Eddy Arnold - Biography
By J Poet
Eddy Arnold was one of the singers largely responsible for moving country music into the mainstream. He was in the music business for 55 years and his 91 hits still hold the record for the most number of country singles on the charts. Today, Arnold remains the most successful selling country artist of all time. And he was a pioneer in other ways, too. Arnold was the first country artist to host a television show and the first country star to perform at Carnegie Hall. He charted an astonishing 71 Top 10 hits between 1945 and 1956. In many respects, it was Arnold’s success that put Nashville on the map as an important city for music recording. His investments may have made him one of the wealthiest stars in Nashville, but he never lost his folksy, down-home touch. He died in 2008, two months after the death of his wife of 63 years, Sally.
Arnold, the son of a sharecropper, was born in 1918, near Henderson, Tennessee. His father died when he was 11-years-old, and he quit school to help the family survive. As a teenager, Arnold took a job driving a hearse, and he picked up guitar to make extra money playing dances and parties. He landed his own program on WTJS in Jackson when he was 18, and played clubs until 1940 when Pee Wee King hired him as lead vocalist for his popular cowboy swing band, Pee Wee King and His Golden West Cowboys. They had a regular spot on the Grand Ole Opry, and Arnold’s easygoing vocals became a big part of their appeal.
In 1943, RCA signed Arnold as a solo act, and not long after he started singing solo on The Opry. His manager was Colonel Tom Parker, who later went on to be Elvis Presley’s manager. Arnold’s third single, “That’s How Much I Love You,” went to #2 in 1946. His fifth single, “What Is Life Without Love,” hit #1 and started off an amazing streak of chart-topping songs, including “I’ll Hold You in My Heart,” which spent nearly a year on the country charts. “Bouquet of Roses” in 1948 just missed the Pop Top 10, but it was another #1 country record.
In 1955, Arnold convinced RCA to add a pop-string section to his records and it resulted in “Cattle Call” becoming a hit. When Chet Atkins took over RCA’s Nashville studios, he agreed with Arnold’s pop instincts and together they created the crossover sound that became known as “countrypolitian” by fusing pop and rock influences to their arrangements. Arnold started appearing on stage in a tuxedo, and while purists carped, he steadily crossed over to the pop mainstream with singles like “Anytime” and “Make the World Go Away”—both of which became international hits.
When LPs came in, RCA released Anytime (1955 RCA), The Chapel on the Hill (1955 RCA), A Little on the Lonely Side (1956 RCA), and My Darling, My Darling (1957 RCA). Arnold hosted The Eddy Arnold Show, a variety program than ran on television from 1956 to 1958, moving from NBC, to ABC, to CBS. He also appeared at Carnegie Hall and in the showcase casinos in Las Vegas and Lake Tahoe, while the hits just kept coming for the better part of the next decade. In chronological order, his albums that followed were Thereby Hangs a Tale (1959 RCA), You Gotta Have Love (1960 RCA), Let’s Make Memories Tonight (1961 RCA), Our Man Down South (1962 RCA), Cattle Call (1963 RCA), Folk Song Book (1964 RCA), Sometimes I’m Happy, Sometimes I’m Blue (1964 RCA), I Want to Go with You (1966 RCA), The Last Word in Lonesome (1966 RCA), Turn the World Around (1967 RCA), The Romantic World of Eddy Arnold (1968 RCA), The Glory of Love (1969 RCA), Love & Guitars (1970 RCA), and Loving Her Was Easier (1971 RCA).
The country music business was changing in the early 1970s and Arnold’s laid-back style was quickly growing out of favor. He left RCA for MGM in the ’70s, but returned to RCA for Eddy (1976 RCA)—one of his last big hit albums—and I Need You All the Time (1977 RCA).
He recorded infrequently for the rest of his life, but continued touring until he retired in 1999. His last albums include Last of the Love Song Singers (1993 RCA), a two-album set of old hits and new recordings, and After All These Years (2005 RCA), his 100th album. While his voice wasn’t what it used to be, he still delivered a love song like no one else. He was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 1999, and was awarded a Lifetime Achievement Award Grammy in 2005.
Arnold was elected to the Country Music Hall of Fame in 1966.
