Jan. 20, 1973: The Bard of Buffalo's new favorite -- WHLD's Bob Williams
Another visit with the Bard of
Jan. 20, 1973
WHLD’s Bob Williams
Builds Country Sound
With Belle’s New Songs
SOME PEOPLE
have formal living rooms for entertaining guests, but Belle Dowdell, the
80-year-old Bard of Buffalo, has a whole house to use that way.
She just bought the place – it’s on a cozy street near UB –
and she calls it The Bard’s Retreat. Her spinet piano fits perfectly into the
niche in the living room and on Sundays she dresses in something like that
stylish floor-length skirt she’s wearing and invites her country musician
friends to come around.
“I wrote a new song,” Belle exclaims and today’s guest, Bob
Williams, raises his eyebrows for that look for well-controlled interest that
he gets. “It’s called ‘My Bed’s Wired With Electricity.’”
* * *
BOB, WHO HAS
a country music radio show on
But when Belle sings it, eyes closed, tapping rhythm with
her feet, it turns out to be safe. The bed is one of those automatic hospital
beds. “I’m afraid of electricity, you know,” she confides.
As part of her campaign to write a hit song and make a man
a star, Belle called Bob at the station one day last summer and offered him her
material.
“We struck up kind of a mutual friendship over the
telephone,” he says, “and I looked through her songs for something that would
be suitable for me. As you know, her repertoire consists of all kinds of
things.”
He chose “Music Is My Business,” to which
It’s had modestly enduring success. Stores in
* * *
“I’M AFTER a
salable product,” Bob says, “not necessarily a hit record. I’d rather have a
good sound and steady sales. There’s a lot of people making money in this
business with a good sound.”
Bob’s sound has been patterned after Hank Snow ever since
Bob went backstage and met him after a show in
The friendship between them is still strong. In fact, that
pale blue suit Bob’s wearing – that Nashville Killer with the rhinestone
flowers embroidered on the sleeves and chest and the little gold belts over the
pockets – he got that from Hank Snow, got it about a year ago, along with
another one.
“The other one’s brighter,” he says. Both were done by
Nudie, the foremost custom country tailor in
His other passion these days is flying. There’s a brand new
1,900-foot airstrip behind his house and earlier this Sunday he was up winging
to
“There’s beer and roast beef sandwiches in the kitchen,”
Belle announces. Bob declines the offer. “Just slide the teakettle on for me,”
he says.
* * *
MORE VISITORS
show up. Bob Moore and Ross Berger, interviewer and photographer for the
new-defunct Frontear Country magazine, with a blind woman named Evelyn, a
devoted country music fan who’s made tapes of Bob Williams radio shows since
1971.
Belle’s asked if she’s written any love songs and she
switches on her cassette player to give some examples.
What she’s looking for is a
“We already know that,” she chuckles, hitting the rewind
button.
“Bob Williams has probably done as much for local people as
anybody we’ve run into,” Bob Moore says. “He gives local records a break on his
show. He doesn’t just take things out, he puts somethin’ back in.”
“Since I’ve gone on the air,” Bob Williams notes, “I’ve
been doing mostly personal appearance type things, the way Ramblin’ Lou does.
People hear you on the radio and they always wonder what you look like.
Somebody said once they thought I was nine feet tall.”
“Well,” beams Bob Moore, “you are nine feet tall when it
comes to country music.”
Bob Williams’ country career has been growing since before
he met Hank Snow. He’s had bands in the
* * *
THERE HE WAS
part of a house band on a radio station jamboree, playing with Sonny James, but
otherwise he fell upon hard times and returned home two years later, taking a
job with Niagara Mohawk.
These days he’s a lineman, lives with his wife and children
in a new house he had built next to his boyhood home on his parents’ 100-acre
farm outside
“No, I didn’t build it myself,” he remarks. “I’ve seen too
many guys working late at night, freezing their hands off. I just told the
contractor what I wanted and didn’t come back until he gave me the keys.”
He calls it Rainbow Ranch. Partly because of Hank Snow –
his band is called the Rainbow Ranch Boys. And partly because of the success it
represents.
“After all these years of struggle,” he says, “it seemed like the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow.”
The box/sidebar
The Band Can Handle a Whole Show
Bob Williams’ band was supposed to show up for practice at
The Bard’s Retreat Sunday, but two of them came down with heavy fevers – Super
Bowl variety – and called to say they weren’t able to leave the house.
“They can handle a whole show, really,” Bob says. “Me, I
come out after a few numbers with a flat-top guitar, like Hank Show. I’ve got a
microphone for it, but there’s plenty there to hear without hearing me.”
* * *
THE GROUP’S
been with Bob for about five years. There’s rhythm guitarist Bob Bahnstadt,
bass guitarist Dave Schandel, fiddler Kenny Bennett, pedal steel guitarist Bud
Thomason and drummer Jack Faery.
“Dave does some fine vocals and he and our fiddle player do
a lot of good harmony,” Bob says.
* * *
SINCE BOB
succeeded a friend of his on the WHLD country show four years ago, he’s avoided
the lengthy engagements country groups usually look for. He goes in for special
appearances instead.
“If you play a club,” he says, “most of the time all you see
is regulars, the same people week after week. This way I get out and see lots
of different crowds. We wind up playing most every Saturday.”
They’ll be at the Monte Carlo Club in
* * * * *
IN THE PHOTO:
Bob Williams in one of those suits he got from Hank Snow.
* * * * *
FOOTNOTE: “Music Is My Business,” the second and last single
released on the Bards Records label, turned out to be Belle’s greatest hit,
albeit a very minor one. She passed away in 1979.
Bob Williams stayed on the air at WHLD until 1977 and continued
to lead the Rainbow Ranch Boys and work for Niagara Mohawk as a lineman up
until shortly before he died at age 57 in 1989.
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