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[6] Mr. Teardrop
- University of Illinois Press
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[6] Mr. Teardrop WhenMartyrenewedhisColumbiacontractonDecember12,1952,helistedhis addressas1887LoneyDriveinNashville.HeandMarizonapurchasedthehouse the following year. “You couldn’t see a mile down the road,” Marty said about his early impression of the South. “[Roads] were crooked, trees everywhere. I felt trapped down here. I almost went back to Arizona. I couldn’t handle the cold weather down here; I couldn’t take the humidity.”1 He first appeared on the Grand Ole Opry as a member on January 24, 1953. Too shy to look at the audience, he stared at the floor and never looked up. WSMRadiogavehimhisownshow,MondaythroughFriday,from5:45to6 am, sponsored by Martha White flour. “I Couldn’t Keep From Crying,” recorded 42 during the most recent Dallas session, became Marty’s second Billboard chart song, debuting in March 1953 and reaching a peak of number five. More than a year would pass before another of his songs charted.2 Because Marty didn’t have a band, one was assigned. “I don’t know who decided that,” rhythm guitarist Ray Edenton says about finding sidemen for Marty to use in Nashville and on out-of-town shows. Initially, they were Edenton , Floyd “Lightnin’” Chance on bass, Don Slayman on fiddle, and Jack Evins on steel guitar. There was no lead guitar. Chance was a comedian, with considerable frontman experience, and Jack Stapp assigned him to the band to “carry the ball” for Marty. “All Marty could do was sing,” Chance said in an oral history. “He’d be standing singing his heart out and the show died completely.” TheyallworkedwithotherentertainersandfilledinwhenMartyneededthem. Evins, who played steel for Ray Price, agreed to help Marty until Jim Farmer arrived from Phoenix. Lum York, a former Hank Williams band member, was freelancing in Nashville, andhe occasionallytook his upright bass andcomedy act on the road with Marty when Chance wasn’t available.3 “It was like starting all over,” Marty recalled. “In Phoenix on radio and television shows, I learned to talk to audiences a little bit. But when I moved to Nashville, I met stars and I was absolutely tongue-tied. It took me three or four years to get over that.”4 “He just wasn’t suited for that Martha White circuit we worked,” Edenton states. “That was strictly a bluegrass circuit.” Their road shows were out-andback dates within two hundred miles of Nashville. “We had a lot of fun on the road, working with him,”Edenton reminisces. “Idon’t have manystories about Marty; he was too straight. He didn’t drink, he didn’t smoke, he didn’t run around.” But Marty did like to make the rounds of clubs, and he took Edenton, a partying bachelor, with him. “We’d go around all night long,” Edenton says, “and he’d buy me drinks to stay with him. We had a big time, and we’d stay up all night and get in just in time to do the radio show in the morning.”5 One night at a drive-in theater in Sparta, Tennessee, their guitars lost tune in the moist night air. Evins carried his steel guitar on his shoulder as they all climbed a ladder to get to the platform under the movie screen. “People didn’tapplaudatadrive-intheater,”Evinsexplains.“Theyblewtheirhorns.You couldn’t see them, sitting in their cars. I remember how weird that feeling was. You couldn’t see anybody; it was awful.” Before the show, Marty told Lightnin’ Chance, “If I get stuck now, you come to my rescue.” Chance replied, “Don’t [44.204.204.14] Project MUSE (2024-03-28 11:15 GMT) 43 [ CH 6 ] Mr. Teardrop worry, Little Chief, I’ll take care of you.” Chance usually did most of the talking . “Marty was very shy,” Evins recalls. “He wasn’t much of a spokesman. He depended on others to fill in for him, because he’d get stuck. He’d get up there and start talking and he’d run out of things to say.” That night he sang two or three songs, and the crowd responded with honking horns. After saying, “It’s a pleasure to be with all you people up here,” Marty stammered and couldn’t remember the name of the town. Finally he turned sideways and spoke into the microphone, “Lightnin,’ dang it, say something!”6 Acuff-Rose, Marty’s publishing company, scheduled an interview for him with Ralph Emery, a twenty-year-old disc jockey at WAGG Radio in nearby Franklin. The scheduler told Emery, “He’s kind of shy; he...