Sleepy LaBeef Hits The Road To Support
His Gavin Americana Hit "Tomorrow Never Comes"

Davis began recording in 1928 and was still recording 70 years later, giving him one of the longest recording careers in entertainment history. Davis also had the distinction of being one of the earliest country singers to record with a racially integrated band. One of 11 children born in Beech Springs, La., to a sharecropping couple, Davis rose to prominence in the 1930s with a smooth vocal style that helped popularize country music far beyond its original rural southern audience. The singer's best-known songs, particularly "You Are My Sunshine," helped carry him to the governorship of Louisiana in 1944 and in 1960. With its easy-to-follow melody and sweet inspirational message, "You Are My Sunshine" has been recorded more than 350 times by many top artists. The song, now a country music anthem and a children's favorite, became nationally known in 1941 through recordings by Gene Autry and Bing Crosby.

Davis' own Decca recording was released in 1940. Prior to his purchase of the song, "You Are My Sunshine" was credited to Paul Rice, a member of Louisiana band The Rice Brothers Gang, but Rice previously may have purchased the copyright himself. The rumored sale price between Rice and Davis was as low as $15 and as high as $500. The copyright to "You Are My Sunshine" is now perhaps the most valuable in country music. Far from being frowned on, purchasing the original compositions of other local musicians was the accepted practice of the time. There was nothing underhanded about it. Like A.P. Carter and a host of other artists of the era did, Davis would rework the original tunes to fit his style of singing and change the lyrics to meet his own needs. Regardless of its origin, "You Are My Sunshine" clearly belonged to Davis -- he's the reason it is one of the most recognized and most loved songs in the world.

Davis began his singing career in the Glee Club of Louisiana College in Pineville. At the same time he was a member of a local quartet, the Wildcat Four, singing lead tenor. After school, he worked in the fields and busked on street corners until he had raised enough money to allow him to study for his master's degree at Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge. There, too, he sang in the Glee Club as a tenor in a quartet. In the late 1920s he accepted a teaching position in Shreveport at Dodd College, a Baptist junior college for women, and began performing weekly at Shreveport radio station KWKH.

Davis left Dodd after one year and began working as a clerk at the Shreveport Criminal Court, a job that lasted until 1938 and that helped usher him into a career in Louisiana politics.

After recording a couple of piano-accompanied records for KWKH in 1928, Davis made records for RCA Victor Records for four years, most of them excellent white blues songs performed in a Jimmie Rodgers style. Some, such as "Organ Grinder's Blues" and "Tom Cat and Pussy Blues," contained risque lyrics that political opponents would later use in unsuccessful efforts to discredit him.

In 1934, Davis began recording for the newly-formed Decca records. His first release on the label, "Nobody's Darling But Mine," became his first substantial hit. Although a risque element remained in his repertoire for a while, Davis soon focused on western swing, recording two songs with The Musical Brownies, by then led by Milton Brown's brother, Derwood. In 1938, Davis was made Shreveport's Commissioner of Public Safety and in 1942, he was promoted to State Public Service Commissioner. He scored Top 5 country hits in the 1940s with "Is It Too Late Now," "There's a Chill on the Hill Tonight," "Grievin' My Heart Out for You" and "Bang Bang." Davis' biggest chart single was "There's a New Moon Over My Shoulder," which topped the charts in 1945 and lingered on them for 18 weeks. Between 1942 and 1947 Davis appeared in five Hollywood films: Strictly in the Groove, Riding Through Nevada, Frontier Fury, Cyclone Prairie Ramblers and his own life story, Louisiana. In 1944, standing as a Democrat, Davis was elected to governor.

After his first four-year term as governor, Davis began singing full time for the first time and began to specialize more in gospel music than in straight country songs.

He went back to the governor's mansion for a second four-year term in 1960. School integration was a hot issue in the Deep South in those years and while Davis maintained a segregationist stance, his moderate form of opposition helped Louisiana avoid much of the violence that took place in neighboring states.

"Where the Old Red River Flows" gave Davis a Top 20 country hit in 1962 and went on to become yet another very popular and much recorded song. After the death of his first wife, Alvern, in 1967, he married Anna Carter Gordon, a member of the Chuck Wagon Gang gospel group. In 1971, Davis was unsuccessful in his third bid for the governorship and instead concentrated more on sacred songs. The following year he was elected into the Country Music Hall of Fame.

During the 1970s and up to the mid-1980s, Davis continued to make recordings of gospel music and appearances at some religious venues until a heart attack in 1987 caused him to restrict his activities. However, in the spring of 1992 he appeared on CBS-TV's special celebrating the Country Music Hall of Fame's 25th anniversary, and in 1998 he recorded a new version of "You Are My Sunshine."

