kiss an Angel Good Morning is his most known hit song, I like, and am more familiar with, his cover of Please Help Me I'm Falling, recorded in 1967. It was written by by Don Robertson and Hal Blair in 1960.
Here's a little bit more about Charlie Pride: Per wiki, from his time in the baseball leagues (as a pitcher),
Later that season [1953], while in the Negro leagues with the Louisville Clippers, two players – Pride and Jesse Mitchell – were traded to the Birmingham Black Barons for a team bus. "Jesse and I may have the distinction of being the only players in history to be traded for a used motor vehicle," Pride mused in his 1994 autobiography.That sounds like something one might write about in a country song. Regarding his making music in this particular genre:
According to a news item by the Associated Press, Pride made this comment in a 1992 interview: "They used to ask me how it feels to be the 'first colored country singer' ... Then it was 'first Negro country singer;' then 'first black country singer.' Now I'm the 'first African-American country singer.' That's about the only thing that's changed"Till Beyonce, of course.
... he was booked for his first large show, in Detroit's Olympia Stadium. Since no biographical information had been included with those singles, few of the 10,000 country fans who came to the show knew Pride was Black and discovered the fact only when he walked onto the stage, at which point the applause trickled off to silence. "I knew I'd have to get it over with sooner or later," Pride later remembered. "I told the audience: 'Friends, I realize it's a little unique, me coming out here – with a permanent suntan – to sing country and western to you. But that's the way it is.' "Haha, and yes, they liked both kinds of music at Detroit's Country Bunker, Country AND Western!
The songs sung by Charlie Pride, such as the above example, were pure country, what with the cheating song, the steel guitar, and his voice. Let's face it, Charlie Pride was an honorary White Man.
Thanks for reading and writing in this week, Peakers! Have a restful Sunday.
Comments:
Ganderson
Sunday - April 7th 2024 2:43PM MST
PS
Charlie did a nice version of Hank Williams’ Kaw-Liga, about a cigar store Indian. Talk about cultural appropriation!
In Robert Altman’s film Nashville the Tommy Brown character is based on Pride- money quote from the movie: “ Hey Tommy Brown! The whitest ‘jogger’ in Nashville!”
Charlie did a nice version of Hank Williams’ Kaw-Liga, about a cigar store Indian. Talk about cultural appropriation!
In Robert Altman’s film Nashville the Tommy Brown character is based on Pride- money quote from the movie: “ Hey Tommy Brown! The whitest ‘jogger’ in Nashville!”
J1234
Sunday - April 7th 2024 1:47PM MST
PS-
I said:
"That's right, but - as far as I can tell - this new future that we find ourselves headed for doesn't seem to come out of a past that's determined by our arbitrary attachment to historical accuracy. That's what some would say."
Um...I kind of phrased that wrong...it didn't come out right. I meant to say that many important people nowadays don't pay attention to what actually happened in the past, i.e., it's a detachment from reality. Beyonce seems to be among them. (I'm waiting for her to find an imagined noose somewhere during her country music "career", much like NASCAR'S first black driver did.)
Does anyone remember the John Fogerty cover of "Please Help Me I'm Falling" on his Blue Ridge Rangers album? (post CCR) That was the first time I'd ever heard the song. As big o an influence as country was on pop music in the early '70's, it still wasn't really common for rock musicians to do straight ahead covers of straight ahead country songs, even roots oriented rockers like JF. I was struck by that.
I remember "Kiss an Angel Good Morning". The only other song Charlie Pride song I remember was "Mississippi Cotton Pickin' Delta Town," which I liked pretty well. I wasn't too familiar with his music.
I said:
"That's right, but - as far as I can tell - this new future that we find ourselves headed for doesn't seem to come out of a past that's determined by our arbitrary attachment to historical accuracy. That's what some would say."
Um...I kind of phrased that wrong...it didn't come out right. I meant to say that many important people nowadays don't pay attention to what actually happened in the past, i.e., it's a detachment from reality. Beyonce seems to be among them. (I'm waiting for her to find an imagined noose somewhere during her country music "career", much like NASCAR'S first black driver did.)
