Jim Reeves(1923-1964)
- Music Artist
- Music Department
- Actor
Jim Reeves was one of the best of the "Nashville Sound" style country
and western singers. His fame was widespread, not only in the USA, but
also in Britain, India, Scandanavia and South Africa. Born in 1923 in
Panola County, Texas, Jim after college began to pursue a professional
baseball career but was sidelined by an injury to his leg while a
pitcher with the Houston Buffaloes. He also for a brief period was a
full-time radio announcer. He began his recording career in 1945, and
also composed his own songs. The peak of his career came in late
1959-early 1960 with the success of the single "He'll Have To Go",
which reached number 2 in the U.S. hit record charts and number 12 in
Britain, ultimately reaching three million in sales. After his success
he made successful tours of the U.S., Scandinavia and South Africa,
where he starred in a film, Kimberley Jim (1963) (released in the U.S. in 1965) and
recorded songs in the local Afrikaans language. Jim was well known as
the singer with the velvet voice and the gentlemanly manner. Jim had
been planning more tours and television appearances at the time his
Beechcraft Debonair aircraft went down in bad weather on July 31, 1964.
Federal and state officials found country music singer Jim Reeves in the charred wreckage of his small plane in a wooded area near Brentwood on Aug. 2, 1964 - taking the lives of Jim and his business manager and his piano player, Dean Manuel, Jim's widow, Mary Reeves, kept many of the
recordings unreleased after his death in backlog and had them released,
little by little over the years, to great success - so much so that
younger executives in the record business had to be reminded that Jim
has been gone for over 35 years! He even had an album reach Gold status
in Denmark in 1999! It is a source of great frustration to Jim's fans
and family that his great catalog of music does not get equal airplay
today in the U.S. compared with other artists who have gone on such as
Patsy Cline. But Jim's legacy still lives on, as one of the greatest voices
in recorded music, country or otherwise.
