Lloyd Green
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
October 4, 1937
Lloyd Green | |
|---|---|
 Lloyd Green in 2021 | |
| Background information | |
| Born | Lloyd Lamar Green October 4, 1937 Leaf, Mississippi, U.S. |
| Genres | Country |
| Occupation | Musician |
| Instrument | Pedal steel guitar |
| Years active | 1947–present |
Lloyd Lamar Green (born October 4, 1937) is an American pedal steel guitarist and session musician. Green was a member of the country music studio musician collective known as the Nashville A-Team, and has performed on more than 5,000 recordings, for artists such as Charley Pride, The Byrds, Johnny Cash, The Monkees, Don Williams, Paul McCartney, and Bob Dylan.[1] His playing on The Byrds' 1968 album Sweetheart of the Rodeo influenced generations of steel guitarists.[2] Green was inducted into the Steel Guitar Hall of Fame in 1988.
Green was born on October 4, 1937[3] in Leaf, Mississippi, about 40 miles southeast of Hattiesburg. He and his family moved to Mobile, Alabama at the age of four, where he began to take music lessons.[4] At age seven, he applied for lessons at the Oahu Music Company, but they did not take students under fourteen. Oahu allowed a "test lesson" for him. When they found his strong aptitude, they let him enroll.[5] He was an exceptional student, to the extent that Oahu used him in their promotional materials and newsletters. Green said, "I became the poster child for the course when I was about 10 years old" (see photo).[5] About that time he received his first electric steel guitar, a Rickenbacker with an Oahu amplifier. He had the ability to memorize songs quickly and was able to play them back exactly as his teacher had played them.[5] About this time, lap steel guitars were getting pedals added to become the new pedal steel guitar and Green made an improvised pedal to add to his lap steel using an automobile accelerator pedal.[5][2]: 211 He graduated from high school in 1955 and attended the University of Southern Mississippi. Green said, "While in school, I was playing around Mississippi with Justin Tubb, the Wilburn Brothers, the Browns, Hank Locklin. . . It really whetted my appetite.”[5] In 1956 at age 19, he shocked his parents[5] when he decided to take a year off college and move to Nashville to pursue music.[4] After the move, he roomed for a while with another future steel guitar great, Jimmy Day.[3]: 183 A few months after the move, he met his future wife Dot Edwards from Columbia, Tennessee and they were married in 1957.[6]: 1 They have remained together over five decades.[7]: 9
Early career
Green joined Faron Young's road band in December 1956 and stayed for 18 months.[4] He soon played steel guitar on his first session, George Jones' "Too Much Water" recorded in the newly opened RCA Studio in Nashville.[8] After a one-month tour with Ferlin Husky, with money tight, he swore never to tour again[3]: 183 and temporarily gave up music to work as a shoe salesman, not playing his guitar for two years.[5] By the spring of 1963 he was ready to try music again. Singer Roy Drusky offered him a job as Drusky's assistant working in the Nashville office of the music licensing company SESAC.[5] At that time, Green didn't have enough money to renew his expired musicians' union card until Fred Rose's widow renewed it for him.[9] The SESAC job put Green in the middle of the action on Nashville's Music Row. He said, "...the first week I was there, Slim Williamson, who owned Chart Records, hired me for a demo and master session."[5] Green began working with a new artist, Lynn Anderson, whose hits for Chart led to her stardom on Columbia Records with hits such as "Rose Garden".[5]
Success
In 1965, Green recorded a demo of a song called "The Bridge Washed Out" for Decca recording artist Warner Mack. Mack liked what Green played on the demo. It was a sharp-edged rapid style on muted strings now known as "chicken pickin'". Mack wanted to hire Green for the master session, but producer Owen Bradley objected.[5] Green was an unknown outsider at the time and Bradley wanted Pete Drake, who was a veteran studio player. Warner persisted and Green got the job.[5] At the session, Bradley was not happy and said over the talkback, "Turn them damn highs off-a that steel! They're killin'my ears".[5] Bassist Bob Moore heard Green play and said, "Son, that's a career for you right there – there's your sound!"[5] Moore's positive sentiment was not unanimous– Bradley was not convinced and guitarist Grady Martin issued a one-word expletive.[5] However, when the record came out three months later, it went straight to number one and ushered Green into the circle of studio hit-makers.[5] Well-wishers congratulated Bradley on the hit's ground-breaking new sound and his answer was "Well, I really appreciate that. We knew we were on to something new when we cut it." The unique style was copied by other steel players and remained in vogue for a few years thereafter.[7]: 9
For the next 15 years, Green remained an elite studio player averaging 400 sessions a year including a string of 17 years of performing on at least three No. 1 songs each year.[6]: 9 He performed on recordings of about 500 artists. A partial list includes Faron Young, Freddie Hart, the Byrds, Charley Pride, Paul McCartney, Ringo Starr, Dolly Parton, Ricky Skaggs, T.G. Sheppard, Ronnie Milsap, Waylon Jennings, Hank Snow, Jerry Lee Lewis, Nanci Griffith, Jim Reeves, Johnny Cash, Johnny Paycheck, and Loretta Lynn.[10] He turned down a U.S. tour with McCartney due to the fact that he didn't want to lose work in Nashville.[4]
His 1968 performance on the Byrds' landmark album Sweetheart of the Rodeo, made the biggest impact on the overall American music audience[7]: 13 and influenced generations of non-mainstream country guitarists.[2]: 211 Music writer Peter Cooper called the album "a genre-bender that illuminated a path that led to modern California Country, Americana and alternative country music".[7]: 11 On the album, Green was featured on "You Ain't Goin' Nowhere", "Hickory Wind", "Nothing Was Delivered", and "One Hundred Years from Now". In Los Angeles, steel guitarist JayDee Maness performed on four other tracks. Green appeared with the Byrds at the Grand Ole Opry on March 16, 1968 to promote the album, but the Byrds were booed and heckled by the conservative Opry audience[7]: 11 who considered them "long-haired outsiders".[7]: 11 Part of the reason was that Gram Parsons assured the presenter that he would perform "Sing Me Back Home" by Merle Haggard, but instead performed his own song, "Hickory Wind".[11] In 2018, Green and fellow steel guitarist JayDee Maness teamed up to make a tribute album called Journey to the Beginningː A Steel Guitar Tribute to the Byrds.[12]
Many steel guitarists point to Green's 1968 performance on Charley Pride's In Person album as the highlight of Green's career to that point.[7] In addition to his work as a sideman, Green has cut several of his own LPs, and had a top 40 hit with his instrumental version of “I Can See Clearly Now.”
Later years
In the 1980s, an inner ear ailment which distorted his hearing forced Green to stop working.[6]: 13 Green said, "It was a nightmarish experience. It went on for about a year before I quit doing sessions. Everything sounded terrible [to me]."[6]: 13 He described it as a half-step different pitch in each ear.[6]: 13 After a few years the problem resolved and he tried to return to session work after a 15-year hiatus but younger players and different styles had evolved and producers and record labels would not hire him.[6]: 15 Green was inducted into the Steel Guitar Hall of Fame in 1988.[13] He has performed with over 500 artists, has played on 116 number one hits, and over 100 top ten hits.[14] He was featured with a speaking part on Ken Burns' Country Music documentary film in 2019.[8]
