Tex Williams & Bonnie Sloan ~ Where Do We Go From Here

Tex Williams
Tex Williams (23rd August 1917-11th October 1985) was an American country musician from Ramsey, Illinois. He helped move rural and acoustic country music to dance-oriented mainstream pop Western swing.

Although not nearly as well-known as figures like Bob Wills, Spade Cooley, Hank Penny, Leon McAuliffe, and Hank Thompson, Tex Williams was an important Western swing performer. Like all of the aforementioned musicians, he helped develop country music from its rural, acoustic origins to a more danceable, city-fied, and electrified form with a much wider popular appeal. At his peak in the late '40s, he recorded some of the most enjoyable country swing of his time, distinguished by his talking-blues vocal delivery. Much of his style can be heard in the Western swing-influenced recordings of Asleep at the Whee.

The singer and guitarist caught his first big break after moving to Los Angeles in 1942. At that time California was populated by many former Texans and Oklahomans working in the defense industry, creating a need for Western swing entertainment in a region not noted for country music. One of the musicians on this circuit was fiddler Spade Cooley, who employed Jack Williams as his singer, nicknaming him "Tex" to ensure easy identification by the many Texans in their audiences. Several of Cooley's mid-'40s Columbia singles featured Tex on vocals.

Inj, 1946, Tex signed a contract with Capitol as a solo artist, which strained the relationship between Tex and the tempestuous Cooley to the breaking point. Cooley fired Williams in June 1946, a move which backfired badly, as most of Cooley's band opted to follow Tex rather than remain with their difficult boss. Cooley achieved his greatest subsequent notoriety when he was convicted of beating his wife to death in a drunken fit in 1961.

Tex's renamed backing band, the Western Caravan, was one of the best units of its kind. Numbering about a dozen members, it attained an enviable level of fluid interplay between electric and steel guitars, fiddles, bass, accordion, trumpet, and other instruments (even occasional harp). At first they recorded polkas for Capitol, with limited success. They found their true calling when Williams' friend Merle Travis wrote most of "Smoke! Smoke! Smoke! (That Cigarette)" for him, emphasizing Tex's talking-blues delivery and heavier boogie elements. The song was a monstrous commercial success in 1947, and indeed one of the biggest country hits of all time, making number one on the pop charts.

Williams' commercial success began to peter out in the early '50s, and he left Capitol in 1951. He continued to record often in the 1950s, mostly for Decca, without much success; in 1957, the Western Caravan disbanded. He pressed on, however, returning to Capitol in the early '60s, and recording a live album that included Glen Campbell on guitar. He had one final country hit, the memorably titled "The Night Miss Ann's Hotel for Single Girls Burned Down," which entered the Top 40 in 1971. Williams died of pancreatic cancer on October 11, 1985.
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Bonnie Sloan
California based country singer Bonnie Sloan, was undeservedly obscure, but she was an excellent honky tonk singer. In July of 1955 there was a new country music park near or in Riverbank, California called "Shady Oaks Park". The venue was either owned or run by Chester Smith and was appearing there every Sunday with visiting artists to the area. The entertainment would start at noon ad usually run to 6:00pm. Artists who had appeared there included Freddie Hart, Terry Fell, Bonnie Sloan, Jinks (Tex) Carman, Cousin Herb Henso, Foreman Bill and Skeeter Gardner .

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Music

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• Country
• Music

[UPALLNITE4U]

What a great oldie. Thanks for sharing this classic. ♥

[JEMCO2008]

Nice  Thank You