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JULY 1, 2001 - The world lost a great musical icon yesterday with the passing of "Mr. Guitar" Chet Atkins. He left behind an incredible legacy with many contributions to music history. Nashville's daily periodical, The Tennessean, ran a touching tribute article today. It surpasses anything that I could ever write about this great man and musician. So, I would like to give this brilliant article a place in Countrypolitan.com's archives so that fans can enjoy it for longer than today. I hope that you all will enjoy it and thank you to The Tennessean for a wonderful tribute to the founder of the Countrypolitan style that we all have come to love so much.
Sherry Anderson, Countrypolitan.com, July 1, 2001
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'Mr. Guitar' Chet Atkins dies |
By ROBERT K. OERMANN, Special to the Tennessean
and PETER COOPER, Staff Writer
Chet Atkins, known as ''Mr. Guitar'' and considered the most-recorded solo instrumentalist in music history, died at his Nashville home yesterday morning after a long battle with cancer. He was 77.
Mr. Atkins was a Country Music Hall of Fame producer, executive and instrumentalist whose studio musicianship allowed his string-tickling work to grace the records of dozens of other Nashville legends.
His style influenced such pop greats as Mark Knopfler, Duane Eddy, George Harrison, The Ventures, George Benson and Eddie Cochran, as well as thousands of country pickers. He won nine CMA musician of the year awards, four Playboy jazz poll honors and 14 Grammys.
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Randy Piland / Staff file
Chet Atkins, 1924-2001 |
As the Nashville head of RCA Records, he propelled an entire generation of country stars to fame. Dottie West, Waylon Jennings, Bobby Bare, Hank Snow, Porter Wagoner, Dolly Parton, Jim Reeves, Jerry Reed, Skeeter Davis, Charley Pride and Eddy Arnold all were either signed or produced — and some of them both — by Atkins.
He built RCA Studio B, said to be the most hit-generating studio in the history of Music Row. The name Chet Atkins is synonymous with The Nashville Sound.
''There's nobody like him, and he'll never be replaced,'' Jennings said.
Visitation will be 5-8 p.m. tomorrow at Roesch-Patton Funeral Home on Broadway. Funeral services will be 11 a.m. Tuesday at Ryman Auditorium. Both are open to the public. Interment will be at Harpeth Hills Cemetery on Highway 100.
Chester Burton Atkins was born in 1924 near the tiny Appalachian hamlet of Luttrell, Tenn. His Sears guitar was his constant boyhood companion. He also learned to fiddle, playing early gigs at mountain square dances and dreaming of radio stardom. At age 18, Mr. Atkins auditioned at Knoxville's WNOX and was hired as a fiddler by Archie Campbell and Bill Carlisle. By 1943, he was touring as a sideman with Kitty Wells and Johnny Wright.
''He played fiddle with us,'' Wells said. ''But anytime you'd go backstage, he'd be sitting there, practicing on his guitar.''
Mr. Atkins moved among the barn dances of Knoxville, Renfro Valley and Cincinnati during the next few years. At Cincinnati's WLW Boone County Jamboree, he worked with Leona and Lois Johnson, the station's singing Johnson Twins. Mr. Atkins ended up marrying Leona in 1946. His lifelong friend Kenneth Burns — Jethro of Homer & Jethro — married Lois.
Chet and Leona Atkins had daughter Merle in 1947, and the family returned to Knoxville's WNOX. RCA then signed him, believing that Mr. Atkins might be its answer to Capitol's star, Merle Travis. Backed by Homer & Jethro, Mr. Atkins' Galloping on the Guitar got some airplay as a radio theme tune in 1949.
Things also started looking up when he joined Mother Maybelle & The Carter Sisters. Mr. Atkins scored another minor instrumental success in late 1949 with Main Street Breakdown, recorded with backing from Anita Carter and Homer & Jethro.
Opry star George Morgan caught the Carters' act with Mr. Atkins and raved to the WSM executives back home in Nashville. In 1950, the troupe was offered Grand Ole Opry stardom, and Chet Atkins came to town to stay.
