Tex Williams

Tex Williams

Tex Williams (born Sollie Paul Williams) August 23, 1917 – October 11, 1985) was an American Western swing musician from Ramsey, Illinois. His popularity peaked in the late 1940s. Williams is perhaps best-known for this talking blues style; his biggest hit was the novelty song, "Smoke! Smoke! Smoke! (That Cigarette)," which held the number one sales position on the Billboard charts for six weeks in 1947 and can also be heard during the opening scenes of the 2006 movie, "Thank You for Smoking".

Smoke, Smoke, Smoke (That Cigarette) was the #5 song on BillBoard's Top 100 list for 1947, and was #1 on the Country chart that same year. [http://www.billboard.com/bbcom/charts/yearend_chart_display.jsp?f=The+Billboard+Hot+100&g=Year-end+Singles&year=1947]

Tex's backing band, the Western Caravan, was one of the best units of its kind. Numbering about a dozen members, it attained an enviable level of fluid interplay between electric and steel guitars, fiddles, bass, accordion, trumpet, and other instruments (even occasional harp). At first they recorded polkas for Capitol, with limited success. That was changed by the success of Smoke, Smoke, Smoke (That Cigarette) written in large part by Merle Travis. [http://www.cmt.com/artists/az/williams_tex/bio.jhtml]

He died of pancreatic cancer in October 1985. [Kienzle, "Southwest Shuffle", p. 99: "In 1985, he died of pancreatic cancer (not lung cancer, as was widley reported)."]

Williams, along with his band, the Western Caravan, appeared in the following films:
* Tex Williams and His Western Caravan (1947)
* Tex Williams & Orchestra in Western Whoopee (1948)
* Tex Williams' Western Varieties (1951).

Discography

* 1955 - "Dance-O-Rama #5"
* 1960 - "Smoke! Smoke! Smoke!"
* 1962 - "Country Music Time"
* 1963 - "Tex Williams In Las Vegas"
* 1966 - "The Voice Of Authority"
* 1971 - "A Man Called Tex"
* 1974 - "Those Lazy Hazy Days"

References

Bibliography

*Kienzle, Rich. "Southwest Shuffle: Pioneers of Honky Tonk, Western Swing, and Country Jazz". New York: Routledge, 2003. ISBN 0-415-94102-4
*Whitburn, Joel. "The Billboard Book of Top 40 Country Hits". Billboard Books, 2006. ISBN 0-8230-8291-1

External links

*
* [http://www.tobacco.org/History/Smoke_Cigarette.html New York Times article from 1985 on tobacco.org]
* [http://wc06.allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=11:azfqxq95ldje~T1 All Music Guide]


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