That fun has generally centered around the guitar. He gets invited to all the official openings.and he’s constantly in demand for television appearances.Chet Atkins is low key, urbane, thoughtful, well read and as dry as a Saltine cracker.He has a twinkle in his eye, the kind that tells you Chet Atkins has a lot more fun than you think he does.” (From Country Music: White Man’s Blues by John Grissim, Paperback Library, New York, 1970). The local Cadillac dealer personally buys him fresh cigars and handdelivers them. Everybody knows him, or recognizes his name. “In Nashville,“ John Grissim wrote in 1970, “Atkins is Numero Uno. Following some years of discontent and relative inactivity, he resigned from the label in 1981). In 1960, he became RCA’s Nashville A&R manager in 1968, Chet became vice-president of RCA Records. (Chet became A&R assistant to RCA’s Steve Sholes in 1952. Guitar players just don’t become record company moguls, as Chet was for nearly three decades at RCA. Chet further confounds our stereotype of guitarists by having been nearly as influential and innovative as a producer as he has been as a picker. Given all these strikes against him in the legend trade, we can only assume that Chet has become legendary by dint of working hard and long without, considering his relaxed demeanor, letting it show. His public, the neuroses or ego eruptions often evident in large talents of long standing. Nor has he manifest, at least to the extent that it’s become apparent to 2 He did not ‘play himself to death’ (Charlie Christian), succumb to foul play over a woman (Robert Johnson), or OD (Jimi Hendrix). (Being a child of the Depression-era South, the poetic side of poverty is generally lost on Chet, who once knew what it was to go to bed hungry.) Obviously, he did not die young. He has not, since his 1940s radio days, lived in anything resembling poetic poverty. A selfdescribed ‘square,’ he has never lived a particularly bohemian lifestyle, despite a few 1960s photos of him sporting a natty goatee. In the course of those four decades, Chet has managed to contradict most of our prevailing stereotypes surrounding legendary guitarists. There are exceptions aside from Chet, of course, but precious few guitarists enjoy 40 year long careers – not ones that anyone much notices, anyway. Viewed side by side, Vestapol’s two Chet Atkins performance videos reflect 40 richly creative years. 2 March 1979īy his own account, he’s been playing guitar more than six decades now. Some of my first memories were when I heard a chord strummed on a guitar.” – Chet Atkins to Bob Anderson, Pickin’ Vol. I don’t know why, but I was completely taken by it. “I just had an insatiable appetite for the sounds of a vibrating string of a guitar. Chet Atkins Rare Rare Performances Performances 1976 –– 1995 1995 1976ĬHET ATKINS RARE PERFORMANCES 1976–1995 Photo by David A.
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