Black History Month Music: Charley Pride

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Right now I’m having lunch not too far from Jerry Lee Lewis’ hometown of Ferriday, Louisiana. I’ll have chickens in the salad (whose salad, what salad, my salad) for lunch. Meanwhile, here’s someone you hopefully knew would be on the list this month in celebration of Black History Month. Charley Pride Oh, Linda? NO! While there are three black performers in the Country Music Hall of Fame, the only one you probably think of is Charley Pride. You don’t normally associate Ray Charles (used earlier this month) with country music, and you’re never heard of DeFord Bailey (a harmonica player who had no problem with the white country singers he toured with in the 1920s and 30s…there’s a funny story in Roy Acuff’s book about how, because of the Jim Crow laws, Bailey would pose as Uncle Dave Macon’s “brother” when it came to getting lodging ). No, Pride was not the first black in country music. He was, and remains, however, the best-known and most popular. You had one-offs like the Pointer Sisters’ Grammy-winning “Fairy Tale” or Isaac Hayes doing an 18-minute version of “By the Time I Get to Phoenix,” but Pride billed himself as Country Charley Pride because he WAS. Very few people cared that Pride was black. (An interesting thing: Bill Anderson, in his first book, said he received two negative letters from having Pride on his syndicated country television show. Both were from the Midwest, not the south.) Most people cared that he sang country music. Pride was almost neo-traditionalist for his time, given that there were so many country acts (especially on RCA, the same label he was on) utilizing the “Nashville sound” strings and backing vocals. Not for Pride. He was backed with steel guitars and fiddles, not “strings.” Pride was still performing well into his 80s. Unfortunately, along came covid, a nightmare for older people. It took his life in December 2020. I got to meet him briefly once at the Opry. He was a very kind and gracious man. Country music is better because of him. Charley Pride Born Charley Frank Pride, March 18, 1934, Sledge, Mississippi Died December 12, 2020, Dallas, Texas (COVID-19) (age 86) HALL OF FAME: Country Music, 2000 Here’s Charley’s second-ever single, a cover of the bluegrass song “Before I Met You.”