Roger Miller
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Roger Dean Miller (January 2, 1936 – October 25, 1992) was an American singer, songwriter, and musician.
Although usually grouped with country music singers, Miller's unique style defied easy classification. He had a string of pop hits in the 1960s, and also his own TV show in 1966. Many of his recordings were humorous novelty songs with whimsical lyrics, coupled with vocalese riffs filled with nonsense syllables. Others were sincere ballads, which also caught the public's fancy, none more so than his signature song, "King of the Road", a major 1965 hit, about a presumed "hobo" who relishes his life and freedom, riding the rails.
In addition to 11 Grammy Awards, Roger Miller won Broadway's Tony award for writing the music and lyrics for Big River, which won a total of 7 Tonys including best musical in 1985.
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[edit] Life and work
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Roger, the youngest of three boys, was born in Fort Worth, Texas, to mother Laudene Holt Miller and father Jean Miller. Jean died when Roger was one, and he was sent to live with his aunt and uncle, Elmer and Armelia Miller, in Erick, Oklahoma.
Miller had a lonely and unhappy childhood. Heavily influenced by the Grand Ole Opry on Saturday nights and the Light Crust Doughboys on Fort Worth radio, he desperately wanted to be a singer-songwriter. When he was 17 he stole a guitar, but turned himself in and chose to join the Army rather than go to jail. He later quipped, "My education was Korea, Clash of '52."
On leaving the army, he went to Nashville to work on his music career. In 1959 he wrote his first number-one song, "Billy Bayou" recorded by Jim Reeves.
He was voted into the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1973 and the Country Music Hall of Fame in 1995. In Erick, Oklahoma where he grew up, a thoroughfare was renamed "Roger Miller Boulevard."
A lifelong cigarette smoker, Miller died of lung and throat cancer in 1992. In a TV interview, he once explained that he composed his songs from "bits and pieces" of ideas he wrote on scraps of paper. When asked what he did with the unused bits and pieces, he half-joked, "I smoke 'em!" (One of his songs, "A Man Can't Quit", centered on the subject of addiction to cigarettes.)
The chorus of one of his songs, "England Swings", was used for the 1998 BBC radio program, 15 Minutes of Misery The song was also featured in the 2003 movie Shanghai Knights. .
He was married to Mary Arnold, who herself was a musician, a member of country-rock band, Kenny Rogers and The First Edition. Rogers had introduced the two. Arnold now manages Miller's estate.
His eldest son, Dean Miller, is a singer-songwriter in his own right. Roger's Christmas song "Old Toy Trains" was written about him and Dean was only 2 years old when the song came out in 1967.
In his 1997 autobiography Johnny Cash compared Miller's bass vocal range favorably with his own, saying it was the closest to his own that he had heard.
In early 2006, Roger Miller's 1967 single "Walkin' In The Sunshine" was featured in a Mastercard commercial. In the 1970s, Miller appeared in ads for Monroe Shock Absorbers, backed by a re-recording of "King of the Road".
Roger Miller wrote and performed three songs in Robin Hood (1973 film) as Alan-a-Dale. A sample of his song Whistle Stop was used as the musical accompaniment for the internet phenomenon the hampsterdance.
[edit] Discography
[edit] Hit singles
| Year | Title | Chart Positions | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| US Hot 100 | US Country | UK Singles | ||
| 1960 | "You Don't Want My Love" | - | #14 | - |
| 1961 | "When Two Worlds Collide" | - | #6 | - |
| 1963 | "Lock, Stock, and Teardrops" | - | #26 | - |
| 1964 | "Dang Me" | #7 | #1 | - |
| 1964 | "Chug-a-Lug" | #9 | #3 | - |
| 1965 | "Do-Wacka-Do" | #31 | #15 | - |
| 1965 | "King of the Road" | #4 | #1 | #1 |
| 1965 | "Engine, Engine No. 9" | #7 | #2 | #33 |
| 1965 | "One Dyin' and A-Buryin'" | #34 | #10 | - |
| 1965 | "Kansas City Star" | #31 | #7 | - |
| 1966 | "England Swings" | #8 | #3 | #13 |
| 1966 | "Husbands and Wives" | #26 | #5 | - |
| 1966 | "I've Been a Long Time Leavin'" | - | #13 | - |
| 1966 | "You Can't Roller Skate in a Buffalo Herd" | #40 | #35 | - |
| 1966 | "My Uncle Used to Love Me But She Died" | #58 | #39 | - |
| 1966 | "Heartbreak Hotel" | #84 | #55 | - |
| 1967 | "Walkin' in the Sunshine" | #37 | #7 | - |
| 1967 | "The Ballad of Waterhole #3" | - | #27 | - |
| 1967 | "Old Toy Trains" (Christmas Song) | #13xm | - | - |
| 1968 | "Little Green Apples" | #39 | #6 | #19 |
| 1968 | "Vance" | #80 | #15 | - |
| 1969 | "Me and Bobby McGee" | - | #12 | - |
| 1969 | "Where Have All the Average People Gone?" | - | #14 | - |
| 1970 | "Don't We All Have the Right" | - | #15 | - |
| 1971 | "Tomorrow Night in Baltimore" | - | #11 | - |
| 1971 | "Loving Her Was Easier" | - | #28 | - |
| 1973 | "Hoppy's Gone" | - | #42 | - |
| 1974 | "Whistle Stop" | - | #86 | - |
| 1977 | "Baby Me Baby" | - | #68 | - |
| 1982 | "Old Friends"(with Willie Nelson and Ray Price) | - | #19 | - |
| 1985 | "River in the Rain" | - | #36 | - |
[edit] Awards
- 1964 — Grammy Award: Best Country Song: "Dang Me"
- 1964 — Grammy Award: Best New Country and Western Artist
- 1964 — Grammy Award: Best Country and Western Recording, Single: "Dang Me"
- 1964 — Grammy Award: Best Country and Western Performance, Male: "Dang Me"
- 1964 — Grammy Award: Best Country and Western Album: "Dang Me"/"Chug-a-Lug"
- 1965 — Jukebox Artist of the Year
- 1965 — Grammy Award: Best Country Song: "King of the Road"
- 1965 — Grammy Award: Best Country Vocal Performance, Male: "King of the Road"
- 1965 — Grammy Award: Best Country and Western Recording, Single: "King of the Road"
- 1965 — Grammy Award: Best Contemporary Vocal Performance, Male: "King of the Road"
- 1965 — Grammy Award: Best Contemporary (Rock 'N Roll), Single: "King of the Road"
- 1965 — Grammy Award: Best Country and Western Album: "The Return of Roger Miller"
- 1965 — Academy of Country and Western Music: "Best Songwriter"
- 1965 — Academy of Country and Western Music: "Man of the Year"
- 1985 — Tony Award : Best Score: "Big River"
- 1988 — Academy of Country Music: Pioneer Award
- 1995 — Country Music Hall of Fame
- 1997 — Grammy Hall of Fame Song : "Dang Me"
- 1998 — Grammy Hall of Fame Song : "King Of The Road"
- 2003 — CMT's 40 Greatest Men of Country Music: Ranked #23.
[edit] Reference
- Cooper, Daniel. (1998). "Roger Miller." In The Encyclopedia of Country Music. Paul Kingsbury, Ed. New York: Oxford University Press. pp. 347-8.
