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Ernest Dale Tubb (February 9, 1914 – September 6, 1984), nicknamed the "Texas Troubadour", was an American singer and songwriter and one of the pioneers of country music. His biggest career hit song "Walking the Floor Over You" (1941) marked the rise of the honky-tonk style of music. In 1948-49, he was the first singer to record a hit version of "Blue Christmas," a song more commonly associated with Elvis Presley and his mid-1950s version. Another well-known Tubb hit is "Waltz Across Texas" (1965), which became one of his most requested songs and is often used in dance halls throughout Texas during waltz lessons. In the early 1960s, he recorded duets with up-and-coming Loretta Lynn, including their hit "Sweet Thang".
Tubb was born on a cotton farm near Crisp, Texas (now a ghost town in Ellis County, Texas). His father was a sharecropper, so Tubb spent his youth working on farms throughout the state. He was inspired by Jimmie Rodgers and spent his spare time learning to sing, yodel, and play the guitar. At the age of nineteen, he took a job as a singer on a San Antonio radio station. The pay was low, so Tubb also dug ditches for the Works Progress Administration and then clerked at a drug store. In 1939 he moved to San Angelo, Texas and was hired to do a 15 minute afternoon live show on radio station KGKL. He drove a beer delivery truck in order to support himself during this time. During World War II he wrote and recorded a song titled "Beautiful San Angelo". Ernest Tubb was known to be good friends with the father of Dan Seals, country music singer.
In 1936, Tubb contacted Jimmie Rodgers’s widow (Rodgers died in 1933) to ask for an autographed photo. A friendship developed and she was instrumental in getting Tubb a recording contract with RCA. His first two records were unsuccessful. A tonsillectomy in 1939 affected his singing style, so he turned to songwriting. In 1940, he switched to Decca records to try singing again and it was his sixth Decca release with the single "Walking the Floor Over You" that brought Tubb to stardom.
Tubb joined the Grand Ole Opry in February, 1943 and put together his band, the "Texas Troubadours." He remained a regular on the radio show for four decades, and hosted the Midnight Jamboree after it. In 1947, Tubb headlined the first Grand Ole Opry show presented in Carnegie Hall in New York City. In 1965, he was inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame and in 1970, Tubb was inducted into the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame.
Tubb always surrounded himself with some of Nashville`s best musicians. Jimmy Short, his first guitarist in the Troubadours, is credited with the Tubb sound of one-string guitar picking. From about 1943 to 1948, Short featured clean, clear riffs throughout Tubb`s songs. Other well-known musicians to either travel with Tubb as band members or record on his records were Jerry Byrd, the phenomenal steel guitarist; Tommy "Butterball" Paige, who replaced Short as Tubb`s lead guitarist in 1947. In 1949, Billy Byrd, the quintessential Tubb guitarist, joined the Troubadours, and brought jazzy riffs to the instrumental interludes, especially the four-note riff at the end of his guitar solos that would become synonymous with Tubb`s songs. Actually a jazz musician, Byrd - no relation to Jerry - remained with Tubb until 1959.
Another Tubb musician was actually his producer, Owen Bradley, who is honored with a statue of his likeness in front of one of Nashvill
Biography Credit: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ernest_Tubb
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Born in Crisp, Texas, USA
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