Buck Owens, along with Merle Haggard, was the leader of the Bakersfield sound, a twangy, electricified, rock-influenced interpretation of hardcore honky tonk that emerged in the '60s. Owens was the first bona fide country star to emerge from Bakersfield, scoring a total of 15 consecutive number one hits in the mid-'60s. In the process, he... [+] Read More

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The father in the country & western Chuck Howard dynasty, this guitar picker was a musician's musician type, the kind of guy whose licks are played on a thousand records but nobody knows who he is. One of his most famous credits is on the often overlooked country album by Ringo Starr, Beaucoups of Blues. In fact, Howard was one of the main... [+] Read More

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Dave Dudley (born David Darwin Pedruska, May 3, 1928, Spencer, WI) is the father of truck driving country music. With his 1963 song "Six Days on the Road," he founded a new genre of country music -- a variation of honky tonk and rock-inflected country that concentrated lyrically on the lifestyles of truck drivers. Dudley had a string of Top 15... [+] Read More

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Steel guitarist Jerry Brightman was one of Buck Owens' Buckaroos during the first half of the '70s, and with them, he performed on TV's wacky variety show, Hee Haw before moving into the business side of music, and helping start the annual country festival, Jamboree in the Hills, in his homestate of Ohio. Born in Akron, Brightman picked up the... [+] Read More

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Known throughout country music as "The Guitar Man," singer/songwriter Jerry Reed gained recognition not only for a successful solo career but also as an actor and ace session player. Jerry Reed Hubbard was born in Atlanta, Georgia on March 20, 1937; after picking up the guitar as a child, he was signed by publisher and producer Bill Lowery to... [+] Read More

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The first time that many people ever heard of Johnny Paycheck was in 1977, when his "Take This Job and Shove It" inspired one-man wildcat strikes all over America. The next time was in 1985, when he was arrested for shooting a man at a bar in Hillsboro, OH. That Paycheck is remembered for a fairly amusical novelty song and a violent crime (for... [+] Read More

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For most of his career, pianist/vocalist Mickey Gilley lived in the shadow of his cousin, Jerry Lee Lewis, playing a similar fusion of country, rock, blues, and R&B. In the early '70s, he managed to breakthrough into country stardom, but it wasn't until the late '70s, when he became associated with the urban cowboy movement, that he became a... [+] Read More

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Best known for his string of trucking songs, Red Simpson was raised in Bakersfield, California, the youngest of a dozen children. At age 14, he wrote his first song -- about chickens -- and sang it to his family's fowl. During the Korean War, he served aboard a naval hospital ship, the Repose, where he found relief by forming the Repose... [+] Read More

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