Johnny Wright Dead at 93

[t***@iwvisp.com]

tennesseean.com...

Johnnie Robert Wright — who made significant contributions as a solo
artist, a member of innovative duo Johnnie & Jack and, most famously,
as the lifelong partner to Queen of Country Music Kitty Wells – died
Tuesday morning at his Madison home. He was 97.


With Johnnie & Jack, Mr. Wright introduced Latin rhythms into country
music and scored hits included “Ashes of Love,” “Poison Love” and
“(Oh
Baby Mine) I Get So Lonely.” As a solo artist, Mr. Wright billed
himself as “Johnny Wright” and had a No. 1 hit with the Tom T. Hall-
penned “Hello Vietnam.”


And from the time he married 18-year-old Muriel Deason in 1937, he
was
an integral part of her career: Mr. Wright gave Deason the stage name
“Kitty Wells,” he brought her the landmark hit “It Wasn’t God Who
Made
Honky Tonk Angels,” he offered her headline status on package shows
at
a time when females were unfailingly relegated to sub-prime
positioning, and he was a constant as a sounding board, business
advisor and husband.


Mr. Wright grew up in Mt. Juliet, at the time a bucolic, country
community. As a boy, he listened regularly to WSM’s Grand Ole Opry,
wiggling a wire on a crystal radio set to improve the signal. His
chief childhood thrill came at when Opry star Uncle Jimmy Thompson
would make semi-regular visits to a Mt. Juliet feed store for
impromptu performances.


“He had a woman with him called Becky Bruce,” Wright told a Nashville
audience in 2000. “Uncle Jimmy had this little old Ford truck, and
he’d come in and get this fiddle out. He’d fiddle, and that woman
would start dancing… and I’d get out there and start dancing, too.”


Muriel Deason came into the picture when Mr. Wright’s sister, Bessie,
married and moved in next door to the Deason family in Nashville.
Five
years’ Deason’s senior, Mr. Wright was smitten when he heard the
teenager sing and play guitar. She was impressed by his musicianship
and by the fact that he owned a car.


“I had a Chevrolet, probably a 1931, and we’d ride around down on
First Street and look at the river. Back then, the river wasn’t near
as wide as it is today.”


They married on Oct. 30, 1937. Deason had just turned 18, and Mr.
Wright worked at the Davis Cabinet Company, making $13 a week. Deason
made less than that, folding and ironing shirts at the Washington
Manufacturing Company to help make ends meet.


In 1938, Mr. Wright's duo partner, Jack Anglin, married Mr. Wright’s
sister, Louise, who sang backing vocals with Deason as “Johnnie
Wright
& The Harmony Girls” on WSIX radio in Nashville. Soon, Mr. Wright was
performing with Anglin as Johnnie & Jack, with Deason on harmony
vocals. Anglin’s military stint halted that, and Mr. Wright worked
for
a time as a band leader, hiring young Chet Atkins to play fiddle.
(Atkins would later become known as one of country music’s greatest
guitarists.) Upon Anglin’s 1946 discharge, Johnnie & Jack was back in
business, working at a radio station in Raleigh, N.C. The duo’s
recording career began in 1947, the same year the group was offered a
place on the Grand Ole Opry (they soon left the Opry in favor of the
Louisiana Hayride show).


The 1951 Johnnie & Jack hit “Poison Love” brought a Latin beat into
country and landed at #4 on the country chart. Calypso-tinged “Cryin’
Heart Blues” followed, another Top 10 hit. A direct line may be drawn
from “Poison Love,” “Cryin’ Heart Blues” and other Johnnie & Jack
songs to the south-of-the-borderish contemporary country successes of
Kenny Chesney.


In 1952, Deason was working, though sporadically, as “Kitty Wells,” a
name Mr. Wright drew from the folk ballad, “Sweet Kitty Wells.” She
had decided to give up her professional singing in favor of full-time
homemaking. Hank Thompson’s “Wild Side Of Live” was a 15-week No. 1
hit that year, and a songwriter named J.D. Miller had penned an
“answer” song called “It Wasn’t God Who Made Honky Tonk Angels.” The
original song blamed faithless women for relationship problems.
Miller’s answer ballad turned the tables, with lyrics like “Every
heart that’s been broken/ Was because there always was a man to
blame.”


