Ray Stevens: Seasons of Sessions...

If you all have been familiar with the career of Ray Stevens for as long as I have then you'll be aware that Ray used to appear on recording sessions in Nashville, Tennessee on a fairly frequent basis throughout the '60s and into the early '70s. Ray has often, when asked, spoken about his years as a session musician. He often cites specific things that took place in recording sessions or who he worked along side and as well as any information about the producer of those sessions. Sometimes, due to the passage of time, everything seems like a blur to him. He was declared a Nashville Cat a number of years ago for the sheer amount of recording sessions he appeared on. In addition being a musician he, at times, produced a lot of recording sessions for small labels. He also was a music arranger for a lot of recording artists on top of being a musician and record producer. Ray could more or less do it all, technically speaking, and he eventually became his own music arranger, producer, and leader of the studio band on his albums. 

If everything I made mention of isn't already impressive enough he is also a songwriter. He wrote a majority of the songs he recorded throughout the first half of his career. Well, I should say, he wrote the majority of his recordings between the years 1961 and 1983. He did several covers albums in the 1960s and 1970s which features a lot of songs that he didn't write...but if we're to focus primarily on the albums featuring original songs, well, most of those that were released in that time period were self-written. His songwriting helped him get elected to the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1980. The same year he was elected to the Georgia Music Hall of Fame. It's also important to point out that a majority of the albums that Ray released during 1962-1983 were mostly all serious...filled with all kinds of ballads of various category. He sang love ballads that fit both the pop and country music formats; he sang rhythm and blues style songs; he sang up-tempo and mid-tempo songs that crossed most all music forms...including gospel music. He recorded social commentary with a heavy topical overtone and then there were the comedy/novelty songs. As I've touched on many times a lot of people would be surprised to learn that Ray really never released that many comedy albums in the 1960s or the 1970s. You'd think he would've had dozens of zany, novelty albums racked up in his discography from that time period but it just isn't the case. In those days the single record was heavily favored over the long-playing album (LP). So back then, if a single became a big hit, then a record company would build an album around it. 

His first two Mercury Records albums feature novelty songs and ballads: 1,837 Seconds of Humor (1962) and This is Ray Stevens (1963). Ray's first album to feature all comedy songs is Gitarzan (1969). In the recording sessions for Ray's earlier albums he played piano/keyboard...since that is his main musical instrument. He wasn't his own record producer in those days...it was Shelby Singleton. In the years prior to Shelby's involvement the main guidance of Ray's career happened to be Bill Lowery. Ken Nelson, Jerry Kennedy, Chet Atkins, Fred Foster, and Ralph Emery were also important figures in Ray's early career. Ray worked with the likes of Tommy Roe, Joe South, Jerry Reed, and Billy Joe Royal in and around Atlanta, Georgia. All of them at one time or another appeared on a local radio series called The Georgia Jubilee. Ray posted a photo from the early 1960s at the ABC/Paramount Recording Studio owned by record producer Sam Phillips. Ray was often on the recording sessions of various vocal groups and recording artists on small labels and larger labels. I can spot Ray from a mile away. There wasn't any background given as to why there's so many women in the photo. Some of us Ray Stevens fans spoke online about it might be some sort of field trip to a recording studio by a local high school music class or something. Ray identified some of the other people in the photo: Billy Sherrill, Tommy Roe, Allen Breed, and Hugh Jarrett. 

As far as Ray's recording sessions go a soul group known as The Tams, for example, some of their recordings were published by Bill Lowery (credited as Lowery Music, Inc.). On some of the single releases by The Tams the performances are credited as Ahab Productions, signaling that Ray Stevens was the record producer. This is no doubt a reference to Ray's 1962 novelty, "Ahab the Arab". Some of the recordings by The Tams were on ABC/Paramount and it's possible this photo is from when Ray was producing and working on sessions with The Tams. He produced their recordings of "Untie Me" and "Disillusioned" and the audio clips are on YouTube. When you listen to "Untie Me" you can hear Ray's 'sound' from that time period all over it. Joe South wrote "Untie Me". When Ray began his music publishing company he called it Ahab Music. He changed the name in 1977 to Ray Stevens Music. He's created several music publishing companies that are in the official umbrella of Ray Stevens Music but almost everything he's recorded since 1977 is credited to Ray Stevens Music.

Ray's involvement in so many recording sessions have almost gone by with little notice over the decades. I've been a fan for years and years and even I'm still discovering information about recording sessions that he participated in over the course of his career. Some of this has to do with the lack of proper credit...musician credits were rarely shown on albums from the '60s...unless the musician publicly disclosed everything they played on it was likely a general audience wouldn't have any idea who played on what.