Eddy Arnold

Eddy Arnold. . , The first artist to successfully and consistently blend country and pop music into a new hybrid, Eddy Arnold was a pioneer of what became known as "the Nashville Sound." He introduced country music to a broad audience, registering 37 pop hits and nearly 150 country hits. He charted records in six decades, and, in 1948 alone, held the No. 1 position on the country charts for all but two weeks., Richard Edward Arnold was born May 15, 1918, on a farm in Chester County, Tennessee, about 20 miles south of Jackson. After his father's death in 1929, the family fell upon hard times, so Arnold supplemented the family income by singing on the radio in Jackson. When he was 16, he moved to Memphis, and in 1938, to St. Louis, Missouri. After hearing that Nashville-based Grand Ole Opry star Pee Wee King was losing his vocalist. Arnold auditioned for King's Golden West Cowboys. He joined in January 1940, staying until 1943. During that time, he became popular on the Opry and was hired as a solo act after he left King., In 1944, Arnold signed with RCA Victor Records between 1944 and 1953, Arnold was managed by Colonel Tom Parker, who would later guide Elvis Presley to stardom, Arnold's first recording session in Nashville, resulting in the hit single "The Cattle Call," was the first in the city since 1928, laying the groundwork for Nashville to become the recording center of country music., Arnold scored 28 No. 1 country hits. 12 of them in the 1940s, including "That's How Much I Love You," "It's a Sin," and "I'll Hold You In My Heart." An unabashed populist, Arnold expanded his following with warm mellifluous vocals and increasingly full instrumentation. The strings and arrangement on his 1953 recording of "I Really Don't Want to Know" foretold the country-pop blend soon to be called "the Nashville Sound.", Rock 'n' roll dealt a setback to his career, but he returned in 1959 with the folk song "Tennessee Stud," and then as a pop crooner. His mid-60s hits included "What's He Doing in My World" and "Make the World Go Away." The latter topped the country charts and reached No. 6 on the pop charts. Fronting full symphony orchestras, he appeared regularly on national television, in Las Vegas and on national concert tours., In 1966, Eddy Arnold was elected into the Country Music Hall of Fame, and the following year he became the first Entertainer of the Year at the Country Music Association awards show. In the face of the slowly declining sales, Arnold semiretired. Mindful of the poverty of his youth, he had invested primarily in real estate, purchasing large swaths of land in the Nashville suburb of Brentwood., In 1998, on his 80th birthday, Arnold announced his permanent retirement from touring. He died in Nashville on May 8, 2008, one week before his 90th birthday., Three weeks after Arnold's death, his last single, "To Life," spent one week on the country charts, setting a record for the longest span between the first and last chart single: 62 years and 11 months.