Fate couldn't have planned it better. Surveying the infant recording and song publishing scene of 1950, WSM disc jockey David Cobb began referring to Nashville as ''Music City.'' The nickname was more hopeful than realistic at the time, but it stuck. And with Mr. Atkins' help, Nashville did, indeed, become world-renowned as Music City.
Mr. Atkins was lured not only by the Carters' Opry berth but also by producer/publisher Fred Rose's offer of recording studio work. Soon after moving, Mr. Atkins was backing Hank Williams (Cold Cold Heart, Kaw-Liga, Jambalaya) and The Louvin Brothers (When I Stop Dreaming), both of whom were produced by Rose.
In 1951-56, Mr. Atkins also recorded with, among others, Faron Young (Goin' Steady, I've Got Five Dollars and If You Ain't Lovin'), Webb Pierce (There Stands the Glass and Walkin' the Dog), The Carlisles (Too Old to Cut the Mustard, No Help Wanted and Is Zat You Myrtle), Johnnie & Jack (South in New Orleans and I Want to be Loved), Porter Wagoner (Uncle Pen), Rosalie Allen (Guitar Polka) and Kitty Wells (Release Me and Repenting).
Executive Steve Sholes became Mr. Atkins' booster at RCA. As the decade of the '50s began, the New Yorker began to rely more and more on the 26-year-old guitar hotshot as his session leader.
Mr. Atkins and Boudleaux Bryant co-wrote Eddy Arnold's 1953 chart-topper How's the World Treating You, as well as Mr. Atkins' signature instrumental of 1953, Country Gentleman. That song was reprised at last night's Opry, as the staff band closed the televised portion of the show with the number.
The instrumentalist's fame spread rapidly in Music City. By 1954 he had his own show on WSM. During that same year, RCA issued his debut album, Chet Atkins' Gallopin' Guitar, and he toured with the label's Country & Western Caravan concert series.
He had two hit singles in '55, Mr. Sandman and a guitar duet with Hank Snow called Silver Bell. He endorsed a top-selling Gretsch model guitar bearing his name, published a guitar-instruction course and built his first home studio. People were beginning to call him ''Mr. Guitar.''
As Nashville's importance as a recording center grew rapidly, Mr. Atkins was hired to oversee RCA's day-to-day operations in Music City.
New Sholes signee Elvis Presley arrived in 1956. Mr. Atkins played on Heartbreak Hotel, the singer's history-making RCA debut. It created a pop culture revolution and in one stroke made the term Music City, U.S.A. a reality. Mr. Atkins went on to perform on such Presley hits as I Need Your Love Tonight, I Got Stung and A Fool Such as I.
He also led the sessions for another major act of the teen revolution: The Everly Brothers. He was with them in the studio when they created the 1957-62 tunes that would eventually make them members of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, including Bye Bye Love, Wake Up Little Susie and All I Have to Do Is Dream.
''Chet was like a second father to us,'' Phil Everly said yesterday. ''We loved him dearly, and we'll miss him.''
The Everly Brothers were not the only seminal pop act to draw inspiration from Mr. Atkins. As a young guitarist, future Beatle George Harrison studied Mr. Atkins' records and later introduced an Atkins-derived finger-picking style into several Beatles records, including All My Loving and I'm A Loser. Harrison bought a Gretsch as his first American-made guitar in 1962 because Mr. Atkins played the company's instruments. In 1974, former Beatle Paul McCartney came to Nashville and worked in the studio with Mr. Atkins, recording a song written by McCartney's father called Walking In The Park With Eloise.
In early 1957, Sholes promoted Mr. Atkins to RCA manager of operations. Mr. Atkins' first order of business was convincing the label that it needed to build its own office and studio. RCA Studio B, at 17th and Hawkins (now Roy Acuff Place), was the first permanent record-company office on Music Row.
Mr. Atkins struck instant paydirt in the new studio by producing Don Gibson's double-sided 1958 smash, Oh Lonesome Me and I Can't Stop Loving You. Some historians cite this disc as the first true ''Nashville Sound'' recording. Top producers including Mr. Atkins and Owen Bradley created that ''Nashville Sound'' by adding uptown pop production touches to country tunes.
