Buddy Emmons obit

Buddy Emmons, Steel Guitar Legend, Dies at 78

Buddy Emmons -- one of the most influential musicians ever on the steel guitar -- died Wednesday (July 29) at the age of 78.

 

He was not on the list.

Buddy Emmons — one of the most influential musicians ever on the steel guitar — died Wednesday (July 29) at the age of 78.

Born Buddy Gene Emmons on Jan. 27, 1937, in Mishawaka, Indiana, his love of the instrument began when his father bought him a six-string lap steel and signed him up for lessons. He quickly took to it, citing Hank Williams’ steel player Jerry Byrd and Herb Remington as two of his biggest inspirations. Emmons began playing with local bands around the Indiana area and left school at the age of 16. His music would eventually carry him to Detroit, where he would go to work for local musician Casey Clark.

It was while playing with Clark that he came to the attention of Grand Ole Opry star Little Jimmy Dickens. Impressed with his playing, the Columbia Records superstar offered Emmons a job in his band, which meant a move to Nashville. After a year with Dickens, he formed the Sho-Bud Company, which became one of the most successful steel companies in the business. He also became a highly sought-after session player, with Faron Young’s recording of “Sweet Dreams” being an early highlight.

His next band experience would come in 1957 as a member of the Texas Troubadours, the touring band for Ernest Tubb. It was on an early Tubb session that Emmons pioneered the use of the “split pedal” sound. By the 1960s, Emmons was continuing to help manufacture steel guitars for Sho-Bud, in addition to his growing session work. He also stayed busy on the road, taking a job in 1962 with Ray Price. As a member of the Cherokee Cowboys, his work on “Night Life” remains one of the definitive licks in the instrument’s history. Emmons remained with Price through 1967, by which point he had left Sho-Bud to start his own guitar company. It was during his years with Price that he recorded his greatest work as a solo instrumentalist, 1963’s Steel Guitar Jazz. The first jazz record to feature Emmons’ trademark instrument, it was critically praised in the pages of Downbeat magazine.

His next move took him across the country to California, where he soon found work with Roger Miller. His work in the late 1960s and early 1970s can also be heard on many records outside of the country genre, such as that of Gram Parsons, the Carpenters and Ray Charles. He also played the famous steel riff on Judy Collins’ recording of “Someday Soon.” Emmons returned to Nashville in the mid-1970s and would remain one of the most imitated players of his time. He spent 10 years playing for the Everly Brothers and was inducted into the Steel Guitar Hall of Fame in 1981. In later years, he did some session work with Price, Willie Nelson and Johnny Bush, and also was an occasional player on Garrison Keillor’s Prairie Home Companion.

Emmons was born in Mishawaka, Indiana. When he was eleven years old, his father bought him a lap steel guitar and arranged for lessons at the Hawaiian Conservatory of Music in South Bend, Indiana, which he attended for about a year. He then began figuring out how to play the country music that he heard on the radio. He has said that Jerry Byrd and Herb Remington were among his first musical influences. By age fifteen, his playing had progressed considerably. In those teenage years, he started spelling his first name "Buddie" just because he wanted to have six letters each of his first and last names. This was only a temporary whim, but his name may appear in published sources spelled that way, including the song title "Buddie's Boogie". His parents bought him a triple-neck Fender Stringmaster steel guitar, and he began performing with local bands in South Bend.

Bored with high school, he left at age sixteen and moved with a childhood friend to Calumet City, Illinois, where he was hired by Stony Calhoun to play in his band. He moved to Detroit to play with Casey Clark. While he was with Clark, he bought a Bigsby steel guitar with pedals similar to the pedal steel guitar that Bud Isaacs had used on the Webb Pierce song "Slowly". (The pedals on a pedal steel guitar allow the player to change the pitch of one or more strings while playing the instrument. A separate volume pedal is also used, compensating for the attack and decay of the strings for a smooth, constant or creative near-constant volume.)

The next year, Little Jimmy Dickens heard Emmons playing with Casey Clark and offered him a job with his band, so at the age of 18, in July, 1955, Emmons moved to Nashville. Dickens's band was then a popular act in country music, with complex arrangements and fast twin guitar harmonies. Dickens arranged for his band to record several instrumentals on Columbia Records under the name The Country Boys. The first tunes recorded included three of Emmons's originals, two of which, "Raising the Dickens" and "Buddie's Boogie", became steel-guitar standards.

In 1956, Dickens dissolved his band to perform as a solo act. Emmons began doing recording sessions in Nashville. One of his first studio sessions resulted in Faron Young's hit version of "Sweet Dreams"

In 1957, Emmons (by then nicknamed the "Big E" for both his 6-foot height and musical prowess) joined Ernest Tubb's Texas Troubadours. His first recording with Tubb, "Half a Mind (to Leave You)", became a hit record. In 1958, Emmons quit Tubb's band and moved to California. Eight months later, he returned to Nashville and rejoined the Texas Troubadours as the lead guitar player for the next five months, at which point he returned to the pedal steel guitar chair in the band. In 1962, he left Tubb to join Ray Price and the Cherokee Cowboys, replacing his long-time friend, steel-guitarist Jimmy Day. His first recording with Price in September, 1962, produced the hit song, "You Took Her Off My Hands". On this song Emmons used another of his major steel guitar innovations, adding two "chromatic" strings (F# and D#) to the E9 tuning. These "chromatic strings" have since become part of the standard 10-string pedal steel guitar tuning.

Also in 1977, he played steel guitar and resonator/dobro on Christian singer Don Francisco's album Forgiven. This album was recorded in Nashville.

In 1990, Emmons and Ray Pennington formed the Swing Shift Band and began producing a series of CDs that included big band swing, Western swing, and original country songs. Emmons began touring with The Everly Brothers in 1991, which continued until about 2001. He discontinued regular session work around 1998 to tour with The Everlys.