About the president, Billy Arr

I was born and raised on good old Country Music in Dixon, Missouri. The only instrument I could play by the time I reached my Freshman year was the Triangle. Guess what I played in the School Band? However, I could tap dance and sing, so at the age of 14 I sang with a band 5 nights a week at a club near the Ft. Leonard Wood Army Base and danced with the Lee Mace "Ozark Square Dancers" at his Lake of the Ozarks theater. Our dance group often worked Red Foleys' Ozark Jubilee in Springfield, Mo, and we appeared on the Grand Ole Opry twice, I think, when I was with them. 

Dixon was a very small town and seemed a whole lot like Mayberry to me at the time, so I escaped in 1954 by joining the Army. Serving in France, I taught myself to play the upright bass and some guitar as well. While playing doghouse bass and standing beside our piano player for almost two years, I watched his finger positions closely on each and every song we played.  Funny, almost like a typewriter, one day I somehow had learned to play piano, and now, imagining I was the next Jerry Lee Lewis, I could finally sit my butt down and get off that damned doghouse bass.

I spent over 11 years in the Army, seeing the best and worst in Korea, Cambodia, Thailand, Laos, Vietnam, and also in France,Germany, Italy and Switzerland. Except for when I was in the War Zones, I almost always had a band while I was in the Army. One day in Germany, I suddenly realized I was spending much more time playing music in Army Clubs than I was soldiering, and that's not a good thing for a career Army Sergeant. I took an early discharge and stayed there in Germany, playing music some 27 nights a month in American Service clubs and also backing up Nashville Country Stars on European tours.  Wade Jackson, (Stonewall Jackson's brother),  and I had 11 bands in Germany, each of us working in one band and booking all 11. Wade, a career sergeant in the Air Force, wrote Stonewall's hit, "Don't Be Angry". Our partnership made us a lot of money before Army rules at the time forced me to leave Europe and return to the States, after a year as a civilian in Germany.

It was 1966 and now, back in Missouri, I called some of my civilian band members, (Americans living in Germany), and asked them to come back to the States and play with me. Two of them came back and we  immediately put a band together and played the same club I had worked at the age of 14 for a year and a half. A club owner from Indianapolis came thru one night, made me an offer I couldn't refuse and 2 weeks later we left Missouri for Indiana. We played there for a few months, then as house band for Cristy Lane in Peoriafor awhile, then I hit the road with the band, playing anywhere they would hire us.  A couple of years later, in late 1968, I settled down in Topeka, Kansas, where finally I had my own clubs. One was a 300 seater with live Country music six nights a week and the other a Surf and Turf restaurant with piano bar. I would play til midnight, close the 300 seater and drive across town to play my piano bar until three a.m. Then, I would close it, run home for a four hour nap , wake up and get ready for the next day. Beer and liquor trucks in and out, and market shopping for two clubs will keep a man busy, believe me. Two members of that band in Topeka had played with me in Germany. One of them was my partner in the two clubs, he had retired there in Topeka from 24 years in the Air Force.

I made my first 3 day trip to Nashville in 1970, taking only 11 of my 300 plus songs with me. Luckily, the first day in Music City, thru the kindness of Bobby Bare, I was able to walk in and play them for Curly Putman, a writer of many Hits, including "D.i.v.o.r.c.e" and Green, Green Grass of Home". Curly had Green Grass Music Publishing at the time and Tree Publishing Company was working his catalog. Curly listened to all eleven of my songs, selected nine of them for publishing in his company, called a demo session with full band for the next day and asked me to sing the demos. After the recording session I returned to Topeka and waited. Four weeks later, Curly called to say I had a Charlie Walker single. It turned out to be a top 20 song entitled "Let's Go Fishin' Boys, the Girls are Biting". I fondly recall that Curly called me the very night that Charlie debuted this new single on the Grand Ole Opry. Obeying his instructions, I jumped off the stage, went out to my car at about 9:30 and listened to Charlie Walker"live on the Opry" singing the first song I'd ever had recorded. It was a real hoot, believe me. When it hit the national charts I sold the clubs to my partner,  packed the furniture, the wife and 2 children, and moved lock stock and barrel to Music City USA. It was September, 1970. Now, over 40 years later, in every December BMI statement it seems, I still receive royalties from that song.  Radio stations play it each and every Spring, during fishing season, I suppose.
 
