| In the late 60's I was working in Fresno with a guy named Lee Ross. Lee was Bob Wills’ lead singer after Tommy Duncan. Lee had written a couple hit songs; one was "Heart to Heart Talk" that Bob recorded. The other was "My Shoes Keep Walking Back To You" that Ray Price recorded. Lee thought it would be great to have a Bob Wills reunion and bring all the old band members back together. Bob had been retired for a while and loved the idea. The only problem Bob had was that his guitar player, Tag Lambert, had died. Lee told him that he had a guitar player, Ray Riggs, working with him that knew all of Bob’s songs and could pull it off just fine. Playing with Bob Wills was one of the highlights of my life. Saturday night, after the last show, I asked Lee if anyone had ever recorded Bob’s life story on tape. Lee said he didn't know, and that he would ask him. Bob said no one ever had, and agreed that it would be a good idea to have it on tape. I had an old Webcor tape recorder and took it up to Bob’s hotel room. Lee started asking questions and Bob really opened up. After the interview Bob asked what we were going to do with the recording, and Lee said he didn't know yet, but we'd think of something. Bob’s reply was, “Well I'm just glad that you got it on tape.” A short time after that, Lee got into some serious trouble with his wife. Lee left Fresno and I never heard from him again. Bob died in 1975, and I was left with the tape and didn't know what to do with it. So I've held on to it all these years. I made a few inquiries to Bob Wills' kinfolk about the recording, but never heard back. I thought a lot of people who are Bob Wills fans to this day would like to hear it, so I converted the analog tape to digital format. I sent a copy to Gary Freitag, an old friend and bandmate from Montana who lives in Florida now (owner & Webmaster for this site, as well). Gary did some research and discovered that Dwight Adair, in Austin, Texas, is one of the world's leading Bob Wills' experts and owner of www.bobwills.com. Several emails and phone conversations later resulted in a fantastic opportunity with Mr. Adair to remaster the audio and make it available on www.bobwills.com. |
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