Red Sovine

Woodrow Wilson Sovine (July 17, 1918 — April 4, 1980), better known as Red Sovine, was a country music singer. He was associated with truck driving songs, particularly those recited as narratives but set to music. The most famous example was his 1976 number one hit "Teddy Bear."

Biography

Early years

Born in 1918 in Charleston, West Virginia, Sovine was taught to play guitar by his mother. His first venture into music was with his childhood friend Johnnie Bailes, with whom he performed as "Smiley and Red, the Singing Sailors" in the country music revue Jim Pike's Carolina Tar Heels on WWVA-AM in Wheeling, West Virginia^{[citation needed]}. Faced with limited success, Bailes left to perform as part of The Bailes Brothers. Sovine got married, and continued to sing on Charleston radio, while holding down a job as a supervisor of a hosiery factory.^{[citation needed]} With the encouragement of Bailes, Sovine formed The Echo Valley Boys.^{[citation needed]}

After a year of performing in West Virginia, Sovine moved to Shreveport, Louisiana, where the Bailes Brothers were performing on KWKH. Sovine's own early morning show wasn't very popular, but he gained greater exposure performing on the famed KWKH radio program, Louisiana Hayride. One of his co-stars was Hank Williams, who steered Sovine toward a better time slot at WSFA in Montgomery, Alabama, and toward a contract with MGM Records in 1949. That same year, Sovine replaced Williams on Louisiana Hayride when Williams jumped to the Grand Ole Opry. Over the next four years he recorded 28 singles, mostly following in Williams' honky tonk footsteps, that didn't make much of a dent on the charts but did establish him as a solid performer.

Fame

Another Louisiana Hayride co-star who helped Sovine was country music legend Webb Pierce. Pierce convinced Sovine to lead his Wondering Boys band and helped him toward a contract with Decca in 1954. The following year Sovine cut a duet with Goldie Hill, "Are You Mine?" which peaked in the Top 15, and in 1956 he had his first number one hit when he duetted with Pierce on a cover of George Jones' "Why Baby Why." Sovine had two other Top Five singles that year and joined the cast of the Grand Ole Opry. After recording close to 50 sides with Decca by 1959, Sovine signed to Starday Records and began touring the club circuit as a solo act.

1960s

In 1963, Sovine passed on the helping hand given him by older performers when he heard the singing of African-American minor league baseball player Charley Pride and suggested that he move to Nashville, Tennessee. Sovine opened doors for Pride at Pierce's Cedarwood Publishing, but his own career had stalled: "Dream House for Sale," which reached number 22 in 1964, came nearly eight years after his last hit.

Trucker songs and sentimental tunes

In 1965 Sovine found his niche when he recorded "Giddy-Up Go," which, like most of his other trucker hits, was co-written by himself with Tommy Hill. It is spoken, rather than sung, as the words of an older long-distance truck driver who rediscovers his long-lost son driving another truck on the same highway. Minnie Pearl released an answer song titled "Giddy-Up Go Answer." Sovine's version of the song spent six weeks atop the country charts and crossed over to the pop charts. Other truck-driving hits followed, including:

• "Phantom 309," a tale of a hitchhiker who hops a ride from a trucker who turns out to be the ghost of a man who died years ago giving his life to save a school bus full of kids from a horrible collision with his rig. This particular story was later adapted by singer/songwriter Tom Waits who performed "Big Joe and Phantom 309" during his Nighthawks At The Diner recordings. Waits' version of this song was covered by Archers of Loaf on the 1995 tribute album, Step Right Up: The Songs of Tom Waits. Musician Steve Flett named a recording project after the song. The song was originally written and recorded by Tommy Faile
• "Teddy Bear," the tale of a disabled boy who lost his truck driver father in a highway accident and keeps his CB radio base as his only companion.
• "Little Joe," a tale of a trucker and his devoted canine friend which became his last big hit.

Sovine was also remembered for his Christmas tear-jerkers, which included "Here it is Christmas" (a divorcee's holiday lament), "Faith in Santa" (a dialog between a poor, runaway boy and a sidewalk Santa), and "What Does Christmas Look Like?" (a little blind girl asks daddy to describe the Christmas she cannot see). He scored another sentimental hit with "Little Rosa" in which a Mexican-American railroad employee tells a stranger, in broken English, about getting a bouquet to place on the grave of his small daughter who was killed by a train while he was away.

Covers

Sovine performed covers of many truck driving songs made popular by fellow country stars, such as Del Reeves and Dave Dudley, as well as "Why Baby Why", a duet with Webb Pierce, originally recorded by George Jones. Other covers include "A Dear John Letter" (Jean Shepard and Ferlin Husky), "Old Rivers" (Walter Brennan), "Bringing Mary Home" (The Country Gentlemen), and "Roses for Mama" (C.W. McCall), among many more.

Many of Sovine's biggest truck driving hits were covered by artists such as, Del Reeves, Ferlin Husky, Boxcar Willie, Tex Williams and Australian country singer Nev Nicholls.

Death

On April 4, 1980, Sovine suffered a heart attack while driving his Ford van in Nashville, which caused him to crash. The injuries and his heart attack were fatal. For many years after his death, his greatest hits collection (The Best Of Red Sovine) was advertised on television; exposing his music to a new generation of fans. In 2007, many of his songs were played in Washington, DC and Richmond, Virginia on the Elliot in the Morning radio show.

Discography

Studio albums

Compilation albums

Singles

References

• Red Sovine Feature in the WFMU Diesel Sniffing Series
• Official Site
• Allmusic
• Tales from the Truck Stop - A humorous, illustrated fiction blog that spoofs the sentimental and supernatural world Red Sovine created in his songs.
• Trott, Walt (1998). "Red Sovine". In The Encyclopedia of Country Music. Paul Kingsbury, Editor. New York: Oxford University Press. p. 499. lpdiscography.com