Sheb Wooley

Sheb Wooley (born April 10, 1921 in Erick , Oklahoma , † September 16, 2003 in Nashville , Tennessee ) was an American country musician and film actor. His biggest hit was The Purple People Eater from 1958. He also made a career in comedy under the name Ben Colder .

Life

Childhood and youth

Sheb Wooley grew up in poor conditions in rural Oklahoma. His parents ran a small farm, but the harvest was often ruined by the adverse weather. Wooley got into horse riding at an early age and took part in rodeos before he was ten. Another hobby was music; his father gave him his first guitar, which he had exchanged for a rifle. In high school, Wooley was a member of a country band. But because he saw no prospects in music, he worked as a welder on the oil fields in Oklahoma.

Like many others, Wooley moved to California with the prospect of a better life . There he worked as an orange picker on a plantation, where he could just buy his food with his salary. A short time later he married Melba Miller, the sister of the future country star Roger Miller . Since he was unable to participate in World War II , which was breaking out at the time, due to an injury as a child at the rodeo , he worked in various armaments factories.

Beginnings

In 1945 he happened to get into the small record company Bullet Records in Nashville , where he recorded his first, but not very successful, record. This record was recorded in the studio of the radio station WSM , the station that broadcast the Grand Ole Opry . The Opry management had no interest in Wooley at the time. Instead, Wooley appeared on the smaller radio station WLAC, for which he received no payment. A year later Wooley moved to Fort Worth , Texas , shortly afterwards to California again, where he became a member of the Hill & Range Songwriters Association with the help of a friend who worked at WSM. Through this union he came to the newly founded label MGM Records , which already had the then superstar of country music Hank Williams under contract. Wooley took acting classes in hopes of an acting career. To Wooley's greatest surprise, he succeeded; he starred in Errol Flynn's latest western, Rocky Mountain . He was then in many other films, such as Mit stahlharter Faust (1955), Giganten (1956), Rio Bravo (1959, with John Wayne in the leading role), the western classic High Noon (1952) with Gary Cooper or in 1986 on the side of Gene Hackman in free throw ( Hoosiers ) with it.

breakthrough

While continuing his acting career, he made regular records. In 1955 he wrote the song Are You Satisfied for Rusty Draper , which landed a hit with it. Wooley had his first big hit three years later with Purple People Eater , which was number one in the country and pop charts. In total, over three million copies were sold. The title is a parody of the pop culture of that time and the enthusiasm that began at the time for mostly unrealistic horror films. However, Wooley struggled with his record company, who thought the song was "too daring" and therefore refused to release it. Eventually it became one of the greatest titles in MGM Records history.

Wooley's next hit wasn't until 1962 with That's My Pa . Since 1959 he played in the western series A Thousand Miles of Dust (Rawhide) on the side of Eric Fleming and Clint Eastwood as Pete Nolan. He also recorded the title track of the same name , which Frankie Laine sang in the original version, along with an album of Western titles. However, both sales were sluggish. The record company reserved the song Don't Go Near The Indians , written by Lorene Mann and which he also wanted to record, for Rex Allen , who had great success with it. Frustrated by this negative gesture, Wooley wrote the parody Don't Go Near The Eskimos and played it under the pseudonym Ben Colder. Ben Colder went from a pseudonym to a character in his own right who was constantly drunk on the side. In 1969, Wooley was named "Best Comedian of The Year" for Ben Colder. When the country comedy series Hee Haw went on air that same year , Wooley was hired as a songwriter for the songs on the show and as a show act. He also had other hits, including Almost Persuaded No. 2 . He achieved his last title with a good chart placement in 1971.

In 1998 his doctor diagnosed him with leukemia , of which Sheb Wooley died on September 16, 2003 at the age of 82.

Trivia

Sheb Wooley is believed to be the voice of the so-called Wilhelmsschreis .

Discography (albums)

as Sheb Wooley:

• 1956 : Sheb Wooley (MGM)
• 1956 : Blue Guitar
• 1958 : The Purple People Eater
• 1962 : That's My Pa & That's My Ma
• 1963 : Tales of How the West Was Won
• 1965 : It's a Big Land
• 1969 : Warm and Wooley

as Ben Colder:

• 1963 : Spoofing the Big Ones
• 1966 : Big Ben Strikes Again
• 1967 : Wine Women & Song

Web links

• Sheb Wooley in the nndb (English)
• Sheb Wooley in the Internet Movie Database (English)
• Sheb Wooley in the database of Find a Grave (English)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Cinema Myth - The First Cry - SPIEGEL ONLINE . Retrieved June 5, 2013.