Back in the Saddle Again

Ah, Gene Autry! That singing cowboy made a big impression on me. Rainy Saturdays sitting at home, watching his old movies on UHF channel 17. Goldtown Ghost Riders, Gaucho Serenade, Guns & Guitars - These movies stirred the soul of this impressionable youth. Cowboys, six-guns, guitars and those great shirts...what's not to love?

Then I discovered his 1935 serial, The Phantom Empire. A bizarre mixture of Western and science fiction featured an alien race living underground and desperadoes thwarted by Gene with help from the Junior Thunder Riders. I was hooked. For weeks I'd wear a beat-up old cowboy hat, cowboy boots and a toy six-gun trying to learn chords on a guitar found in the attic.

Even as a kid, I was an avid reader and loved the library. I'd leave the house (Mom would never let me parade around town in my boots and hat, so I kept them in the garage putting them on surreptitiously) to research the singing cowboy. This led me to John Lomax's 1910 Cowboy Songs & Other Frontier Ballads. 


Cowboy music started on the cattle drives. Longhorns were skittish, so vaqueros would sing softly to them at night avoiding a deadly stampede. It started with standard ballads, then some cowpoke would add cattle-specific phrases which led to original songs. This era was short-lived, but these anachronistic cavaliers left their brand on the American psyche.

Western music has ebbed and flowed in popularity, but will always stir fondness in this ol'buckeroo. I have two Scully shirts (Western wear company started in 1906 who made shirts for Autry, Roy Rogers & others), a worn-in pair of Tony Lama boots and finally figured out some chords on the guitar. Never could get that yodel down, though - as ever BB

"He's the last of the singin' cowboys/Singin' songs of inspiration and joy/Yippie Yi Yo, Yippie Ay Aye/
He took a break, just to chug him down a beer/C'mon folks holler out the songs you'd like to hear" - Last of the Singing Cowboys - Marshall Tucker Band