Oral History Program William Hancock Interviewed by Benjamin Wheeler 08 June 2008 i Oral History Program Weber State University Stewart Library Ogden, Utah William Hancock Interviewed by Benjamin Wheeler 08 June 2008 Copyright © 2012 by Weber State University, Stewart Library ii Mission Statement The Oral History Program of the Stewart Library was created to preserve the institutional history of Weber State University and the Davis, Ogden and Weber County communities. By conducting carefully researched, recorded, and transcribed interviews, the Oral History Program creates archival oral histories intended for the widest possible use. Interviews are conducted with the goal of eliciting from each participant a full and accurate account of events. The interviews are transcribed, edited for accuracy and clarity, and reviewed by the interviewees (as available), who are encouraged to augment or correct their spoken words. The reviewed and corrected transcripts are indexed, printed, and bound with photographs and illustrative materials as available. Archival copies are placed in Special Collections. The Stewart Library also houses the original recording so researchers can gain a sense of the interviewee's voice and intonations. Project Description The Weber State College/University Student Projects have been created by students working with several different professors on the Weber State campus. The topics are varied and based on the student's interest or task for a specific assignment. These oral history assignments were created to help Weber State students learn the value and importance of recording public history and to benefit the expansion of the Weber State oral history collections. ____________________________________ Oral history is a method of collecting historical information through recorded interviews between a narrator with firsthand knowledge of historically significant events and a well-informed interviewer, with the goal of preserving substantive additions to the historical record. Because it is primary material, oral history is not intended to present the final, verified, or complete narrative of events. It is a spoken account. It reflects personal opinion offered by the interviewee in response to questioning, and as such it is partisan, deeply involved, and irreplaceable. ____________________________________ Rights Management All literary rights in the manuscript, including the right to publish, are reserved to the Stewart Library of Weber State University. No part of the manuscript may be published without the written permission of the University Librarian. Requests for permission to publish should be addressed to the Administration Office, Stewart Library, Weber State University, Ogden, Utah, 84408. The request should include identification of the specific item and identification of the user. It is recommended that this oral history be cited as follows: Hancock, William, an oral history by Benjamin Wheeler, 08 June 2008, WSU Stewart Library Oral History Program, University Archives, Stewart Library, Weber State University, Ogden, UT. iii Abstract: The following is an oral history interview with Bill Hancock. The interview was conducted on June 7, 2008, by Ben Wheeler, in the basement of his home in Bountiful, Utah. The subject of this interview is the memories and experiences during the career of Country Song-Writer Bill Hancock. BW: Where and when were you born Bill? BH: I was born in a little town of Scottsville, Kentucky in July of 1945 in a town of twenty-five hundred people and it’s still about twenty-five hundred people today. It’s about seventyfive miles north-east of Nashville, Tennessee. BW: You gotta love those small towns. Can you tell me about your parents' place of birth and their occupations? BH: They were born in Kentucky and born in Green County and my dad was a machinist; my mom was an office worker. BW: What led you into the career of writing Country Music? BH: I tell you Ben, from my earliest memories all I wanted to do was write. Life where I grew up was rough, it wasn't easy. You know you listen to the Grand Ole' Opry at night and I thought I wanted to be a journalist. I wrote a lot of poetry when I was in school in grade school all through high school and I liked that and I went to college and I studied Journalism. I wrote songs and I remember writing one for Tennessee Ernie when I was thirteen years old and I was thinking you know it was a really great talk-along sing-along 1 song for Tennessee Ernie Ford. I think through my college career I worked for a radio station and since I was already a poet, so to speak, Country Music was easy. BW: That's great. Do you recall a certain network of friends or a significant close friend you had while you were writing music? BH: You know one of the guys I use to write with in Nashville and has his own studio now is a guy whose father owned a dairy farm near where we were born and his name was Forest Borders. He and I collaborated on a lot of things and he did some good stuff. He was really a friend in the music business and I haven't seen him in years but in that particular time in the late 60's and early 70's he was really a friend in the music business. He wrote Barbara Mandrel's first hit for Dalgalico Music Billy Sherrill and Columbia Records back in about 1968 or early 69. BW: Would you say a close friend helped you through the hard times in Country Music or would you say cling closer to your family or were you an independent soul? BH: I was an independent soul I didn't have any close relationships with anyone. You know... BW: Just the music. BH: Well, there were friends that helped out along the way, You know, one of my friends from my school and college days was Lenard Casey Scott who worked for WSM radio and he helped me a great deal in fact, I lived with Casey in Battleson, Tennessee in the seventies at least when I was involved in the music industry in Nashville. BW: What would you say was the greatest contribution to the Country Music world? 