He also took over the production of three established RCA stars, Eddy Arnold, Hank Snow and Jim Reeves, bringing all three men to stupendous new levels of success and eventual election into the Country Music Hall of Fame.
Mr. Atkins had a gift for finding distinctive voices and ear-catching hit songs. By the early '60s he was redefining country music with a host of new Nashville Sound artists.
Among those who created classics in Studio B, ''the house that Chet built,'' were Skeeter Davis (The End of the World, 1962), Bobby Bare (Detroit City, 1963), Floyd Cramer (Last Date, 1960), George Hamilton IV (Abilene, 1963) and Hank Locklin (Please Help Me I'm Falling, 1960), all produced by Mr. Atkins.
Dottie West won the first female country Grammy with 1964's Here Comes My Baby. In 1959, The Three Bells by The Browns became the first Nashville Sound record to reach No. 1 on the national pop charts.
Roger Miller launched his career with You Don't Want My Love and When Two Worlds Collide on RCA in 1960-61. Hank Snow's tongue-twisting signature song, I've Been Everywhere (1962), is also a Studio B product.
So are such huge Jim Reeves hits as He'll Have to Go (1959) and Welcome to My World (1964). Eddy Arnold's Tennessee Stud (1959), Make the World Go Away (1965) and The Tips of My Fingers (1966) were also Nashville Sound landmarks.
Homer & Jethro's 1959 hit Battle of Kookamonga became the only Music City record in history to win a Grammy for comedy. Again, all of these were Chet Atkins productions.
Meanwhile, Mr. Atkins' performing career was heating up. He appeared at the Newport Jazz Festival in 1960 and performed for President Kennedy in 1961. He had a top-10 country instrumental hit with Yakety Axe in 1965. A book was written about him in 1967.
By then, he was unquestionably the best-known country guitarist on Earth. His guitar course, his Gretsch endorsement, his high visibility in the media and his capacity for hard work paid off. He had become the most visible and influential guitarist of his time, producing 25 acts simultaneously for RCA while maintaining his own performing and recording career and taking a place alongside industry innovators like Les Paul.
''I think he influenced everybody that picked up a guitar,'' said Duane Eddy. ''The first thing I ever recorded on guitar was one of Chet's songs, and that was when I was 15. He's one of my heroes. He and Les Paul, they turned everything around.''
Mr. Atkins signed Waylon Jennings in 1965 and produced more than 15 of the superstar's top-20 hits during the next five years, including Only Daddy That'll Walk the Line, Yours Love, Mental Revenge and Brown Eyed Handsome Man.
By 1964 he had produced many hits for Porter Wagoner. He signed Willie Nelson, Jessi Colter and Charlie Rich, all of whom were to achieve later stardom. He signed Charley Pride (1966) and Jerry Reed (1967). He also signed, but did not produce, Connie Smith (1964) and Dolly Parton (1968).
''I tell you what, he was a good man,'' Jennings said. ''He went by the talent, and if he believed in you, he'd go to the wall.''
Nowhere was that belief more evident than in Mr. Atkins' signing of Charley Pride, who would become the first major African-American country music singing star.
''I'll always love that man,'' said Pride, now a Country Music Hall of Famer. ''There are only two people I was awed enough by to be nervous around: Mickey Mantle and Chet Atkins.''
Mr. Atkins attracted a wide diversity of talent to RCA's studios in the 1960s, including pop crooner Perry Como, trumpeter Danny Davis, Bonanza television star Lorne Greene, actress Ann-Margret and Dixieland king Al Hirt. Each came looking for the magic touch of The Nashville Sound. Comedian Don Bowman summed it all up in his 1964 single, Chit Akins, Make Me a Star.
In 1968, Chet Atkins was promoted to an RCA vice presidency. By the 1970s he was producing less but still with enough vim to guide the massive 1970-71 Jerry Reed pop crossover hits Amos Moses and When You're Hot You're Hot.
Just as Steve Sholes had helped him, Mr. Atkins brought along a new generation of RCA producers, notably Bob Ferguson, Felton Jarvis and Jerry Bradley. His later contributions to the RCA roster included Guy Clark, Tom T. Hall, Dickey Lee, Gary Stewart, Steve Young and Ray Stevens.
