We're the Light Crust Doughboys from Burrus Mill"

by Boyd, Jean Ann

• ISBN13: 9780292709164
• ISBN10: 0292709161
• Edition: 1st
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2003-03-01
• Publisher: Univ of Texas Pr

Summary

The Light Crust Doughboys are one of the most long-lived and musically versatile bands in America. Formed in the early 1930s under the sponsorship of Burrus Mill and Elevator Company of Fort Worth, Texas, with Bob Wills and Milton Brown (the originator of western swing) at the musical helm and future Texas governor W. Lee "Pappy" O'Daniel as band manager and emcee, the Doughboys are still going strong in the twenty-first century. Arguably the quintessential Texas band, the Doughboys have performed all the varieties of music that Texans love, including folk and fiddle tunes, cowboy songs, gospel and hymns, commercial country songs and popular ballads, honky-tonk, ragtime and blues, western swing and jazz, minstrel songs, movie hits, and rock 'n' roll. In this book, Jean Boyd draws on the memories of Marvin "Smokey" Montgomery and other longtime band members and supporters to tell the Light Crust Doughboys story from the band' founding in 1931 through the year 2000. She follows the band' musical evolution and personnel over seven decades, showing how band members and sponsors responded to changes in Texas culture and musical tastes during the Great Depression, World War II, and the postwar years. Boyd concludes that the Doughboys' willingness to change with changing times and to try new sounds and fresh musical approaches is the source of their enduring vitality. Historical photographs of the band, an annotated discography of their pre-World War II work, and histories of some of the band' songs round out the volume.

Author Biography

Jean A. Boyd is Professor of Music History at Baylor University in Waco, Texas. She has researched and written on western swing since the early 1990s

Table of Contents

Preface	ix
Setting the Scene: ``Beautiful Texas''	1	(24)
Getting Started: 1930--1935	25	(18)
The Glory Years: 1935--1941	43	(30)
Key Band Members during the Glory Years	73	(14)
Starting Over: After World War II	87	(18)
The New Golden Age	105	(14)
Afterword	119	(4)
Appendix Tunes Recorded by the Light Crust Doughboys, 1936--1941	123	(24)
Notes	147	(6)
Bibliography	153	(4)
Index	157