2 BH: Getting out of it. BW: Getting out of it! So it's a pretty rough time. Can it be artificial at times? BH: I think a lot of it is. The music industry has changed so much since I was in it so many years ago there were people in there that were producers like Billy Sherrill, like Fred Foster, like Buddy Killian, Pete Trade, Gene Kennedy people like that could tell from the lyrics written on a piece of toilet paper and the way the song was sung if it were good enough to record and the industry is not like that today. Today, the industry is more of, "Let’s have ready-made ready-to-go CD. Just like it would come out on the air and that's what you pitch and it’s kinda got to be all done and tied up with a red ribbon. BW: Which is unfortunate. BH: Back in the day it wasn't like that but the music business has changed a lot in the Country Music field since I was first introduced to it. BW: It’s more of an assignment now than straight from the heart. BH: Right. BW: Alright, what noted Country Music artists did you write with and get a chance to hang out with? BH: Well, I hung out with... Ah me, I hung out with a noted few and you know I...through my friend Lenard Casey Scott back in the 70's, I was doing some stuff for Monument Records and Tree Publications and that was a precursor of Roger Miller and Johnny Cash and Kris Kristofferson coming to the forefront and I hung around with those people back in the late 60's and I drank a lot of beer. We used to drink beers at a place on the 3 corner of South Street and 16th Avenue there was a little clapboard joint painted red called the Tally-hoe Tavern and it was a nasty place. But I drank a lot of beers in there and Kris Kristofferson back in the day wrote a song from the Tally-hoe Tavern called, "To Beat the Devil." And I can tell you a little bit about Kris. I met him through my friend Casey Scott that worked for WSM radio. At the time I met him, he was living in an apartment down on 21st Avenue South and the Mumruff Street down near Vanderbilt University. And when I first met him he was the perfect picture of the song that he wrote, "Sunday Morning Coming Down." He had dark curly hair, his clothes were disheveled, he had probably had a few drinks, might of, he probably had a few drinks. And I thought man o' man, I could never be that way. But unfortunately, the guy was a genius. BW: He lived the songs that he wrote, "Sunday Morning Coming Down,". BH: I tell ya, he did and I said at the time that they were going over his portfolio in the studio, that he wrote the best gutter poetry that I ever read in my life. I came to realize later that the guy was exactly what he was. He was a road scholar, he was a helicopter pilot, he was a graduate from the United States Military Academy, he had spent his time in the service in Vietnam, and had met Johnny Cash prior to the time that I met Kris Kristofferson and the rest is history. He flew a helicopter over to Cash's house on Old Hickory Lake on Cages Cove, landed in the yard and presented a song to Cash and that's it and after that they began to go through his portfolio and publishing everything that he had. I think when Kris was about thirty years old, he realized he didn't have to work anymore. I had that association and I look back on it and realize it was a lot of fun. But I can tell you sometimes that I went out with Gene Kennedy and Pete Dragner there used to be a place down on the West end of the Avenues called Bandy's. And we'd go 4 down there at night and talk about the day's work. What was out, what was new, what was written, who's up-and-coming and that kind of thing and Kris Kristofferson was a great songwriter and I'd get angry about that and then get drunk at him. So, that was my career. I could never match that, so. BW: Those are great stories, is there anything you remember in particular about Johnny Cash or Roger Miller? BH: I remember Roger Miller's songs. I remember distinctly Minnie Pearl telling him that his songs weren't right and they'd never sell cause he was off the wall she didn't put it that way, I don't remember how it was, but anyway, that was one story. Roger Miller went on to become a great star, had his own TV show and that's history. BW: Was Johnny Cash a pretty charming fellow? BH: Johnny Cash was moody just like any other country star or performer. He could be solemn, he could be open, he could be gregarious, and he could be totally withdrawn. Usually, when he was withdrawn it meant he had something goin' on in his mind. I spent a lot of time over at the old studio on old 31 East in Hendersonville, Tennessee with the old House of Cash as it was called and had written some stuff for Johnny Cash that never got picked up and I can tell you some stories that went on over there. He had a sister named Reba and Reba's last name was Hancock. She was Reba Hancock and she ruled the roost. She said what went and what didn't go. I was in there one day and she was cleaning out the place. By cleanin' it out I mean firing everybody even down to her own son