Decca Records’ Paul Cohen was at a Johnnie & Jack show at the Ernest
Tubb Record Shop on Broadway in 1952, and he spoke to Mr. Wright
about
a new song that might be good for Kitty Wells. Deason was reluctant
to
sing it at first, but the 33-year-old wife and mother was swayed by
the $125 payment she would receive for recording. Mr. Wright played
an
aluminum bass on in the studio on “It Wasn’t God Who Made Honky Tonk
Angels,” and the song soon topped the charts, selling more than
800,000 copies in its initial release and crossing over into the pop
music Top 40.


Suddenly, Kitty Wells was the hottest act in the family. And Mr.
Wright offered her top billing in shows, knowing she could pull in
ticket-buyers as the main attraction. Superstar Roy Acuff was among
those who advised Mr. Wright against allowing a woman such a place of
professional prominence.
“He said it wouldn’t work,” Mr. Wright told The Tennessean. “But it
did work.”


Indeed, Wells became known as The Queen of Country Music, and she was
the top female country star of her generation. In 1976, she was
elected to the Country Music Hall of Fame.


Johnnie & Jack remained a chart force through most of the 1950s,
though things cooled after 1958’s Top 10 “Stop the World (And Let Me
Off).” In 1960, Mr. Wright was the organizational force behind a
package show that spotlighted Wells and also featured Johnnie & Jack.
He called in young steel guitar player Johnny Sibert for an audition.


“Johnnie offered me the position,” Sibert said. “But he said, ‘I’ll
let you know, in a few years I’ll be 50-years-old, and we’re going to
hang it up and retire.”


In fact, Mr. Wright and Kitty Wells performed up until the last day
of
2000.
Upon moving to Decca in 1961, Mr. Wright noticed that the label had
misspelled his name as “Johnny” on a single. Figuring “Johnny” was
easier to spell, he kept the spelling from that point forward.


In 1963, Anglin died in a one-car crash on the way to a funeral
service for Patsy Cline, Hawkshaw Hawkins, Cowboy Copas and Randy
Hughes. Mr. Wright worked as a solo act after that, notching his only
No. 1 single in 1965 with “Hello Vietnam.” He continued to tour with
the Kitty Wells Family Show, which included son Bobby Wright. Much
later, in 1995, Mr. Wright and Wells brought fiddler Eddie Stubbs to
town to perform with them, Bobby Wright and the Tennessee Mountain
Boys band. Stubbs would become a famed air personality, broadcasting
a
nightly show on WSM and serving as a Grand Ole Opry announcer, and he
marveled at Mr. Wright and Wells, both as performers and as a couple.


“There are celebrity marriages that don’t even last 72 days now,”
Stubbs said at Wells’ 90th birthday party, in 2009. “This is possibly
the longest celebrity marriage in history.”


Part of the reason the marriage lasted was that Mr. Wright put in
plenty of work. A good mechanic, he was often called upon to fix
engine problems with the tour bus. On that bus, Mr. Wright slept on a
top bunk, reserving the bottom bunk for The Queen. No telling the
number of miles, the number of songs, the fatigue or the number of
hands that clapped together in appreciation for the songs and sounds
and memories.


Mr. Wright gave of himself through his music, through his promotional
efforts on Kitty Wells’ behalf, and through thousands of kindnesses:
an autograph here; patching a radiator hose here, on the side of some
highway; complimenting his wife, or hanging another knick-knack up in
her country kitchen. In exchange, he received a place in the history
books, and a marriage that lasted more than 73 years.


At the dawn of the new century, as he and Wells retired from the road
(though they kept the tour bus parked in the driveway, just in case),
Mr. Wright was already prepared to call the whole thing a success.


“It’s been a good, joyful life,” he said, sitting on his couch in
Madison, as Kitty Wells turned to him and smiled.


