The cover of Bradley's biggest single as a performer, "Big Guitar."

Owen Bradley (c. 1916 - January 7, 1998) was an influential American record producer, who, along with Chet Atkins and Bobby Ferguson, was one of the chief architects of the popular 1950s and 1960s "Nashville Sound" in country music. 1916 (MCMXVI) is a leap year starting on Saturday (link will take you to calendar) // Events January-February January 1 - The Royal Army Medical Corps first successful blood transfusion using blood that had been stored and cooled. ... January 7 is the seventh day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. ... 1998 (MCMXCVIII) was a common year starting on Thursday of the Gregorian calendar, and was designated the International Year of the Ocean. ... In the music industry, a record producer (or music producer) has many roles, among them controlling the recording sessions, coaching and guiding the performers, and supervising the recording, mixing and mastering processes. ... Chet Atkins Chester Burton Chet Atkins (June 20, 1924 – June 30, 2001) was an influential guitarist and record producer. ... Bobby Ferguson is a former football manager. ... // Events and trends This map shows two essential global spheres during the Cold War in 1959. ... The 1960s decade refers to the years from 1960 to 1969, inclusive. ... The Nashville sound in country music arose during the 1950s in the United States. ... In popular music, Country music, also called country and western music or country-western, is an amalgam of popular musical forms developed in the Southern United States, with roots in traditional folk music, Celtic Music, Blues, Gospel music, and Old-time music that began to develop rapidly [1] in the...

Before the fame

A native of the Nashville suburb of Westmoreland, Bradley learned piano at an early age, and began playing in local nightclubs and roadhouses when he was just a teenager. At 20, he got a job at WSM-AM radio, where he worked as an arranger and musician. In 1942, he became the stations musical director, and was also the leader of a sought-after dance band that played well-heeled society parties all over the city. He kept the band up until 1964, although in the intervening decades, his work as a producer would far overshadow his own performing career. For other cities named Nashville, see Nashville (disambiguation). ... Westmoreland is a town located in Sumner County, Tennessee. ... A grand piano A piano is a musical instrument which is classified as a keyboard, percussion or string instrument, depending on the system of classification used. ... A nightclub (often shortened to club) is an entertainment venue which does its primary business after dark. ... A roadhouse is a theatre building that does not house a producing company of its own, but instead rents its facility to production companies. ... A separate article is about the punk band called The Adolescents. ... WSM is the call letters of a 50,000 watt AM radio station (and its associated FM station) located in Nashville, Tennessee. ... This article is about the year. ... For the Nintendo 64 emulator, see 1964 (Emulator). ...

In 1947, Bradley took a position as an assistant producer and songwriter at Decca Records. He worked with Paul Cohen on recordings by some of the biggest talents of the day, including Ernest Tubb, Burl Ives, Red Foley and Kitty Wells. Learning from Cohen, he eventually began to produce records on his own. When his mentor left the label in 1958, Bradley became vice president of Decca's Nashville division, and began pioneering what would become "The Nashville Sound." 1947 (MCMXLVII) was a common year starting on Wednesday (the link is to a full 1947 calendar). ... A songwriter is someone who writes the lyrics to songs, the musical composition or melody to songs, or both. ... It has been suggested that Decca Music Group be merged into this article or section. ... Paul Joseph Cohen (born April 2, 1934) is an American mathematician. ... Ernest Dale Tubb (February 9, 1914 - September 6, 1984), nicknamed the Texas Troubadour, was an American singer and songwriter and one of the pioneers of country music. ... Burl Ives, photographed by Carl Van Vechten, 1955 Burl Icle Ivanhoe Ives (June 14, 1909 – April 14, 1995) was a successful folk music singer, author and actor. ... Clyde Julian Red Foley ( June 17, 1910 - September 19, 1968) was a country music singer. ... Kitty Wells Kitty Wells (born Muriel Deason on August 30, 1919) is an American country musician from Nashville, Tennessee, known from about 1955 as the Queen of Country Music. ... 1958 (MCMLVIII) was a common year starting on Wednesday of the Gregorian calendar. ...

The Nashville sound

Country music had long been looked on as unsophisticated and folksy, and was largely confined to listeners in the less affluent small towns of the American South and Appalachia. In the late 1950s, Bradley's home base of Nashville was poising itself to be a vibrant, affluent, urban city with a burgeoning music recording industry, and not just the traditional home of the Grand Ole Opry. In fact, a Quonset hut attached to a house Bradley owned with his brother Harold at 804 16th Avenue South in Nashville, informally called "Bradley's Barn," became the first recording studio in the area. After Bradley's Barn, RCA built its famous Studio B, and a handful of other labels set up shop on what would eventually become known as Music Row. Southern United States. ... Appalachian Region of the U.S., as defined by the Appalachian Regional Commission Appalachia is a term used to include a region stretching from Maine to Alabama that surrounds the Appalachian mountains. ... The Grand Ole Opry is a weekly Saturday night country music radio program broadcast live on WSM Radio in Nashville, Tennessee. ... A typical Quonset hut A Quonset hut is a lightweight prefabricated structure of corrugated steel having a semicircular cross section. ... For other uses, see RCA (disambiguation). ... Studio B Studio B is an American television program appearing on Fox News Channel. ... Music Row is an area just to the southwest of Downtown Nashville, Tennessee that is home to hundreds of businesses related to the country music, gospel music, and Christian music industries. ...