David that worked there. She was getting ready to throw me out and she said to me, "I want to tell you something, Bill; if your daddy wasn't a sailor, you 'aint 5 worth shit." And I said, “Reba, it so happens that my dad was a sailor, he was a CV in the South Pacific in World War II,” and she didn't throw me out. I did have a thing for his secretary, can I tell ya' a little story about her. She was a genuine person back in the late sixties. Johnny did a religious documentary and he went over to the Holy Land and the Documentary was entitled “Journey to Jerusalem”, and his private secretary Maryelle Curtis was the only person, was the only woman, not the only person that he took over there with him. She redid the script and rewrote things and typed and redid and that type of thing. Maryelle and I were really good friends and I liked her a lot. She was a genuine person. This is old I wanted to read this to you. Can I read this to you? BW: Yeah, go ahead; by all means. BH: This is from the House of Cash, and it's a personal note from Maryelle Curtis. And it says, "What a wonderful surprise it was to receive your letter this morning. It never fails that when I begin to feel like I'm a failure on this earth someone kind like you comes through with some compliments to make me feel like I have helped to make someone's day a little brighter. Thank you so much for your kind comments. The letter has made the day for me because I realize that I have been successful in my attempt to convey kindness and understanding to my fellow man. Even though I did not know Thomas Wayne personally, we were all saddened by his sudden death. Luther "Luther Perkins," was my neighbor at the time of the fire and even though I was not associated with this office at that time and did not know him, I shall never forget that morning. Please be sure to contact me at any time you're in Nashville and perhaps in some small way I may be of some assistance to you. Even though my job here is strictly as secretary, and as not being able to recognize talent; I'm tone deaf. Sincerely, Maryelle.” 6 BW: It seems like you were a major part of Mrs. Curtis's life. BH: She was a good person and I tried to be a good person but sometimes my failings overrode my goodness, Ben. BW: We're all guilty of that at some point. I know we elaborated on the fakeness of Country Music today. That modern Country Music a lot of times tries to portray images and a lot of the heart is lost in that. My question is, did the record companies ever come to you and try to tell you what to write? Or did you always just assert what came from your heart? BH: I wrote what came from my heart. I was in that same mold as those early songwriters. You know like my friends Forest Borders, Kris Kristofferson, and I never was a studio writer. I always thought that I'd like to be a studio writer but I wasn't disciplined enough to do that. So I wrote and put whatever chords I could put to it and then pitched it and said, "Here it is." BW: I think that's the way music should be written personally and elaborating on that kind of subject, can you tell me about the bands you worked with that never made it big, that never went to the studio and were they equally as talented as the ones you knew that did make it big? Such as Roger Miller or Johnny Cash. BH: Oh I think there's a lot of talent out there especially when you’re around Nashville, Tennessee. There is so many people across the country that have talent equal to or would surpass the bands even back years ago. But they never had the break. It was the thing about being in the right place at the right time or knowing the right person. I was in and out of so many publishing studios in down on Music Row 16th 17th 18th South and 7 listened to no telling how many good songs get pitched in the waste-basket. A whole lot better than anything I could ever put together. There is a dearth of talent out in the world and there still is. People that never got heard or went on to play locally in their local bands. BW: That's really unfortunate; can you think of any song in particular that comes to mind when you think of these bands that presented their music strictly from the heart? BH: You know I can't think of one right off the top of my head that comes to mind. I was a personal friend of Ray Griff. I really liked him and I liked his stuff and he was one of those guys who was a songwriter that did the Nashville thing his way and tried to do it their way and had some success along the line and finally just faded out of view. But a tremendous individual with tremendous talent. BW: Along those same lines, I'd really like to hear about the songs that you wrote and what they were about and what inspired you to write them. BH: I think Ben that we write about things that we know a little bit about. You know, our life stories and things that go on in life. Hank Williams is bias to Merle Kilmore. Once when Merle was about seventeen or eighteen years old, maybe younger than that, was go out, fall in love, fall out of love and then write a song about it. Merle did that and he had a number one hit with Webb Pierce when he was eighteen years old and that was before my time. I was associated in the late seventies with Rex Allen Junior and Margo Smith. I did a duet for them don't ask me the name of it I can't tell ya. I got a copy of the forty-five somewhere. The reason I mention Rex Allen Jr. is because Rex Allen and I were acquaintances since we never had a real close relationship but he was a 8 wonderful