Ray Arthur

[t***@iwvisp.com]

Post by t***@iwvisp.com
tennesseean.com...
Johnnie Robert Wright — who made significant contributions as a solo
artist, a member of innovative duo Johnnie & Jack and, most famously,
as the lifelong partner to Queen of Country Music Kitty Wells – died
Tuesday morning at his Madison home. He was 97.
With Johnnie & Jack, Mr. Wright introduced Latin rhythms into country
music and scored hits included “Ashes of Love,” “Poison Love” and
“(Oh
Baby Mine) I Get So Lonely.” As a solo artist, Mr. Wright billed
himself as “Johnny Wright” and had a No. 1 hit with the Tom T. Hall-
penned “Hello Vietnam.”
And from the time he married 18-year-old Muriel Deason in 1937, he
was
an integral part of her career: Mr. Wright gave Deason the stage name
“Kitty Wells,” he brought her the landmark hit “It Wasn’t God Who
Made
Honky Tonk Angels,” he offered her headline status on package shows
at
a time when females were unfailingly relegated to sub-prime
positioning, and he was a constant as a sounding board, business
advisor and husband.
Mr. Wright grew up in Mt. Juliet, at the time a bucolic, country
community. As a boy, he listened regularly to WSM’s Grand Ole Opry,
wiggling a wire on a crystal radio set to improve the signal. His
chief childhood thrill came at when Opry star Uncle Jimmy Thompson
would make semi-regular visits to a Mt. Juliet feed store for
impromptu performances.
“He had a woman with him called Becky Bruce,” Wright told a Nashville
audience in 2000. “Uncle Jimmy had this little old Ford truck, and
he’d come in and get this fiddle out. He’d fiddle, and that woman
would start dancing… and I’d get out there and start dancing, too.”
Muriel Deason came into the picture when Mr. Wright’s sister, Bessie,
married and moved in next door to the Deason family in Nashville.
Five
years’ Deason’s senior, Mr. Wright was smitten when he heard the
teenager sing and play guitar. She was impressed by his musicianship
and by the fact that he owned a car.
“I had a Chevrolet, probably a 1931, and we’d ride around down on
First Street and look at the river. Back then, the river wasn’t near
as wide as it is today.”
They married on Oct. 30, 1937. Deason had just turned 18, and Mr.
Wright worked at the Davis Cabinet Company, making $13 a week. Deason
made less than that, folding and ironing shirts at the Washington
Manufacturing Company to help make ends meet.
In 1938, Mr. Wright's duo partner, Jack Anglin, married Mr. Wright’s
sister, Louise, who sang backing vocals with Deason as “Johnnie
Wright
& The Harmony Girls” on WSIX radio in Nashville. Soon, Mr. Wright was
performing with Anglin as Johnnie & Jack, with Deason on harmony
vocals. Anglin’s military stint halted that, and Mr. Wright worked
for
a time as a band leader, hiring young Chet Atkins to play fiddle.
(Atkins would later become known as one of country music’s greatest
guitarists.) Upon Anglin’s 1946 discharge, Johnnie & Jack was back in
business, working at a radio station in Raleigh, N.C. The duo’s
recording career began in 1947, the same year the group was offered a
place on the Grand Ole Opry (they soon left the Opry in favor of the
Louisiana Hayride show).
The 1951 Johnnie & Jack hit “Poison Love” brought a Latin beat into
country and landed at #4 on the country chart. Calypso-tinged “Cryin’
Heart Blues” followed, another Top 10 hit. A direct line may be drawn
from “Poison Love,” “Cryin’ Heart Blues” and other Johnnie & Jack
songs to the south-of-the-borderish contemporary country successes of
Kenny Chesney.
In 1952, Deason was working, though sporadically, as “Kitty Wells,” a
name Mr. Wright drew from the folk ballad, “Sweet Kitty Wells.” She
had decided to give up her professional singing in favor of full-time
homemaking. Hank Thompson’s “Wild Side Of Live” was a 15-week No. 1
hit that year, and a songwriter named J.D. Miller had penned an
“answer” song called “It Wasn’t God Who Made Honky Tonk Angels.” The
original song blamed faithless women for relationship problems.