Bradley and his contemporaries infused hooky melodies with more refined lyrics and blended them with a refined pop music sensibility to create the Nashville Sound, also known as "countrypolitan." Light, easy listening piano as popularized by Floyd Cramer replaced the clinky honky-tonk keyboards. Lush string sections replete with [[violin]s] and cellos took the place of the mountain fiddle sound, and steel guitars and backing vocals rounded out the mix. As one of the architects of the Nashville sound, Owen Bradley was one of the most influential country music producers in history. For Popular music (music that is popular, rather than of a specific genre or style), see Popular music. ... Easy listening music is a style of popular music which emerged in the mid-20th century. ... Floyd Cramer (October 27, 1933 - December 31, 1997) was an American Hall of Fame pianist who was one of the architects of the Nashville Sound. ... A Honky tonk was originally a type of bar common throughout the southern United States, also called honkatonks, honkey-tonks, tonks or tunks. ... A cello The cello (the c is pronounced /ʧ/ as the ch in church) or cello, short for violoncello, is a stringed instrument and a member of the violin family. ... A Dobro style resonator guitar Steel guitar, strictly speaking, refers to a method of playing using a metal slide (or steel) on a guitar played horizontally, with the strings uppermost. ...

Starmaker

The singers Bradley produced made unprecedented headway into pop radio, and artists such as Patsy Cline, Brenda Lee, Loretta Lynn and Conway Twitty became household names nationwide. Pop singers like Buddy Holly also recorded with Bradley in his Nashville studio. In addition to his production, Bradley released a handful of instrumentals under his own name, including the minor 1958 hit "Big Guitar." With his brother Harold, Bradley produced a half-hour television series, "Country Style U.S.A.", during the late 1950s. Patsy Cline Patsy Cline (September 8, 1932 – March 5, 1963) was an American country music singer. ... Brenda Lee on the cover of her collection, part of The Millennium Collection Brenda Lee, real name Brenda Mae Tarpley (born December 11, 1942 in Lithonia, Georgia) was an American teen idol and is currently a touring country singer. ... Loretta Lynn Loretta Lynn (born April 14, 1935) is an American country singer who was the leading country female vocalist during much of the 1960s and 1970s. ... Conway Twitty Conway Twitty, born Harold Lloyd Jenkins, (September 1, 1933 – June 5, 1993) was one of the United States most successful artists of the 20th century. ... Charles Hardin Holley (September 7, 1936 – February 3, 1959), better known as Buddy Holly, was an American singer, songwriter, and a pioneer of Rock and Roll. ...

Bradley bought a farm outside of Nashville in 1961, converting a barn into a demo studio, and sold the Quonset hut to Columbia (which today is a division of Sony). Within a few years, the new "Bradley's Barn" became a legendary recording venue in country music circles. and legendary studios in country music. It burned to the ground in 1980, but Bradley rebuilt it within a few years in the same location. Sony Corporation ) is Japanese multinational corporation and one of the leading manufacturers of video, communications, and information technology products for the consumer and professional markets. ... 1980 (MCMLXXX) was a leap year starting on Tuesday. ...

Later years and honors

The bronze statue that graces Owen Bradley Park on Nashville's Music Row

In 1974, Owen Bradley was inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame. One additional claim to fame is that he produced records for more fellow Hall of Fame members than anyone else: six. He retired from production in the early 1980s, but continued to work on the selected projects. Canadian artist k.d. lang chose Bradley to producer her acclaimed 1988 album, Shadowland. At the time of his death, he and Harold were producing the album I've Got A Right To Cry for Mandy Barnett, who is best known for her portrayal of Patsy Cline in the original Nashville production of the stage play Always...Patsy Cline. For other cities named Nashville, see Nashville (disambiguation). ... Music Row is an area just to the southwest of Downtown Nashville, Tennessee that is home to hundreds of businesses related to the country music, gospel music, and Christian music industries. ... This official history of the Country Music Hall of Fame skirts the scandals well-documented by veteran Music Row historian Stacy Harris. ... The 1980s decade refers to the years from 1980 to 1989, inclusive. ... k. ... 1988 (MCMLXXXVIII) was a leap year starting on Friday of the Gregorian calendar. ... Shadowland was a British progressive rock band of the 1990s. ...

His production of Cline's legendary hits like "Crazy," "I Fall to Pieces" and "Walkin' After Midnight" remain, more than forty years on, the standard against which great female country records are measured today. It is his work with Cline for which he is best known, and when the biopics Coal Miner's Daughter" and Sweet Dreams were filmed, he was chosen to direct their soundtracks. Crazy is a famous ballad composed by Willie Nelson and first recorded by Patsy Cline. ... A biographical film or biopic is a film about a particular person or group of people, based on events that actually happened. ... DVD cover Loretta Lynn published her autobiography, Coal Miners Daughter, in the mid-70s. ... Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This) is a New Wave album by British synth pop duo Eurythmics, released in January of 1983 (see 1983 in music). ...

In 1997 the Metro Parks Authority in Nashville dedicated to his honor a small public park between 16th Avenue South and Division Street, where a bronze likeness of the legendary producer can be seen. It is directly opposite a monumental public statuary by Alan LeQuire called "Musica," that has become the icon of Music Row, the area he helped to make famous. 1997 (MCMXCVII in Roman) is a common year starting on Wednesday of the Gregorian calendar. ... This article needs cleanup. ...