Buck Owens

Texas to Bakersfield

Alvis Edgar Owens Jr. was born on a farm in Sherman, Texas, on 12 August 1929, and took the name Buck as a small child from an animal on the family farm. The family moved to Mesa, Arizona, in 1937. In 1945 he began playing on local radio as half of Buck and Britt, and in 1951 he settled in Bakersfield, California. There he played the Blackboard nightclub as lead guitarist for the house band, and drove to Hollywood for session work at Capitol Records. He also cut a rockabilly single, Hot Dog, in 1956 under the name Corky Jones, so that his country credibility would not suffer.

Capitol's Ken Nelson signed him in 1957, and Second Fiddle gave him his first chart record two years later. While living in Washington state he met Don Rich, then a teenage fiddle player. Rich went on to become his guitarist and the leader of his band.

The Buckaroos

Owens recorded Act Naturally at Capitol Studios in Hollywood on 12 February 1963. He did not care for it at first, but Rich did. It became his first number one on the country chart, and Love's Gonna Live Here followed with sixteen weeks at the top. Merle Haggard suggested the name Buckaroos for the band. From 1963 to 1967 Rich, bassist Doyle Holly, steel guitarist Tom Brumley and drummer Willie Cantu played on all of Owens's records. Unlike most Nashville artists of the day, he recorded with his road band, and the Hall of Fame describes the result as simple stories, big choruses, twangy electric guitar, a drum track pushed forward in the mix and high two-part harmonies from Owens and Rich.

Together Again, a B side, interrupted its own A side's run at number one in 1964. I've Got a Tiger By the Tail followed that December, with Cryin' Time on the flip. The albums of these years include I've Got a Tiger By the Tail and Before You Go in 1965 and Open Up Your Heart in 1966. In late March 1966 the band played Carnegie Hall in New York, a sold-out show released as Carnegie Hall Concert. They toured Japan in 1967 and played the White House in 1968.

Hee Haw and the 1970s

From 1969 to 1986 Owens co-hosted the television show Hee Haw with Roy Clark. Made in Japan, a number one in 1972, was his last before the 1988 duet. Don Rich died on 17 July 1974. Away from the stage Owens built a business in music publishing, radio stations and booking, and in the 1970s he struggled to top the country charts as he had before. He moved to Warner Bros. in 1975 and, by the 1980s, no longer recorded.

Comeback and legacy

In 1988 Dwight Yoakam persuaded Owens to record Streets of Bakersfield with him, and the duet gave Owens his first number one in sixteen years. Capitol's catalogue came back on compact disc through the 1990s, and in 1996 he was inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame. That year he also opened the Crystal Palace, a nightclub and museum in Bakersfield where he played regularly until his death. He died on 25 March 2006, aged 76.

His songs travelled. The Beatles recorded Act Naturally in 1965, with Ringo Starr singing, and Ray Charles took Cryin' Time and Together Again into the pop charts in 1966. Emmylou Harris, Waylon Jennings and Yoakam, whose 2007 album Dwight Sings Buck is a tribute, have all covered him. The Library of Congress added the Carnegie Hall recording to the National Recording Registry in 2013.