New Orleans, LA (1888PressRelease)
August 20, 2009 - The Louisiana Hayride (1948-60), guitarist James Burton, music businessman Stan Lewis and hit maker Johnny Horton will all be formally inducted into the Louisiana Music Hall of Fame (LMHOF) this Saturday, August 22 in Shreveport’s Municipal Auditorium during the James Burton International Guitar Festival.
Burton will be inducted and then will assist in the Louisiana Hayride's induction onstage. Lewis will be inducted privately earlier in the day, and an official announcement of Horton's posthumous induction will be made. The inductions will bring to 44 the number of music legends that have been formally recognized by the Baton Rouge-based nonprofit organization.
“I can think of no more fitting venue to do this than the Shreveport Municipal Auditorium where all of those great shows were staged and broadcast around the United States,” LMHOF Executive Director Mike Shepherd says. “And to be able to do it within Burton’s annual festival that benefits his education-based foundation and give it some recognition is a big bonus for us.”
Also being inducted will be Rock and Roll Hall Of Famer James Burton, who is famed for his guitar work with Elvis Presley and Ricky Nelson’s bands, but is also distinctive as the youngest musician in the Louisiana Hayride program.
The third inductee to be honored will be Record retailer Stan “The Record Man” Lewis, owner of the longtime Shreveport record shop bearing his name. Lewis was more than just a gifted retailer; he was also a prolific music producer and songwriter whose Jewel, Paula and Ronn record labels and helped launch and impact the careers of dozens of successful recording artists from the region for nearly six decades.
Though raised in East Texas, the late Johnny Horton epitomizes the power of the Louisiana Hayride to break artists into the national spotlight and he was a fixture of the radio and television show until his untimely death in 1960. The influence of the home-bred talents around him was evident in the style and theme of his greatest hit “The Battle of New Orleans” and he scored 13 additional chart hits including “North to Alaska,” “Sink the Bismarck” and “Honky Tonk Man.”
“The phenomenal contributions of ‘the Hayride’ to 20th Century American music cannot be overstated and our first presentation in Shreveport could not overlook this body of work as an entity to be inducted,” Shepherd notes. “At one point in time, the Louisiana Hayride rivaled the Grand Ole Opry for national popularity and featured not just country but blues, gospel, rockabilly and Texas swing genres.”
During its heyday, homegrown country music greats like Jimmie Davis*, Floyd Cramer*, Webb Pierce*, Faron Young, Jimmy C. Newman and Claude King called the Hayride home. They were regularly joined by top artists from Texas to Tennessee and beyond including Hank Williams, Kitty Wells, Slim Whitman, Hank Snow, Jim Reeves, George Jones, Johnny Cash, Tex Ritter, Red Sovine and Lefty Frizzell, among many others. A young rockabilly artist named Elvis Presley made his first nationally broadcast performance from its stage, and others followed.
The 2009 James Burton International Guitar Festival covers two days of events on Aug. 21 and 22, capped by the closing “James Burton and Friends” concert on Saturday night at the Municipal Auditorium. The festival was created to help raise funds for the James Burton Foundation, which is dedicated to raising money to provide technical training, music lessons and free guitars to young musicians in the region. Information can be found at www.jamesburtonmusic.com.
The Louisiana Music Hall of Fame program is under the auspices of the nonprofit La Musique de Louisianne, Inc. LMHOF plans to induct more than 100 additional music hit makers and pioneers associated with the state’s rich and diverse music legacy, and to provide special recognition to many more regional favorites and to luminaries in songwriting, producing and recording. The group also envisions physical exhibits and a raft of educational and promotional activities and programs advancing its mission as the program progresses.
For more information about The Louisiana Music Hall of Fame and La Musique de Louisianne, Inc., please visit www.LMHOF.org. The organization also maintains “Louisiana Music Hall of Fame” pages and video links on Facebook, You Tube and MySpace.
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