26 Facts About Merle Travis

Merle Robert Travis was an American country and western singer, songwriter, and guitarist.

However, it is his unique guitar style, still called Travis picking by guitarists, as well as his interpretations of the rich musical traditions of his native Muhlenberg County, Kentucky, for which he is best known today.

Merle Travis picking is a syncopated style of guitar fingerpicking rooted in ragtime music in which alternating chords and bass notes are plucked by the thumb while melodies are plucked by the index finger.

Merle Travis was inducted into the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1970 and elected to the Country Music Hall of Fame in 1977.

Merle Travis is considered by some to be one of the most influential guitarists of the 20th century.

Merle Travis was born and raised in Muhlenberg County, Kentucky, a place which would inspire many of his original songs.

Merle Travis developed his guitar playing style out of the native, western Kentucky fingerpicking tradition.

Merle Travis acknowledged his debt to both Rager and Everly, and appears with Rager on the DVD Legends of Country Guitar.

At the age of 18, Merle Travis performed "Tiger Rag" on a local radio amateur show in Evansville, Indiana, leading to offers of work with local bands.

In 1937, fiddler Clayton McMichen hired Merle Travis to be the guitarist in his Georgia Wildcats.

Merle Travis later joined the Drifting Pioneers, a Chicago-area gospel quartet that moved to WLW radio in Cincinnati, the major country music station north of Nashville.

Merle Travis performed on various weekday programs, often working with other WLW acts including Louis Marshall "Grandpa" Jones, the Delmore Brothers, Hank Penny and Joe Maphis, all of whom became lifelong friends.

Merle Travis performed in stage shows and landed bit parts and singing roles in several B westerns.

Merle Travis recorded for small West Coast labels until 1946 when he signed with Hollywood-based Capitol Records.

Merle Travis combined traditional songs and several original compositions recalling his family's days working in the mines.

Merle Travis was a popular radio performer throughout the 1940s and '50s.

Merle Travis was a regular member of the Hollywood Barn Dance broadcast over radio station KNX, Hollywood, and of the Town Hall Party which was broadcast first as a radio show on KXLA out of Pasadena, California and later as a TV series from 1953 to 1961.

Merle Travis was lead guitarist in Thompson's Brazos Valley Boys during the time when Billboard magazine rated them the number one Country Western band for 14 years in a row.

Merle Travis found greater popularity after appearing in 1953's hugely popular and multiple Academy Award winning movie From Here to Eternity singing and playing "Reenlistment Blues" and following the success of his friend Tennessee Ernie Ford's million-selling rendition of "Sixteen Tons" in 1955.

Merle Travis's career acquired a second wind during the American folk music revival in the late 1950s and early 1960s leading to appearances at clubs, folk festivals and at Carnegie Hall as a guest of Lester Flatt and Earl Scruggs in 1962.

Merle Travis is acknowledged as one of the most influential American guitarists of the 20th century.

Guitarist Marcel Dadi explains and exemplifies Travis' style on his DVD The Guitar of Merle Travis which includes videos of Travis performing "John Henry" and "Nine Pound Hammer" and includes transcriptions of Travis solos in tablature.

Merle Travis appeared frequently on such country music TV shows as The Porter Wagoner Show, The Johnny Cash Show, Austin City Limits, Grand Old Country, and Nashville Swing; and he was featured on the 1972 Nitty Gritty Dirt Band album Will the Circle Be Unbroken which introduced him to a new generation of roots music enthusiasts.

In 1983, Merle Travis died of a heart attack at his Tahlequah, Oklahoma home.

Merle Travis's body was cremated and his ashes scattered around a memorial erected to him near Drakesboro, Kentucky.

In 1996, he was an honoree of the two hour television special An Evening of Country Greats: A Hall of Fame Celebration and two classic Merle Travis performances are included in the 2001 four part PBS television documentary American Roots Music which is available in CD and DVD formats.