Steel guitarist Bobby Koefer, one of the last surviving members of the Texas Playboys who recorded and toured with Bob Wills, has died at the age of 95. Here is Bobby's obituary, written by western swing historian Buddy McPeters for publication here at BatesLine: John Robert 'Bobby' Koefer, passed away...
A memorial tribute to Charles G. Hill, Oklahoma's best-loved and most-enduring blogger, who died in September 8, 2019.
David Marshall Rollo, a leader in Tulsa choral music for over a half-century, a friend and mentor to many, passed away on April 25, 2017, at the age of 74, of complications from pneumonia. I was blessed to know David for 40 years as his student at Holland Hall, as...
UPDATED 2016/11/02: Having completed my analysis of all 23 sections of the SQ 780 legislation, I have revised the introductory text below to provide a better summary of the effect of passing the state question. Oklahoma State Question 780 began life as an initiative petition. Unlike most state questions, its...
Legendary country singer and songwriter Merle Haggard died Wednesday on his 79th birthday. It might be going too far to say he saved western swing from oblivion, but Merle Haggard's efforts to honor Bob Wills went a long way toward introducing a new generation to the sound. In 1946 or...
This is the ninth rematch between current District 3 Councilor Roscoe Turner and former Councilor David Patrick. The series is tied 4-4, with Patrick winning in 1996, 1998, 2002, and 2008, and Turner winning in 2000, 2004, 2006, 2009. (Turner also won the 1998 special election, beating Patrick's sister Synna.)...
It was the song that took Bob Wills and His Texas Playboys "from hamburgers to steaks." In 1938, they took a fiddle tune called "Spanish Two Step" and ran the melody backwards; the result was a popular instrumental. ("Jazz violinist Joe Venuti, for example, told Wills and members of the...
The Tiffany Transcriptions, discs recorded in 1946 and 1947 for radio use, contain some of the best material ever recorded by Bob Wills and His Texas Playboys. Tom Diamant, whose Kaleidoscope Records made that material available to the general public on a series of LPs in the 1980s, has a...
Jack Webb, of "Dragnet" fame, was the announcer for Bob Wills and His Texas Playboys? Yes, indeed! For a few months, at any rate. Back in 1946, Bob Wills had a weekly half-hour radio show on San Francisco's KGO, broadcast live from the Oakland Auditorium Theatre. TiffanyTranscriptions.com, a website devoted...
Noel Murray at A.V. Club has reviewed the new Collectors Choice box set of the Tiffany Transcriptions, a selection of recordings made by Bob Wills and His Texas Playboys in the mid '40s. It's a great review, with good descriptions of the music and the history behind it, enhanced by...
It's fair to say that the period between Elvis Presley's arrival at Fort Chaffee, Arkansas, in 1958 and the day the Beatles touched down at Idlewild in 1964 was the zenith of instrumental pop. This is not Big Band or Western Swing from the '30s and '40s, nor is it...
Sorry for the recent silence. The 24-hour bug that has been going around town hit our family, too. The toddler had it on Tuesday night, his big brother and sister and mom got it Thursday night, and I had it Friday night. Saturday was a day of quiet recuperation --...
A new entry on YouTube -- the Texas Playboys performing "New San Antonio Rose" on Austin City Limits in 1976. The ensemble included Leon McAuliffe on steel guitar, Leon Rausch singing, Eldon Shamblin on standard guitar (you can see him off to the left in the wide shots). The poster...
Got a comment wondering if I'd be writing about the decision of former Congressman J. C. Watts, Jr., not to run for Governor of Oklahoma. I heard Watts on KFAQ this morning. He cited family as the main reason for his decision, wanting to be a part of his kids'...
I have a bit of strange serendipity to report. This is going to seem like a pointless ramble, but it's going somewhere. I was having a look yesterday at this amazing multimedia blog called Bedazzled, which features rarities from '60s and '70s pop music and pop culture -- outtakes, demo...
All the cool bloggers are doing it, so why not join in? By "it," I mean annoying Baltimore Sun columnist Christopher Hanson, who complains that "[a] great many bloggers are... too self-absorbed to focus on keeping the public informed." He calls such bloggers "I Bloggers", who, says Hanson, "owe less...
Today was the 40th anniversary of the first broadcast of "Round the Horne," one of the most enduringly popular radio shows of all time. As you might guess, any popular radio show that had its premiere only 40 years ago is obviously not American. In the '60s, the BBC still...
Broken Arrow's City Council meeting (tonight at 7 p.m., in the Council Chambers at City Hall, 200 S. First Street in BA) ought to be interesting. Many people have marveled that Broken Arrow appeared to have landed a Bass Pro Shops' Outdoor World without ponying up the millions of tax...
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