On Saturday, country music legend Buck Owens, the host of the television variety show
Hee Haw, passed away in his sleep at the age of 76. The singer, who was battling ill health after a throat cancer surgery in 1993, is credited with the creation of the 'Bakersfield sound', better known as 'American music'.
According to Jim Shaw, a member of Owens' Buckaroos band, the singer died in his sleep at his Bakersfield home due to causes that are not clear yet. On Friday night, Owens performed onstage with the Buckaroos band at the Buck Owens' Crystal Palace in Bakersfield. “He had come to the club early and had a chicken-fried steak dinner and bragged that it's his favorite meal,” Shaw said. He then decided to head home without performing but changed his mind when he saw fans that had come from long distances to watch him sing. “He died in his sleep – they figure it was about 4:30 am – probably of heart failure. So he had his favorite meal, played a show and died in his sleep. We thought that's not too bad,” Shaw said.
Born in August 12, 1929, in Sherman, Texas, to a family of sharecroppers, Owens headed to California with his family in 1937 to escape the Great Depression. However, the family made Mesa in Arizona its home, where Owens gave up studies at the age of 13 to work in the fields. His dream of becoming a singer came from wanting a comfortable lifestyle unlike the one he experienced as a fieldworker. Owens learnt to play the mandolin around that time and took up musical jobs at bars as a teenager. In 1945, he teamed up with a guitarist Theryl Ray Britten to perform on a local radio show called
Buck and Britt, along the way picking up the nuances of steel guitar, saxophone, and harmonica. In 1940, he chanced upon the oil town Bakersfield and in 1950, a 20-year-old Owens, married to small time singer Bonnie Campbell, shifted to Bakersfield in California with his two young sons in tow.
Playing in bars there, Owens mastered the art of playing the Telecaster, finding extra work at Capitol Records in Hollywood and performing with the likes of Tommy Sands, Sonny James, Del Reeves, Wanda Jackson, Gene Vincent, and Faron Young among others. Later, in 1957, the big league beckoned and Owens bagged a contract with Capitol Records. At first things didn't pan out, but around 1959, Owens got his first hit
Second Fiddle, which hit number 24 on the charts. In 1963, he recorded another hit
Act Naturally, which hit number 1 on the charts when the Beatles immortalized the song. Next came
Crying Time in 1965, which climbed the charts after Ray Charles covered it.
Along the way, Owens met teenaged fiddler Don Rich, who not only became his best friend but also his fiddler and bandleader. From there on, Owens never looked back, churning out hits after hits -
Together Again,
Love's Gonna Live Here,
It Takes People Like You (To Make People Like Me), and
How Long Will My Baby Be Gone, among others.
On June 15, 1960, the singer, along with guitarist Roy Clark, embarked on the variety show
Hee Haw, which though boosting his finances, diluted the power of his musical persona. That, however, didn't change the fact that between 1963 and 1967, the musician belted out 15 straight number one records.
“What a musical innovator. His music had so much norteño and Tex-Mex in it. It had such a California influence that Nashville never had. That put the state of California on the map. Not better, just different. It had more edge,” said Chris Hillman, band member of Byrds, the Desert Rose Band and the Flying Burrito Brothers, while condoling Owens' death. Added Roy Clark, “When people start looking back on his career, they are going to be surprised by the number of things he did first. He left a great legacy in country music.”
Besides Bonnie Campbell, Owens was married and divorced from two other women – Phyllis and Jennifer. He is survived by three sons, Buddy Alan, Michael and Johnny.
