Artist: Chet Atkins
Genre(s):
Comedy
Instrumental
Country
New Age
Pop
Discography:
Collection
Year: 2005
Tracks: 18
The Guitar Genius
Year: 1996
Tracks: 10
Almost Alone
Year: 1996
Tracks: 13
The Collection
Year: 1995
Tracks: 18
Picks On The Hits
Year: 1991
Tracks: 16
Pickin' on Country
Year: 1989
Tracks: 18
Street Dreams
Year: 1986
Tracks: 10
Reminiscing
Year:
Tracks: 12
Chet Atkins Picks On The Beatles
Year:
Tracks: 12
Without Chet Atkins, nation music crataegus laevigata never have crossed o'er into the pop charts in the '50s and '60s. Although he recorded hundreds of solo records, Atkins' largest influence came as a seance musician and a phonograph recording producer. During the '50s and '60s, he helped create the Nashville effectual, a manner of country music that owed nearly as very much to pop as it did to honkie tonks.
And as a guitarist, he was without analog. Atkins' style grew out of his admiration for Merle Travis, expanding Travis' signature tune syncopated ovolo and fingers roll into new territory. Interestingly, Atkins didn't start his melodious career by playing guitar. On the testimonial of his elder brother, Lowell, he began playing the shirk at a child. However, Chet was still attracted to the guitar, and at the long time of 9 he traded a handgun for a guitar. Atkins well-educated his tool chop-chop, becoming an effected participant by the time he left high schooltime in 1941. Using a form of contacts, he wounding up playacting on the Bill Carlisle Show on WNOX in Knoxville, TN, as well as becoming part of the Dixie Swingers. Atkins worked with Homer & Jethro spell he was at the radio post. After threesome long time, he stirred to a radiocommunication station in Cincinnati.
Encouraging Red Foley, Atkins made his first appearance at the Grand Ole Opry in 1946. That like year, he made his first records, recording for Bullet. Atkins too began making regular performances on the WRVA tuner station in Richmond, VA, simply he was repeatedly laid-off because his musical arrangements differed from the expectations of the station's executives. He finally affected to Springfield, MO, working for the KWTO station. A tape of 1 of Atkins' performances was sent to RCA Victor's office in Chicago. Eventually, it worked its way to Steve Sholes, the drumhead of res publica music at RCA. Sholes had heard Atkins previously, and had been nerve-wracking to rule him for several years. By the time Sholes heard the tape, Atkins had stirred to Denver, and was playing with Shorty Thompson & His Rangers. Upon receiving the bid from RCA, he stirred to Nashville to record.
Once he arrived in Nashville, Atkins recorded eight tracks for the label, 5 of which featured the guitar player vocalizing. Impressed by his playing, Sholes made Atkins the studio apartment guitar player for all of the RCA studio's Nashville roger Sessions in 1949. The following year, Mother Maybelle and the Carter Sisters hired him as a regular on the Grand Ole Opry, qualification his place in Nashville's musical community batten down. While he worked for RCA, he played on many hit records and helped fashion the Nashville sound. RCA comprehended his work and made him a adviser to the company's Nashville division in 1953. That year, the label began to issue a number of instrumental albums that showcased Atkins' considerable talents. Two years later, he scored his low strike with a edition of "Mr. Sandman"; it was followed by "Silver Bell," a duet with Hank Snow. By the late '50s, Atkins was known passim the euphony industry as a top-notch player. Not merely did his records sell well, he intentional guitars for Gibson and Gretsch; the popularity of these models continues to the present day.
Sholes left wing for New York in 1957 to playact as psyche of pop A&R, leaving Atkins as the handler of RCA's Nashville division. However, the guitar player didn't abandon performing, and throughout the early '60s his ace continued to rise. He played the Newport Jazz Festival in 1960; in 1961, he performed at the White House. Atkins had his low Top Five come to in 1965 with a reworking of Boots Randolph's "Yakety Sax," retitled "Yakety Axe"; in plus to organism a tidy country strike, the birdcall crossed o'er to the pop charts. Atkins' character behind the scenes was palmy as intimately. He produced hits for the legal age of RCA's Nashville acts, including Elvis Presley and Eddy Arnold, and observed a wealth of talent, including Don Gibson, Waylon Jennings, Floyd Cramer, Charley Pride, Bobby Bare, and Connie Smith. Because of his consistent track record, Atkins was promoted to vice president of RCA's country class when Sholes died in 1968.
The next year, Atkins had his lowest major hit single, "Country Gentleman." In the late '60s and early '70s, several minor hits followed, simply only 1 vocal, "Victorian" (1968), made it into the Top 40. Instead, the guitarist's major musical donation in the early percentage of the '70s was with Homer & Jethro. Under the name the Nashville String Band, the trinity released five-spot albums 'tween 1970 and 1972. Following Homer's death, Atkins continued to work with Jethro.
Atkins continued to record for RCA throughout the '70s, although he was creatively suppressed by the tag by the ending of the ten. The guitarist treasured to record a jazz album, only he was met with resistance by the label. In 1982, he left the pronounce and sign-language with Columbia, cathartic his first base album for the label, Act It Out With Chet Atkins, in 1983. During his clock time at Columbia, Atkins gone from his traditional country roots, demonstrating that he was a bold and refined jazz guitarist as well. He did return to nation on affair, especially on brace albums with Mark Knopfler and Jerry Reed, but by and bombastic, Atkins' Columbia records demonstrated a more adventuresome guitarist than was antecedently captured on his RCA albums.
Sadly, Atkins was diagnosed with cancer, and in 1997 doctors distant a tumor from his brain. In his last months, the cancer had made Atkins inactive, and he finally lost the fight on June 30, 2001, at his home plate in Nashville. Throughout his career, Chet Atkins earned numerous awards, including 11 Grammy awards and nine CMA Instrumentalist of the Year honors, as well as a Lifetime Achievement Award from NARAS. Although his award list is telling, it only begins to convey his contribution to nation music.