Miller’s answer ballad turned the tables, with lyrics like “Every
heart that’s been broken/ Was because there always was a man to
blame.”
Decca Records’ Paul Cohen was at a Johnnie & Jack show at the Ernest
Tubb Record Shop on Broadway in 1952, and he spoke to Mr. Wright
about
a new song that might be good for Kitty Wells. Deason was reluctant
to
sing it at first, but the 33-year-old wife and mother was swayed by
the $125 payment she would receive for recording. Mr. Wright played
an
aluminum bass on in the studio on “It Wasn’t God Who Made Honky Tonk
Angels,” and the song soon topped the charts, selling more than
800,000 copies in its initial release and crossing over into the pop
music Top 40.
Suddenly, Kitty Wells was the hottest act in the family. And Mr.
Wright offered her top billing in shows, knowing she could pull in
ticket-buyers as the main attraction. Superstar Roy Acuff was among
those who advised Mr. Wright against allowing a woman such a place of
professional prominence.
“He said it wouldn’t work,” Mr. Wright told The Tennessean. “But it
did work.”
Indeed, Wells became known as The Queen of Country Music, and she was
the top female country star of her generation. In 1976, she was
elected to the Country Music Hall of Fame.
Johnnie & Jack remained a chart force through most of the 1950s,
though things cooled after 1958’s Top 10 “Stop the World (And Let Me
Off).” In 1960, Mr. Wright was the organizational force behind a
package show that spotlighted Wells and also featured Johnnie & Jack.
He called in young steel guitar player Johnny Sibert for an audition.
“Johnnie offered me the position,” Sibert said. “But he said, ‘I’ll
let you know, in a few years I’ll be 50-years-old, and we’re going to
hang it up and retire.”
In fact, Mr. Wright and Kitty Wells performed up until the last day
of
2000.
Upon moving to Decca in 1961, Mr. Wright noticed that the label had
misspelled his name as “Johnny” on a single. Figuring “Johnny” was
easier to spell, he kept the spelling from that point forward.
In 1963, Anglin died in a one-car crash on the way to a funeral
service for Patsy Cline, Hawkshaw Hawkins, Cowboy Copas and Randy
Hughes. Mr. Wright worked as a solo act after that, notching his only
No. 1 single in 1965 with “Hello Vietnam.” He continued to tour with
the Kitty Wells Family Show, which included son Bobby Wright. Much
later, in 1995, Mr. Wright and Wells brought fiddler Eddie Stubbs to
town to perform with them, Bobby Wright and the Tennessee Mountain
Boys band. Stubbs would become a famed air personality, broadcasting
a
nightly show on WSM and serving as a Grand Ole Opry announcer, and he
marveled at Mr. Wright and Wells, both as performers and as a couple.
“There are celebrity marriages that don’t even last 72 days now,”
Stubbs said at Wells’ 90th birthday party, in 2009. “This is possibly
the longest celebrity marriage in history.”
Part of the reason the marriage lasted was that Mr. Wright put in
plenty of work. A good mechanic, he was often called upon to fix
engine problems with the tour bus. On that bus, Mr. Wright slept on a
top bunk, reserving the bottom bunk for The Queen. No telling the
number of miles, the number of songs, the fatigue or the number of
hands that clapped together in appreciation for the songs and sounds
and memories.
Mr. Wright gave of himself through his music, through his promotional
an autograph here; patching a radiator hose here, on the side of some
highway; complimenting his wife, or hanging another knick-knack up in
her country kitchen. In exchange, he received a place in the history
books, and a marriage that lasted more than 73 years.
At the dawn of the new century, as he and Wells retired from the road
(though they kept the tour bus parked in the driveway, just in case),
Mr. Wright was already prepared to call the whole thing a success.
“It’s been a good, joyful life,” he said, sitting on his couch in
Madison, as Kitty Wells turned to him and smiled.
Ray Arthur

97