Freddy Fender

The Recording Academy has announced the newest additions to the GRAMMY Hall of Fame collection. The 2012 class highlights diversity and musical excellence and includes both singles and albums. Among the  new inductees are Gene Autry’s “Deep In The Heart of Texas,” Freddy Fender’s “Wasted Days and Wasted Nights” and Lester Flatt and Earl Scruggs’ Foggy Mountain Jamboree.

To be inducted into the GRAMMY Hall of Fame, recordings must be at least 25 years hold and exhibit qualitative or historical significance. Recordings are reviewed by a committee comprised of professionals from all branches of the music industry before final approval is granted by The Recording Academy’s National Board of Trustees. With the latest addition of new titles, there are now 906 recordings in the Hall of Fame, which is displayed at the GRAMMY Museum.

“The Recording Academy is dedicated to celebrating a wide variety of great music and sound through the decades,” Neil Portnow, President/CEO of The Recording Academy, said. “We are especially honored to welcome this year’s selection of some of the most influential recordings of the last century. Marked by both cultural and historical significance, these works truly have influenced and inspired audiences for generations, and we are thrilled to induct them into our growing catalog of outstanding recordings.” Continue Reading

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Photo courtesy of the PRCA.

The American Cowboy is known all over the world as a symbol of America. The cowboy life might not have been quite as glamorous as the silver screen portrayed it, yet most of the men and women who lived their lives as cowboys or cowgirls wouldn’t have traded it for any big city job available to them at the time.

From that golden era came many familiar cowboy songs, some of them originating as folk tunes in other countries and adapted to their new situation by those Irish or Spanish cowboys who worked out west. Later, cowboy songs were big parts of movies during the singing cowboy era, with Roy Rogers, Tex Ritter, Rex Allen and Gene Autry gaining popularity not only as actors but singers too. Carl T. Sprague is considered the original singing cowboy, recording the first authentic cowboy song, “When the Work’s All Done this Fall,” which sold 900,000 copies.

Today’s singer/songwriters have not forgotten the cowboy way. Folks like Ian Tyson, Michael Martin Murphey, Riders in the Sky, Don Edwards, Ed Bruce and the late Chris LeDoux have given us newer songs and also revived some of the older tunes. Garth Brooks, Willie Nelson, the late Marty Robbins and the late Johnny Cash were also more than happy to sing the new western songs and keep the cowboy tradition alive in country music.

In no particular order, here are our picks for the Top 20 Cowboy & Cowgirl Songs. Leave us a comment below and let us know your favorite! And don’t forget to enter our Wrangler National Finals Rodeo Sweepstakes for your chance to win a trip for two to the rodeo in Las Vegas! Enter now >>

“Amarillo By Morning” – George Strait

Although Chris LeDoux recorded this song first, most people remember George Strait’s version, which begins with a beautiful intro played by fiddle great Buddy Spicher. Here’s a clip of George singing “Amarillo By Morning” live. The song is about a cowboy’s love for the sport of rodeo, no matter what happens to him and no matter what he loses, saddles and girlfriends included. George, as most of his fans know, sponsors his own Team Roping Classic in San Antonio each year. He is no slouch as a roper either!

“Good Ride Cowboy” – Garth Brooks

This song, written by Jerrod Niemann (performing it in the clip above), Richie Brown, Bryan Kennedy and Bob Doyle, became Garth Brooks‘ tribute to his friend Chris LeDoux after the rodeo champ and singer passed away in 2005. It chronicles Chris’ rise to fame in the rodeo world and as a singer, as well as his down-to-earth ways as a father and husband. Chris and Garth became friends after the Oklahoma singer named the rodeo cowboy in his first single, “Too Young to Feel This Damn Old.” They also recorded a duet in 1992, “What’cha Gonna Do With A Cowboy.”

“Night Rider’s Lament” – Suzy Bogguss

Upon hearing this song, one would assume it was written in the heyday of the cowboy. A little research finds it was written by real-life cowboy Michael Burton, but in a much more recent setting, circa 1975. It describes how one cowboy chose career over true love and how he sometimes thinks about what might have been. Those thoughts don’t linger long, however, as he quickly remembers why he chose the life of a cowboy on the range. The tune has been recorded by everyone from Chris LeDoux to Garth Brooks and Nanci Griffith, but Suzy has one of the great versions of the tune. Here she is singing it with Jerry Jeff Walker.

“Should’ve Been A Cowboy” – Toby Keith

Despite the fact that he is as much at home on a horse as he is on a stage, Toby Keith laments in this song that he should have been a cowboy. The Oklahoma native thinks he should have learned to rope and ride in a cattle drive, because he thinks as a cowboy he could have stolen the young girls’ hearts like his heroes, Gene Autry and Roy Rogers. Who among us hasn’t thought how glamorous it would be to be a cowboy on a big ranch somewhere out west, or at the very least, in a movie?

