Pride, Charley 1938(?)–

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Charley Pride 1938(?)–

Country music vocalist

Many African Americans have crossed the color line in their respective fields of endeavor, winning respect and fame throughout American society for their persistence, for their belief in equality and justice, and for sheer guts. Perhaps none other, however, has had a career that so completely overcame negative expectations as that of Charley Pride, country music’s first and only major African American star. Pride made his mark not only by breaking into a white-dominated world, but also by succeeding brilliantly. He was among the best-selling country vocalists of the 1960s and 1970s, and enjoyed an enduring career that stretched over parts of four decades.

Pride’s own autobiography, Pride, is unclear as to his actual birthdate, but most sources agree that he was born on March 18, 1938. Named Charl Frank Pride by his father, he received the name Charley when a clerk mistyped his birth certificate. Pride grew up in the Mississippi Delta, in the small town of Sledge, as one of eleven children in a sharecropper’s family. The children, he wrote in his autobiography, “slept three and four to a bed, lying alternately head to foot.”

As a child, Pride endured not only the worst indignities that Southern segregation could dish out, but also unrelenting physical abuse from his father. Two breezes of influence from the outside seemed to carry suggestions of a different life. Pride shared one of these inspirational influences with many other African American young people of his time: a gifted athlete named Jackie Robinson. Pride was greatly impressed by Robinson, who became the first African American player to enter baseball’s major leagues. The other inspiration was more unusual. Pride, along with his family, listened to the weekly Saturday-night broadcasts of country music’s long-running Grand Ole Opry radio program, which was transmitted on station WSM out of Nashville.

While it was not uncommon for African Americans in the South to listen to country music from time to time—jazz and pop vocalist Ray Charles described similar listening sessions from his own childhood— Pride’s interest went much deeper. Born with a talent for mimicry, he quickly mastered the nasal yet sonorous singing styles of top country vocalists of the day such as Hank Williams and Roy Acuff. Pride’s siblings were

At a Glance…

Born Charl Pride on March 18, 1938, in Sledge, MS; son of Mack Pride, a sharecropper farmer; married, wife’s name Rozene; children: Kraig, Dion, and Angela. Military service: U.S. Army, 1956-58.

Career: Country singer, guitarist, and former professional baseball player; played inNegro Leagues in Detroit, Memphis, and Birmingham, Alabama, 1955-56 and 1958-59; played baseball and worked as tin smelter in Montana, 1960-63; began singing in night ciubs around 1962; recorded debut album for RCA label, 1967; topped country and pop charts with hit single ’’Kiss an Angel Good Morning.’ 1970; moved to 16th Avenue label, 1987.

Awards: Several Grammy awards. Entertainer of the Year and Male Vocalist of the Year, Country Music Association, 1970; Top Male Artist of the Decade (1970s), CashBox magazine, 1980; inducted into Country Music Hall of Fame, 2000.

Addresses: Booking agent— Cecca Productions, P.O. Box 670507, DallasTX 75367

mystified by his desire to sing country music. A natural musician, Pride amused himself by constructing simple musical instruments out of such materials as combs and pieces of wire. At the age of 14, he bought his first guitar.

Despite his interest in music, Pride first turned to baseball as his ticket out of Sledge. “As far as I was concerned, my future was in baseball,” he wrote in his autobiography. “Once I saw what Jackie Robinson did, that was my goal.” Pride won a spot with the Memphis Red Sox and the Birmingham Black Barons in the old Negro Leagues, and excelled even when these teams faced off against major league squads in exhibition play. Following military service in the U.S. Army in 1956 and 1957, Pride made repeated attempts to break into the majors. However, he became frustrated because the number of African Americans who were allowed to play major league baseball was still small. Newly married, Pride settled for an offer from the owner of a small semi-professional team in Montana, the Missoula Timberjacks. The baseball job came with a price, working a dangerous, demanding shift in a smelting plant.

Pride sang the national anthem at baseball games and occasionally performed a country song or two between innings. He was greatly encouraged by the audience’s positive response, and soon began to round out his income by singing in taverns. At a concert in the early 1960s, he filled a slot at a Helena, Montana concert hosted by country stars Red Foley and Red Sovine. Sovine was impressed with Pride’s performance, and gave him the telephone number of his booking agent in Nashville. In the meantime, Pride still tried to earn a spot in the major leagues. In 1963 he tried out for the New York Mets, but was rejected. Given a bus ticket back to Montana by the team, Pride traveled by way of Nashville and acquired the services of a manager, Jack Johnson. Two years passed before Pride was signed to the RCA label in Nashville, and executives at the label moved gingerly to promote their new artist. His first single, the murder ballad “Snakes Crawl at Night,” was released without any accompanying photo publicity. Pride’s rich baritone voice was so steeped in the traditions of country music, that most audiences did not realize he was African American. Initially, RCA would not allow Pride to record love songs such as the sentimental classic “Green, Green Grass of Home”. The song referred to a woman with “hair of gold and lips like cherries,” and executives feared that white audiences would react negatively to hearing Pride sing of a love affair with a blonde-haired woman.

Pride’s first several singles became hits and, by 1966, his career was in full bloom. During live performances, he won the audience over with his vocal stylings and genial sense of humor. Before a crucial Detroit concert, Pride and manager Johnson devised the trademark joke in which he mentioned his “permanent tan.” During the late 1960s, when tensions were running high over riots in several American cities, Pride’s remarkable rapport with audiences ensured that his concerts would be free of any racial violence. Pride joined a tour organized by rising “outlaw” singer-songwriter Willie Nelson, who gave Pride important support during the early stages of his career.

Pride soon became a fixture on the country music scene. With the release of a 1969 collection of his singles, The Best of Charley Pride, the singer hit the coveted Number One position on country music sales charts. In 1970, Pride released “Kiss an Angel Good Morning,” which crossed over to pop audiences and reached the pop top 20. The song, in which Pride delivers the folksy advice “Kiss an angel good morning/And love her like the devil when you get back home”, remains one of his most popular hits. In 1971, Pride swept the Country Music Association’s Male Vocalist of the Year and Entertainer of the Year awards.

Pride’s string of hit singles and albums was virtually unbroken throughout the 1970s. Cash Box magazine named Pride country music’s top male vocalist of the decade. At several points in his career, he struggled with depression. However, he always bounced back and turned to medication only after being hospitalized in 1989. In the early 1980s, Pride released the Hank Williams tribute album There’s a Little Bit of Hank in Me. Pride had always had an affinity for Williams’s songs, and later recorded a rambunctious version of the Williams song “Kaw-Liga”. The song tells the story of a wooden antique-store Indian who is unable to verbalize his love for a similar female figure. The female figure is eventually purchased by a customer and taken away.

During the late 1980s, Pride’s popularity faded somewhat with the rise of newer, rock-oriented country styles. He became a leader of a group of older, established singers who were critical of country radio stations for ignoring the legends of the genre. Pride continued to hold on to his devoted base of fans, however. In 1992, he opened a theater in Branson, Missouri, a country music-oriented tourist town geared to older travelers. That year, he was inducted into the roster of the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville—a high honor among country music traditionalists. Twenty-five years earlier, Pride had become the first African American singer to appear on the Opry stage. In the year 2000, he became the first African American member of the Country Music Hall of Fame.