Don Walser

Vocation

American country music singer, songwriter and guitarist known as a unique, award-winning yodeling "Texas country music legend." A roots musician from age 11, Walser started his first band, The Panhandle Playboys, at age 16, and shared bills with Buddy Holly. From 1959 to 1961, he had a group called The Texas Plainsmen and a weekly radio program. Walser would become known for his catalog of older, obscure country music and cowboy songs. He kept alive 1940s and 1950s tunes and made them his own in a style that blended elements of honky tonk and Western swing. In the mid-1980s, Walser put together his Pure Texas Band and developed a strong local following in Austin, Texas. In 1994, he released the album Rolling Stone From Texas. He was nicknamed "the Pavarotti of the Plains" by a reviewer for Playboy magazine. He attracted fans beyond country music traditionalists, and his band even became the opening act for the surf-punk group, Butthole Surfers. Walser’s band was voted "Best Performing Country Band" at the Austin Music Awards. He played the Grand Ole Opry in 1999 and 2001. In 2000 he received a lifetime "Heritage" award from the National Endowment for the Arts. Walser died from diabetes on 20 September 2006, aged 72. Link to Wikipedia biography