Rick Nelson was born May 8, 1940, in Teaneck New Jersey. He began in radio at the age of 8 playing myself on my family's radio show "The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet" which eventually transitioned to television and became the first and longest running family situation comedy.
he ranked fifth in California among tennis player's 15 years old and younger competed nationally, and at one time had ambitions of going professional.---that was until Rockn'Roll came into his life.
By 1956 a new type of music was taking America by storm and Rick wanted to be a part of it.One night on a date with a girl who swooned over an Elvis Presley song playing on the radio, Rick exclaimed that he too was cutting a record (which he had no plans to do). She laughed at him. so at that point, he was determined to make it happen. He booked some studio time and recorded a cover of Fats Domino's "I'm Walkin." It sold one million copies in a week.
During this time, he began performing songs regularly at the end of the show which gave kids far greater access to Rock n' Roll than they ever would have had, considering its negative mainstream reputation at the time. His band consisted of some top notch players including legendary guitarist James Burton, who later went on to play with Elvis and countless others. His dad Ozzie was pretty innovative and during one episode overlaid Rick's performance of "Travelin' Man" with some footage specially shot on location, making it the first conceptual rock video in history.
Between 1957 and 1961 Rick had 36 Hot One hundred titles, several of them double-sided hits. By 21 I had 9 gold records for the Imperial label, and the song "Travelin' Man," sold over 2 million copies and went to 1. Its flip side "Hello, Mary Lou" also went to 1 in 32 countries and sold in excess of 7 million copies world wide.
Unfortunately, all the success did have a down side which was encapsulated in an article that Life magazine ran coining an original phrase to describe what Rick had become: a "Teenage Idol."---which he hated.
In 1959 Rick took a roll in Howard's Hawks' classic western "Rio Bravo," which co-starred John Wayne and Dean Martin.
During the early 60's the musical climate had changed quite a bit and Rick started branching out; particularly focusing on the genre of country rock. He formed a group called the Stone Canyon Band, which also included some pretty decent musicians, and started writing new material immediately.
In October of 1971, he was reluctantly persuaded to play a Rock n' Roll revival show at Madison Square Garden, on the same bill as Chuck Berry, Bo Diddley and Bobby Rydell, among others. By that time my hair had grown shoulder length, and sang new material. The audience had come expecting their entertainment to be frozen in time, a 50s malt shop, and he wasn't playing along. Anyway, when we got out there, halfway through the set they were booed. "Its a pretty scary thing when 50, 000 people start booing you." Rick got off stage and wrote a song called Garden Party. It became his first million-seller in over a decade and went gold in 1972.
In 1986 he won a Grammy for the album "Interviews from the class of 55 Recording Sessions."
On December 31, 1985, en route from Alabama to a New Year's Eve show in Dallas, Rick Nelson died when his DC-3 crash-landed in a field near DeKalb, Texas.
In the early 1970's, Rick wrote a song called "Gypsy Pilot." This is the final verse: "When they claim my body, they won't have much to say. Except that he lived a good life, he lived every day. And you know he saw the sunshine, and you know he felt the rain. He loved everybody, And he hopes you do the same."