Does anyone remember the John Fogerty cover of "Please Help Me I'm Falling" on his Blue Ridge Rangers album? (post CCR) That was the first time I'd ever heard the song. As big o an influence as country was on pop music in the early '70's, it still wasn't really common for rock musicians to do straight ahead covers of straight ahead country songs, even roots oriented rockers like JF. I was struck by that.
I remember "Kiss an Angel Good Morning". The only other song Charlie Pride song I remember was "Mississippi Cotton Pickin' Delta Town," which I liked pretty well. I wasn't too familiar with his music.
Old Soldier
Sunday - April 7th 2024 6:51AM MST
PS
I'm an old Charley Pride fan from the late 1960s and early to mid 1970s, couldn't get enough of him singing. Sad to hear he died in late 2020.
Whenever I chance to meet
Some old friends on the street
They wonder how does a man get to be this way
I've always got a smiling face
Any time and any place
And every time they ask me why, I just smile and say
You've got to kiss an angel good morning
And let her know you think about her when you're gone
Kiss an angel good morning
And love her like the devil when you get back home.
A lot of people claim to be the first at this or that...a lot of people lie, too.
Here's to you, Charley...
I'm an old Charley Pride fan from the late 1960s and early to mid 1970s, couldn't get enough of him singing. Sad to hear he died in late 2020.
Whenever I chance to meet
Some old friends on the street
They wonder how does a man get to be this way
I've always got a smiling face
Any time and any place
And every time they ask me why, I just smile and say
You've got to kiss an angel good morning
And let her know you think about her when you're gone
Kiss an angel good morning
And love her like the devil when you get back home.
A lot of people claim to be the first at this or that...a lot of people lie, too.
Here's to you, Charley...
J1234
Saturday - April 6th 2024 9:07PM MST
PS-
"...the 1st famous black country singer was a guy named Charlie Pride."
That's right, but - as far as I can tell - this new future that we find ourselves headed for doesn't seem to come out of a past that's determined by our arbitrary attachment to historical accuracy. That's what some would say. So I guess Beyonce is off the hook. :)
In the spirit of accuracy, I should mention that this post got me thinking about my early interests in musical Americana, and a black harmonica player named DeFord Bailey (that was his name, as I recall.) My folks had an LP of Roy Acuff that was a compilation of his better known songs from the 1930's and '40's, and one of my favorites on the album was a song called "Freight Train Blues." I think it said on the liner notes that DeFord played the harmonica solo (which was astounding) on the song.
I'd read somewhere (decades ago) that Deford played some of the first music (a harmonica instrumental) on the first radio broadcast of the Grand Ol' Opry. So, while Charlie Pride was the first famous black country singer in the US, DeFord Bailey was likely the first widely broadcast black county performer.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TmclgyXIrYY
"...the 1st famous black country singer was a guy named Charlie Pride."
That's right, but - as far as I can tell - this new future that we find ourselves headed for doesn't seem to come out of a past that's determined by our arbitrary attachment to historical accuracy. That's what some would say. So I guess Beyonce is off the hook. :)
In the spirit of accuracy, I should mention that this post got me thinking about my early interests in musical Americana, and a black harmonica player named DeFord Bailey (that was his name, as I recall.) My folks had an LP of Roy Acuff that was a compilation of his better known songs from the 1930's and '40's, and one of my favorites on the album was a song called "Freight Train Blues." I think it said on the liner notes that DeFord played the harmonica solo (which was astounding) on the song.
I'd read somewhere (decades ago) that Deford played some of the first music (a harmonica instrumental) on the first radio broadcast of the Grand Ol' Opry. So, while Charlie Pride was the first famous black country singer in the US, DeFord Bailey was likely the first widely broadcast black county performer.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TmclgyXIrYY
The Alarmist
Saturday - April 6th 2024 7:57PM MST
PS
I’d say “Don’t doubt me” about Rucker, but if he is good enough to win at the CMAs, I’d say he’s accepted as a black country music artist.
I’d say “Don’t doubt me” about Rucker, but if he is good enough to win at the CMAs, I’d say he’s accepted as a black country music artist.
Mr. Anderson, I think Hank Jr. or one of the other big 1970s-'80s country singers did Kaw-Liga too. I had no idea it was about a cigar store Indian, just because I didn't pay enough attention to the lyrics. (I guess it's obvious.) Thanks.