A hybrid of country, rhythm & blues and gospel, rockabilly music exploded out of the American South in the mid-fifties, sweeping across the country in popularity and influence. Although the "golden age of rockabilly" only lasted for a few short years (roughly 1954 to 1959), the music was responsible for launching the careers of many famous artists such as Elvis Presley, Carl Perkins, Conway Twitty and Jerry Lee Lewis. Many "mainstream country" artists such as George Jones, Marty Robbins, and Buck Owens dabbled in rockabilly for a while, and an even larger number of artists recorded one or two records in the genre before disappearing into relative obscurity.

More than forty years later, these records and artists continue to influence a new generation of musicians, and the original recordings are highly sought-after treasures.

Some of the goals of the Rockabilly Music Foundation include plans for the construction of a Rockabilly Museum and Hall of Fame in Tennessee, providing financial and healthcare assistance to " first-generation" rockabilly artists, and lending promotional assistance to a new generation of rockabilly musicians. A major"kick-off" fundraiser is planned for April 5, 2001 at the Ryman Auditorium in Nashville, Tennessee, with many rockabilly acts both old and new slated to perform. More information about the Rockabilly Music Foundation and its sponsored events can be found at the Foundation's official website, www.rockabillymusicfoundation.org

Chronicling Sun Records' founding by Sam Phillips and surveying the label's legacy, the docu will feature a series of recording sessions and present-day rock 'n' roll icons who will reflect on the influence of Sun's artists and music. Among the musical legends who have agreed to participate in both the film and soundtrack are Paul McCartney, Bob Dylan, Jimmy Page, Robert Plant, Jeff Beck, Chrissie Hynde, Elton John, Rod Stewart, Van Morrison, Mark Knopfler, Bryan Ferry, the Who and Aerosmith.

Other stars include Live, Third Eye Blind, Chris Isaak and Ben Folds Five as well as France's Johnny Hallyday and Italy's Zucchero. Brian Setzer and Kid Rock are also slated to contribute to the soundtrack. These artists will perform the music of Elvis Presley, Carl Perkins, Jerry Lee Lewis, Roy Orbison, Johnny Cash and other pioneers from the Sun stable. Likely highlights include McCartney singing "That's All Right," recorded by Elvis Presley at one of his earliest Sun sessions in 1954, with the former Beatle backed by guitarist Scotty Moore and drummer D.J. Fontana, who played behind Elvis in that session nearly 50 years ago.

For Solitary Man, Cash and Rubin assembled a group of musicians and guest artists whose musicianship and sense of musical heritage were in sympathy with Johnny's own: Tom Petty (vocals on "I Won't Back Down" and "Solitary Man," organ on "I Won't Back Down"), Sheryl Crow (vocals on "Field Of Diamonds, accordion on "Wayfaring Stranger" and "Mary Of The Wild Moor"), Merle Haggard (vocals on "I'm Leaving Now," guitar), June Carter Cash (vocals on "Field Of Diamonds"), Norman Blake (guitar), Mike Campbell (guitar), Laura Cash (fiddle), Will Oldham (vocals on "I See A Darkness"), Larry Perkins (guitar), Randy Scruggs (guitar), Marty Stuart (guitar), Benmont Tench (piano, organ, harmonium).

"...the song is the thing that matters," writes Cash in his liner notes to Solitary Man (Cash has won two Grammys for penning liner notes). "Before I can record, I have to hear it, sing it, and know that I can make it feel like my own, or it won't work. I worked on these songs until it felt like they were my own. 'Mercy Seat,' Solitary Man,' 'I Won't Back Down."' As surprising as some of Johnny's song choices may be, each bears the unmistakable stamp of the original man in black: the deep rustic integrity, the wit and intelligence, the moral ferocity that borders on the Biblical, the unwavering ability to cut into the heart of a song and its listener at once. In song choices like "I Won't Back Down," one hears the strength of a man who has faced his own mortality and emerged victorious. "On the question of youth and old age," Cash continues in his liner notes, "I wouldn't trade my future for anyone's I know. After all my experiences of the past and present to bring the best song I know to the sessions. The future is not questionable, but for me it is a path of light. Lit by those I know, who enrich my life. The Master of Life's been good to me. He gives me good health now and helps me to continue doing what I love. He has given me strength to face past illnesses, and victory in the face of defeat. He has given me life and joy where others saw oblivion. He has given me new purposes to live for. New services to render and old wounds to heal. Life and love go on. Let the music play."