One-of-a-kind new collection spotlights Bob Wills

Within the pantheon of modern country music (or for that matter American vernacular sounds in general) bandleader and fiddler Bob Wills stands quite tall.

But even those who deem themselves quite familiar with the legacy of Wills and his Texas Playboys band might hear some surprises in the mammoth new 10-CD set The Tiffany Transcriptions (Collector’s Choice), which is being released today.

This is the first boxed set ever issued by Collector’s Choice, and they picked this one because they consider it among the handful of recordings that changed the face of American country music.

Wills, Oakland disc jockey Cactus Jack, and businessman/songwriter Clifford Sundin co-founded Tiffany Music, Inc. in 1945 to create a series of transcriptions. These were pre-packaged radio shows featuring Wills and his Texas Playboys.

The nature of this exercise led to some profound differences between the types of things recorded during these sessions and what was customarily done on recordings Wills would make in the late ‘40s for such labels as Columbia and MGM.

“These recordings are much closer to the type of music that Wills and the Playboys made on the bandstand than almost anything else they recorded during this time,” said famed country music historian Rich Kienzle. “You hear a looseness, an energy that resulted because they were recording these on 16-inch transcription discs rather than 78s, and that gave them more space and more room to stretch out.

“Plus the sheer volume of material that was required for these sessions shows the variety in Wills’ music,” Kienzle added. “You can hear them at times kind of composing and creating on the go, jamming on songs and really operating exactly like they did in concert.”

Kienzle, known for his contributions to such magazines as Vintage Guitar, Guitar Player and the old, sorely missed Country Music, has interviewed many Wills band members (some of whom are quoted in the set’s hefty booklet) and he provides extensive liner notes for the set.

Others contributing to the collection include Ray Benson of Asleep at the Wheel, Ranger Doug from Riders in the Sky and Ashley Kingman from Big Sandy & the Fly-Rite Boys.

The 150 songs include plenty of blues tunes, amazing versions of such jazz classics like “C-Jam Blues” and “Jumping at the Woodside” done western swing style, as well as rags, dancehall pieces, novelty tunes, drinking songs, double-entendre pieces and stomping numbers that reveal a musical direction not always credited to Wills and the Texas Playboys.

“There’s plenty of pre-rock ‘n’ roll influence in a lot of these songs,” Kienzle said. “Bob deeply loved the blues as much as he did old-time fiddle music. Bessie Smith was one of his influences, and if you go through the Playboys’ catalog you’ll see other examples of them covering songs from classic blues singers. But Bob as a fiddler didn’t do the jazzy type stuff, though he clearly wanted that in his music. He let his sidemen provide that element of the musical equation.”

The featured ensembles certainly feature many extraordinary musicians. The lineups include steel guitarists Noel Boggs, Roy Honeycutt and Herb Remington; guitarists Eldon Shamblin and Lester “Junior” Bernard; fiddlers Joe Holley, Louis Tierney and Tiny Moore (who also doubled on mandolin); pianist Millard Kelso; Ocie Stockard on banjo; bassist Luke Wills; and drummer Johnny Cuviello.

“Bob Wills had as much influence on the development of modern country music as any single bandleader,” Kienzle said. “Hank Williams (Sr.) was a Wills fan. When he was doing shows in Alabama before he came to Nashville he used to add, at times, to his band a pianist, a drummer, sometimes some horns. You can still hear the Wills influence today in so many artists. Certainly George Strait and Merle Haggard. But also in people like Tracy Byrd and Brad Paisley.”

This music hasn’t been available at all for decades, and it’s never been made available in this form — a complete and remastered boxed set.

“It’s certainly one of the great boxed sets that’s come out in a long time, and one that really does fill in some holes in the country music catalog,” Kienzle said.