Mr. Atkins' last RCA protégé was multitalented Steve Wariner. Signed in 1976, Wariner outlasted all his contemporaries on the charts to become one of modern country's most consistent hit-makers.
Even while he tended to business matters, Mr. Atkins continued to play with breath-taking virtuosity. As an artist, he embarked on a series of collaborative albums, working with Les Paul, Lenny Breau, Jerry Reed, Hank Snow, Doc Watson, Merle Travis and Django Reinhardt. These were highly acclaimed and reaped a heap of awards.
In 1973, Mr. Atkins became the youngest living person ever inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame. In 1974, he published his autobiography, Country Gentleman. Three years later, he ended his association with Gretsch (later developing his own model for Gibson guitars) and watched as Studio B closed and became a museum. Mr. Atkins resigned his RCA executive position in 1981 and left the label as an artist a year later, signing with Columbia.
Primed for a new chapter in his creative life, Mr. Atkins gave himself a ''degree'' in 1983: Certified Guitar Player. He began signing his name as ''Chet Atkins, C.G.P.''
By then, he had more than 100 solo albums to his credit. Leaning increasingly toward pop-jazz, Mr. Atkins extended his output with a string of Columbia collections. A new generation of performers lined up to collaborate with the legend. They included Dire Straits leader Mark Knopfler, country singer Suzy Bogguss, former Toto bassist David Hungate, champion fiddler Mark O'Connor and jazz greats George Benson, Larry Carlton and Earl Klugh.
''When I was coming up, I almost made a religion of the Everly Brothers and Elvis, and a lot of the sessions that Chet produced and organized and played on,'' Knopfler once noted. ''My whole sensitivity … my whole approach … my whole way of listening to music … my whole idea of arrangements stems from all that.''
As a producer in the 1990s, Chet Atkins continued to do occasional work with acts such as South African balladeer Roger Whittaker and radio star Garrison Keillor. He appeared frequently on the latter's Prairie Home Companion show and remained a popular concert attraction, often appearing with symphony orchestras. He also starred in his own Cinemax and Nashville Network cable-TV specials.
In 1987, Mr. Atkins introduced an instructional video, Get Started on the Guitar, which outsold all other home videos of its type. Thanks to the Chet Atkins Appreciation Society, he became the subject of an annual four-day Nashville convention featuring admirers from around the world. This year's event begins July 19 at the Sheraton Music City hotel.
From 1997-2000, he was honored with the four-day downtown festival, Chet Atkins Musician Days. The first year's festival established the Chet Atkins Music Education Fund, which benefits youth music education in the Nashville area.
''The purpose of this festival is to: One, honor the musician. Two, raise money to teach our youngsters music, and three, provide an excuse for us to get together and play music,'' Mr. Atkins said.
Mr. Atkins was the first recipient of the festival's ''Chettie'' award, which was subsequently given to such figures as Waylon Jennings, Johnny Cash, Grady Martin and Duane Eddy.
His reputation as an instrumentalist will last forever. His skills as a record executive transformed a community. His touch as a producer influenced the sound of American music. Yet even those who benefited most from his musical acumen spoke yesterday of small but meaningful kindnesses.
Mr. Atkins helped persuade Sholes to sign Skeeter Davis (along with partner Betty Jack Davis) to an RCA contract and later produced crossover smash The End Of The World. But Davis said yesterday that her fondest memory of Mr. Atkins is of a time when she'd traveled from Kentucky to record with him in Nashville.
''The guitar part is so great,'' Davis said. ''But the Chet I love is the Chet that called his wife and said, 'I don't want Skeeter to have to stay at the hotel. Put on some extra cornbread and I'm going to bring her home.' ''
For those who knew him, Chet Atkins will be remembered not only as a musician's musician, but as a gentleman's gentleman.
He is survived by his wife, Leona; daughter, Merle Russell; grandchildren, Amanda and Jonathan Russell; and sister, Billie Rose Shockley, all of Nashville.
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