person to know. I have said in many times of my life that Rex Allen Jr. is probably the most honest man that I ever met in the music business and he'd tell it how it is right up or right down and he tried to help me in any way that he could. BW: That's great I can only imagine how many swindlers there were in Country Music saying, "You're gonna make it big." What is your fondest memory or story when working with the Country Music industry? Is there any particular story or awkward situation or anything like that? BH: You know I had many of awkward situations and many of them I brought on myself. I had a lot of good times with people I associated with. I'm one of those people like Waylon and Willey and probably George Jones, I don't know for sure, that has the distinction of sleeping on Sue Border's floor. She was the kind of gal that would hang around. She worked for Music City News way back in the seventies when Farren Young owned the newspaper and I did featured articles for Music City News and she took care of the guys when they imbibed a little too much and if they couldn't get home with whatever association they were with in that particular time and she took them to her house and let them sleep on the floor. BW: You gotta' love those types of gals when you have to find a place to sleep and maybe get a little something to eat to sober up. BH: She was a real princess, she really was. She was a friend to a lot of people and when she passed on there were a lot of people that missed her and still do. BW: Well, the next question is: we have covered a lot of music history from Tennessee and Kentucky so what was it that influenced you to move to Utah? 9 BH: I got married! I married a flight attendant and I flew to Utah and now here I am. BW: So how did you meet her? Did you meet her on a plane? BH: Internet. Is that not true? BW: So do you ever miss the South? BH: Absolutely, every day. She asked one time not long ago if I was homesick and I said, "No honey, I'm not homesick but I miss the South." BW: I know you do a lot of travels in Tennessee and Florida and those areas, do you ever miss the Country Music scene? BH: I don't know; I still have friends that are still in the music business and I stay associated with it on a distant basis and I've had opportunity to do some things in the music business since I got out of it actively. You know, about ten years ago I had a friend in the public relations business call me and ask me if I'd be interested in being affiliated with the Hank Williams Senior Tour of Memories and I said that I'd love to. And he said “When can you come to Nashville?” and I was living at my house in Florida at the time and I said “I'll be there tomorrow.” So I quit what I was doing and went and it was an awesome experience I had an opportunity to meet some what we call the new country stars. You know, John Anderson and Clint Black and Allen Jackson, Billy Ray Cyrus and Lorrie Morgan. You know, I found those people genuine. They were really genuine people they were nice people and easy to get along with and easy to get to know and I thoroughly enjoyed it. We had a tour and one of my all-time favorite people and has been for years was Emmy Lou Harris. I did all the public relations work had my photo made at the Opryland Hotel with Emmy Lou and an old Packard limousine that Hank 10 and the Drifting Cowboys used. That was the only ones that I wanted, Ben and the only pictures that I never saw or never got. Me and Emmy Lou but that's life. BW: So speaking of the West, it's called Country Western Music. Do you think there will ever be a successful Western Country Music Scene out here in the Western States? Or why do you think it’s never taken off like it has, say, in Nashville or the South? BH: I think everybody everywhere even out here in the West associates with some trend or idea in Country Music because its American music and it's a lifestyle and there are people who listen to that type of music everywhere even in New York City. Country Music has a great following in Europe it has a great following in Japan and out here I know the fellows that I work with now and they listen to Country Music. Some of them listen to new country and some of them listen to old. I think it's the story and the story that it tells. You see now Ben, more and more Bluegrass Bands coming to the forefront as a venue and Bluegrass has been around for a long time. I can remember sitting in Edmondson County, Kentucky up above the Green River on a ridge pickin' and singin' and drinking homemade whiskey all night long watching the fog roll on the Green River in the morning dawn and you know those are good memories. You know, a lot of that Kentucky, Tennessee, Virginia, even North Carolina and the collections originated there was Scotch, Irish, Celtic, it all came together and you can hear a lot of it in the bluegrass music and the fiddle playin' and the banjo pickin' and then the mandolin and I've always liked bluegrass music. Unfortunately, I had the slowest left hand in the world. I could never pick. So I had to say, "This is the way you write a song." It's like cheerleading, give me a C, give me a G, give me an E, and put it to a melody and add 11 some words and you've got a song. I had to leave the pickin' to Merle, Travis, and Chet Atkins and Jerry Reed and nowadays Vince Gill and others. BW: Well you've lived an incredible life and speaking of, now we’re going to kind of get into the nitty gritty question which of course, you don't have to answer if you