Fiddle Player Buddy Ray --
A Pioneer of Western Swing

Buddy Ray got his start in Shreveport in 1937, playing on a noon radio program on KWKH with the Modern Mountaineers.  When the band headed back to Houston, Buddy Ray followed.  For 7 years he lived in Houston, playing with The Texas Wanderers and The Village Boys.  These bands were true pioneers of the musical style now known as Western Swing -- a blend of country, jazz, blues and mariachi.

“As old as I am,” says Ray, “I’m damn near the last of the pioneers of western swing music left alive.  To be a true pioneer you had to be playing as far back as 1938-1940, because that’s when it was all starting.  It was country bands playing stuff like ‘C - Jam Blues’ and ‘Take the A-Train’ -- which we were doing in Houston and Fort Worth.”  

Ray would take popular jazz tunes of the time (Benny Goodman, Duke Ellington) as well as hit parade songs (Frank Sinatra, Glen Miller) and arrange them for his groups.  He also filled in as guitar player, singer and songwriter.  But his main love was swinging the violin.  

In 1943 Ray migrated to California and began an astonishing career that lasted for 25 years.  In that time he toured and performed with such heroes as Tex Ritter, Smiley Burnett, Merle Travis, Jimmy Wakely, the T. Texas Tyler Band and many more.  He made USO tours to Alaska, Hawaii, Japan, Korea, Okinawa and Guam.  He worked in motion pictures, too!  Ray appears as a musician in some great films like The Benny Goodman Story, Giant, A Star is Born and Jailhouse Rock. 

While in Hollywood, Ray ran into the number one western swing band in America.  Ray joined Bob Wills and the Texas Playboys in 1945, but the stint didn’t last long.  Their personalities – or maybe their musical souls? – just didn’t seem to mesh.  From Lone Star Swing by Duncan McClean : “My first gig with them, I was singing ‘Outskirts of Town’ – when I heard this holler right at my elbow.  It was Bob doing his famous Ah-ha!  But I’d never heard him doing that jive-talking before, see, and I got such a shock that I jumped in the air, stopped singing.  And Bob got such a shock at me stopping singing, that he stopped hollering!”  Ray laughs at the memory now. 

Ray’s favorite musical memory is of sharing the stage with Nat King Cole.  For two weeks, he performed in the Leighton Noble Orchestra backing Nat – “the greatest musician and singer ever,” says Ray – at Harrah’s South Shore Room in Lake Tahoe.        

Buddy Ray, now 82 years old, lives on Caddo Lake in Waskom with his eighth wife Peggy (they’ve been happily married for over 25 years); their grandson lives next door.  Ray is cataloging his vast collection of music, photographs and memories for the future generations. 

“During the past few years some nice and surprising things have happened,” says Ray.  He’s recorded an album with a swinging blues band – The Bruton and Price Swingmasters Revue  -- which is now on the market.  He’s been inducted into two Halls of Fame for his contributions to Western Swing.  Buddy Ray is also a feature in the 1997 book Lone Star Swing by Duncan McClean, a Somerset Maugham Award winning author.  (He gets a whole chapter to himself in this hilarious travelogue -- “What Makes Bob Holler?”)  “I’m real thankful to have all these nice things going on – it makes being older an interesting experience,” says Ray.  “I thank God every day for the blessings.”