Here's to Country Music is Don Walser's 1999 CD. He has an original song about Jimmie Rodgers on this album, as well as great traditional numbers by Hank Thompson, Marty Robbins, and Floyd Tillman. Walser comments about many of the songs in the liner notes, and says, "The roots of country music are intact, but there are only a few leaves left on the tree." He is doing his part in keeping the great music of yesterday alive with this album.
Don Walser's 1998 album, Down at the Sky-Vue Drive-in, is dedicated to his wife of 46 years, Patricia Jane. Those facts alone tell you a lot about the man. He plays traditional music in a cutting edge world. He sings songs that are 50 years old. He yodels and gets away with it. Don Walser and his Pure Texas Band represent the preservation of a genre. "You let the roots die," he says, "and you lose the whole darn tree." Walser grew up in Lamesa and he plays his music the way he heard it on the radio in Lamesa back in high school. He spent nearly 40 years in the National Guard, making a living for his family, and only at the age of 60 did he begin devoting full time to the music he'd loved all his life.
His 1994 disc, Rolling Stone From Texas, contained eight covers, including songs originally recorded by Jimmie Rodgers, Marty Robbins, Tennessee Ernie Ford and Willie Nelson. He's not a cover artist, however. He takes old songs that many country fans don't know and makes them his own, and he also writes his own music. He says of his songwriting, "I'm not prolific, but sometimes I write good songs, even great songs." He released Archive I and Archive II in 1995 and Texas Top Hand in 1996.
He moved to Austin in 1984, spent ten years putting together his Pure Texas Band, and considers what has happened since then to be pure fun. He enjoys people watching from his position on the stage and gets a kick out of playing in towns where he worked before he "retired."
He plays regular gigs in Austin at Jovita's, Threadgills and the Broken Spoke.
Find his biography, performance dates, and complete information on every album at Don Walser's website. You will also find information about him on the Nancy Fly Agency site.