“Someday Soon” – Ian Tyson

Written by Ian Tyson, “Someday Soon” has been recorded by Judy Collins, Suzy Bogguss and many others and has charted in pop, folk and country. This 2009 video features Ian singing it – and you can see Suzy’s version HERE. Continue Reading

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Alan Jackson photo courtesy of Sony Music Nashville.

Alan Jackson is set to add another honor to his ever growing collection. He will be inducted into the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo Star Trail of Fame on March 18 as he reaches 1 million in attendance at RODEOHOUSTON. He will join superstars Brooks & Dunn, Reba McEntire, Charley Pride and George Strait in the Trail of Fame as well as Gene Autry, Elvis Presley and Roy Rogers. He’ll be only the fifth entertainer history to perform in front of 1 million RODEOHOUSTON fans. Continue Reading

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New Country Music Hall of Fame Members Jimmy Dean (l) and Don Williams.

Don Williams and Jimmy Dean, two vocalists who approached their public presence from very different angles, were officially inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame Sunday night in front of family, friends and a rather elite set of peers.

A singer, comic and television pioneer, Jimmy built his career as a multi-faceted entertainer. Don worked several detail-oriented jobs before his breakthrough — he was a co-partner in a furniture store and an office administrator — and he made his public mark in a workman-like manner, eschewing the party circuit and putting his efforts into finding and delivering well-constructed songs.

Neither singer was able to claim his medallion in person. Jimmy died in June, just a few months after he was told in a phone call that he would have a bronze plaque enshrined with his likeness in the Hall of Fame’s Rotunda alongside such fellow performers as Hank Williams, Johnny Cash, Dolly Parton and Jimmy’s childhood idol, Gene Autry.

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Charley Pride, pictured here second from the left, played for the Memphis Red Sox during the late 1950's. Photo courtesy of CharleyPride.com.

In the years before Charley Pride became a country singer, he proved himself as a talent on the baseball field. He was a player in the Negro Leagues, and he once pitched four innings in an all-star game against a team made of major-league players, including future Hall of Fame members Hank Aaron and Willie Mays.

Now that Charley’s a member of the Country Music Hall of Fame, he finds himself back in baseball in a big way. On Thursday, an 18-person investment group headed by former pitcher Nolan Ryan placed the highest bid in a Fort Worth auction of the Texas Rangers ballclub, with a bid of $593 million, according to MLB.com. The transaction still has to be approved by Major League Baseball, which has its next quarterly meetings Wednesday and Thursday in Minneapolis.

Charley’s hardly the only country singer who’s ever had a stake in a professional team. Glen Campbell was part of the original investment group in the Arizona Diamondbacks, Roy Clark had a hand in the ownership of the Tulsa Drillers, and several stars — Conway Twitty, Jerry Reed and the Oak Ridge Boys’ Richard Sterban — all had a share when the Nashville Sounds franchise was established in the 1970s. Country’s most-successful owner was Gene Autry, who established the Los Angeles Angels in 1960.

A few other sports notes from country music:

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David Nail up to bat during the All-Star softball game. Photo courtesy of UMG Nashville.

There aren’t too many country stars who can boast that they’ve hit a homerun in a major-league ballpark – but David Nail can.

David popped one over the fence during a celebrity softball game Monday in Angel Stadium during the festivities surrounding Major League Baseball’s All-Star Game.

His homerun is just one of numerous current sports-related items in country music, including Big Kenny’s World Cup debut and Taylor Swift’s shot at induction into a hall of fame.

Here are country’s latest sports-related stories:

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Vince Gill photo courtesy of UMG Nashville.

Dwight Yoakam sang about “guitars, Cadillacs and hillbilly music,” and the guitar is central to current stories involving three different Halls of Fame — one of which contains a Cadillac owned by the late Elvis Presley.

The National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum, previously known as the Cowboy Hall of Fame, has a new guitar exhibit at its home in Oklahoma City, where instruments used by the likes of Vince Gill, Garth Brooks, Toby Keith and Marty Robbins are on display.

A guitar Taylor Swift used during a fundraiser to raise money for the Country Music Hall of Fame in the fall is now being sold at auction to raise even more money for the facility. And the Musicians Hall of Fame, located just blocks from the Country Hall in downtown Nashville, has to put guitars owned by some classic figures — including Charlie Daniels and Elvis musician Scotty Moore — into storage by the end of the week.

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Roy Rogers with wife Dale Evans. Photo courtesy of royrogers.com.

The singing cowboy may be a thing of the past, but two of the most influential — Roy Rogers and Gene Autry — are being recognized once again by the U.S. government.

The Library of Congress is adding Under Western Stars, the movie that gave Roy his first starring role, to the National Film Registry, according to the Hollywood Reporter. Released in 1938, the picture had Roy portraying a Dust Bowl rancher who runs for Congress to bring water to his constituents. Naturally, Roy sang a few songs, too. Among the titles he’s credited with at IMDb.com is “Listen To The Rhythm Of The Range,” which Gene and his associate Johnny Marvin authored. Both Gene and Roy were signed to Republic Pictures, which distributed Under Western Stars.

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