don't feel comfortable doing so. When you think of Country Music history and names like Hank Williams and Johnny Cash, you think of wild and crazy times. Can you tell me any of these times you witnessed or experienced when recording music? BH: These are true stories, these are not made up stories. I played some drums and I was drummin' on a gig in a joint outside of Nashville some years ago. Many years ago in fact. The music was going along very well it was a nice ruckus crowd and from out of nowhere a guy comes up on the stage and I didn't see him and he nailed me right in the left jaw with a strong right hand and knocked me right off of the stool and the drums went rolling across the stage and it got real quiet and the snare settled down like a silver dollar rollin' to a stop. Shump... shump... shump… shump. And I looked up from the floor and looked at this guy standing over me and I said, "Why did you do that?" He said, "I didn't like your looks." And that was it. I put the drums back up, put 'em back on the stand, put everything together and went right on playing. BW: The show must go on. BH: That's it. True story absolutely, true story. This is another story, true story. In another joint it was an after-hours joint. Kind of a black and white joint back in the day when there wasn't supposed to be black and white joints, and after hours we were playing in there. And there was a couple of guys in there that got into an argument and they pulled 12 there pistols and they turned up the table and you thought you were in a western movie and they fired off a couple of rounds at each other. So the guitar player and myself pulled the old upright piano into a corner and hid behind it until the action was over. I wasn't about to make it to the forefront and hear, "Come on out buddy, if it hits you, it don't hurt.” I was a coward and proud of it. BW: It was a smart thing. It probably kept you alive and there was a backup plan if they did see you behind the piano, you guys could break into song and maybe change their mood. BH: It was slow down this one and run! It was what are you doing in a joint like this at your age, you’re not even supposed to be in here. Those are just things that happened to me along the way and I just did what I did and was more fortunate than a lot of people that came to Nashville 'cause I actually got cut and as I say a whole lot of material that came through there was a whole lot better than mine and it got canned. So I had a lot of associations with a lot of good people and I look back on it today and I'm thinking, "You know what, it's been a really interesting run. And there's a lot of people who would have liked to have been associated with the people that I associated with and done the things that I've done. I can go on and I can tell you story after story after story. I had a not-solustrous drinking career along the way, and that led into a lot of difficult situations for me. But fortunately, I gave that up many, many years ago and changed my lifestyle and when I did, hanging a gold record on the wall was not so important to me anymore. Because, I had the idea that if I hung a gold record on the wall, then that would make me okay and everyone would like me. And that, I found out, was not true; that there was nothing spiritual whatsoever about a gold record. And when my mind cleared up, I 13 began to realize that some of the people that I associated with in the music business were not on the up and up. They'd take advantage of you in a heartbeat and I decided that it would be better for me not to associate with them anymore. BW: Just elaborating on that point, thinking back to country singers such as Hank Williams or even modern rock bands, they had to come to a point where they had to change their life or they didn't in fact survive. What’s great to me from doing this interview today, I've seen that you've lived a completely exciting life and I look up to you and I know a lot of other people who would have loved to live your life, but you knew when to quit so you could still enjoy your later years unlike, say, Hank Williams who died when he was twenty-nine. It's all the same situation where you get too involved in the company and lifestyle and it all just takes over. And like you said, gold records and such are not a spiritual experience. To me personally, the spiritual experience is the actual music that somebody wrote from the heart and not the glitz and glam and drugs and alcohol that goes with it. BH: It's nice to reflect on the past. I wouldn't like to go back there and live that lifestyle again at all. But, I do Ben, have a foot hold in the music business, different venues. And I'm in the process now of trying to do some things on the up and up for a couple of people that I know down in New Orleans and we'll see how that turns out. This is for fun. This is not for fame and glory and money and that type of thing. BW: Alright, that sounds great and I can't thank you enough for giving me this interview. This has been so exciting for me. I have looked forward to this interview for weeks. This is what history is about. It’s about exploring people who lived incredible lives and followed their hearts. So on behalf of Weber State University and especially myself, a Country 14 Music lover, I want to thank you Bill for sharing some moments that you have had. I hope I can further this research and share it with many other historians and Country Music fans. Thank you again Bill. BH: Thank you Ben, I appreciate it very much. 15