With only the one Chart record to my credit at the time, it was a little slow as a songwriter for me in Nashville,  so I put another band together and toured the U.S. club circuit, booked by the Buddy Lee Agency. My Group was called Billy Arr and The Arrsonists. While doing this, I recorded for both Rice Records and GRT Records. A couple of my Singles did pretty well. After over a year out there with the band, I signed on as Front man-Road Manager-keyboard player for Dave Dudley for a couple of years, then worked that same gig for Billie Jo Spears, Wayne Kemp, Dickie Lee, Crystal Gayle, Johnny Rodriguez, Del Reeves, and a few others. Hell, people thought I couldn't keep a job. Actually, I just had a low tolerance for boredom. I would get tired of their song lineup repetition and move on. Somewhere in between these road jobs, I accepted a job as Music Director and the # 2 speechwriter for George Wallace during his run for the Presidency. That was fun, and after he got shot I came back to Nashville and hit the road with another band. 

Luckily, along the Music Highway during that period, a few more of my songs were being recorded now and then by some good folks like Mel Tillis, Faron Young, Loretta Lynn, Freddie Hart, The Wilburn Bros., The Kendalls, Mickey Gilley, Gene Watson, Bobby Lord, Bobby Lewis, Dave Dudley, and quite a few others, even Roy Rogers, and including some Asian, South American and European Artists.

With my songs being recorded occasionally, and royalty money coming in, I quit the road and concentrated on my songwriting more. I also delved in to a couple of Music Row Bars as owner and one day, just as I was opening the Bar, my first customer was ex SSGT Barry Sadler, the writer/singer of "Ballad of the Green Berets", and it was his 1st day in Nashville. We hit it off immediately as ex-army troopers, and eventually became great friends and cowriters of both books and screenplays. Two of these were published, and one (Nashville With a Bullet) was sold for the movie rights. After Barry died, Jerry Reed (the actor-singer) and I became close Pals and later wound up writing 4 Movie Scripts and 2 Screenplays together. He was one very funny dude. He got me so tickled at Burt Reynolds and Loni Anderson's wedding (we played for it) that I spit food into the cleavage above her beautiful gown. Jerry and Burt both laughed so hard that they spewed champagne for 10-15 feet. 

After nearly 40 years in Nashville, today I reside in Branson, Missouri with my wife, Wanda Kay. I am, for all practical purposes, retired from the road, and now with over 900 songs in my catalog, (though I lost about half of them in the Nashville floods we went through, demo cassettes, lyrics and all) I mostly just write and play a few writer's nights & "guitar pulls". I love to produce records, publish music, (mostly my own) and sometimes still play a few show dates each year just to keep my chops up. You might catch our act in Dixon, Missouri each September, 3rd weekend at the CowDays Festival. We usually go on at noon and play til about 2pm, always with a great band from Lake of the Ozarks. In fact, Starla Queen, our association secretary and her husband Jimmy are in the Band.  Below I've listed the titles of a few of those songs of mine that I mentioned above.

Mel Tillis: "Looking For Tomorrow, Findin' Yesterday" (a # 1 & Mel was entertainer of the year)
 
Faron Young: One of my closest friends in Nashville and he recorded 3 of my songs.


"That Over 30 Look" (#6) "Baxter Hill" (top 20) "Left to Right or Right to Wrong" (top 20)
 
Loretta Lynn: "Love's On The Loose" (on the "One's On the Way" Album, sold 8 million copies)
 
Freddie Hart:  "Everything But My Mind"
 
Mickey Gilley: "What is It That keeps Her Hanging On" (on his "Gilley's Smokin' " Album.

 
Thanks, and God Bless You All
Billy Arr