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ar° <br />Gene Watson <br />This year marks the Golden Anniversary of one of our greatest living country vocalists. In 1962, <br />Gene Watson began his professional career by recording his first single. "I didn't know what I was doing," <br />he chuckles, remembering himself as a 19-year-old. "I think maybe I was dreaming a little bit. Who knows <br />what's going through your mind back then? I was playing nightclubs here and there and decided it might be <br />good if I could record a song. <br />"My first recording ever was on a little ole independent label that was started up just for this <br />recording session, Sun Valley Records. Maybe I thought I could sell them at my shows or something. I <br />wrote the record, `If It Was That Easy.' It was not any good, but, boy, I thought that was something. I had <br />my own record." <br />He might not have known what he was doing in 1962, but he does now. Gene Watson has re- <br />recorded his classic hits on an extraordinary, 25-song collection titled The Best of the Best. His ageless <br />voice sounds exactly as it did when he first recorded these songs in the 1970s and 1980s. Performances <br /> <br />such as "Fourteen Carat Mind," "Love in the Hot Afternoon," "Farewell Party, Memories to Burn, ot <br />No Reason Now for Going Home," "Speak Softly," "Paper Rosie" and "Sometimes I Get Lucky and <br />ForgeY" have forged Watson's reputation as a"Singer's Singer." <br />Watson views his vocal talent as a matter of course. All seven Watson children sang, as did his <br />parents. "I can remember singing as far back as I can remember talking. Singing was something that was <br />not out of the ordinary for me. It wasn't unique. My whole family were singers." Even in a musical genre <br />noted for its hard-luck stories, Watson's stands out. The family drifted from shack to shack as his itinerant <br />father took logging and crop-picking jobs. "Home" eventually became a converted school bus. He dropped <br />out of school in the ninth grade to work alongside his parents in the fields. <br />"I sang in church with my sister. My younger brother Jessie and me would sing at little school <br />functions and local things. When I was 15 and he was about 12, there was a guy who came to town in Paris, <br />Texas who was supposed to be a big producer and talent scout and all this. He thought that Jessie and I had <br />a lot of potential, so he put a show together at the coliseum. That was the big debut for The Watson <br />Brothers. By the time the show was over with, he left town with the proceeds." <br />Watson settled in Houston, where he developed a strong local following and staged his disc debut. <br />In 1964, the Grand Ole Opry duo, The Wilburn Brothers, took him on the road briefly. Then it was back to <br />the Texas honky-tonks and a string of local singles throughout the `60s. <br />"My cousin, Bill Watson, is a songwriter. We decided to go to Nashville and check out what it <br />takes to get a song recorded. That would have been in like, 1966 or 1967. We thought with some of his <br />songs and my singing, we might get someone to listen. Of course, it was to no avail." But in 1974, one of <br />Watson's small-label singles caught the ear of Capitol Records. He was an auto-body repairman and the <br />featured performer at Houston's Dynasty nightclub when the label picked up the steamy, sexual waltz <br />"Love in the Hot Afternoon" for national distribution. It became the first of Watson's two-dozen top-10 hits <br />in early 1975. <br />"Seems like my career just kind of happened accidentally," says Watson. "It was pure y <br />unintentional. Music was just a sideline. I was going to be playing and singing no matter what line of work <br />I was going to do. I never did really have any high expectations out of the music business." <br />Watson quit drinking in 1980 and quit smoking in 1990. He underwent surgery and survived colon <br />cancer in 2000-01. Through it all, he continued to record one critically applauded collection after another. <br />He was inducted into the Texas Music Hall of Fame in 2002. <br />"It's unbelievable to me that it's been 50 years," saysWatson. "For most of those years, it seemed <br />like it took everything I could do to keep working as steady as I needed to. Now that Pm older, it seems <br />like everything comes to me without trying. Pm warking more shows than I was 15 years ago. It's quite a <br />compliment. I think a lot of it is because there's not too much of what I do around anymore. I think there is <br />still such a hunger out there for traditional country music. So Pd like to stay out there as long as Pm able to <br />do the job and do it well. Every time I step out on that stage and see that audience, it's a new beginning. <br />Even though Pve sung these songs miliions of times, I look at each one like it's brand new to me. Every <br />night, I try to deliver that song the best that I can. Being called a`Singer's Singer' humbles me. It's <br />flattering, but what I do is just what I do. The good Lord just gave me the voice." <br />46 <br />