Frankie Armstrong born 13 February 1941

Frankie Armstrong (born 13 January 1941) is an English singer and voice teacher. She has worked as a singer in the folk scene and the women's movement and as a trainer in social and youth work. Her repertoire ranges from traditional ballads to music-hall and contemporary songs, often focusing on the lives of women. 

She is a key mover of the natural voice movement and is the president of the natural voice network, and has been a voice coach for theatrical groups, including at the National Theatre for 18 years Involved with folk and political songs from the 1950s, she has performed and/or recorded with Blowzabella, the Orckestra (with Henry Cow and the Mike Westbrook Brass Band), Ken Hyder's Talisker, John Kirkpatrick, Brian Pearson, Leon Rosselson, Dave Van Ronk and Maddy Prior. She is blind from glaucoma. 

Frankie with Louis Killen

Armstrong was born in Workington, Cumberland. She moved to Hoddesdon, Hertfordshire, as a young child. She began singing in a group with her brother singing Elvis Presley and Little Richard numbers, and in 1957 joined the Stort Valley Skiffle Group which a few years later changed its name to the Ceilidh Singers as its repertoire moved towards folk music. The group founded the Hoddesdon Folk Club. 

In 1963 she qualified as a social worker for blind people and began working with Louis Killen and performing solo (Louis Killen's advice led to her developing the harder voice quality for which she is noted.). In 1964, at Killen's suggestion she joined The Critics Group directed by Ewan MacColl and Peggy Seeger. In 1965 she sang at the Edinburgh Festival "Poets in Public", with John Betjeman, Stevie Smith and Ted Hughes. 

              Here’s “The Frog and the Mouse” from above LP

                       

Her first recording, in 1965, was at the invitation of Bert Lloyd who as director of Topic Records was putting together an album of erotic songs with Anne Briggs, released as The Bird in the Bush. In 1968 she recorded songs for the radio programme The Blind Set produced by Charles Parker about the treatment of visually impaired people which led to the formation of the Blind Integration Group. 

In 1973 she spent several weeks in the US and met Ethel Raim. She was inspired by Raim's Balkan singing workshops and in the mid-1970s pioneered her own workshops developing her own approach to singing with a natural voice. Her conviction that singing is for everyone has underpinned her approach. She was an initiating member of the NVPN – Natural Voice Practitioners' Network, and "The key figure behind the development of the network...". 

She was a member of the Feminist Improvising Group (FIG), co-founded in 1977 by vocalist Maggie Nicols, bassoonist Lindsay Cooper, keyboardist Cathy Williams, cellist and bassist Georgina Born, and trumpeter Corinne Liensol. Armstrong collaborated within the accomplished FIG after 1978, and also with free jazz pianist (and partly percussion playing) Irène Schweizer, saxophonist (and film maker) Sally Potter, trombonist and violist Annemarie Roelofs, flutist and saxophonist Angèle Veltmeijer, and saxophonist and guitarist Françoise Dupety. 

In 2018, she was awarded a Gold Badge Award from the English Folk Dance and Song Society for outstanding contributions to folk music. She wrote and recorded a song for Stick in the Wheel which is included in their second "From Here: English Folk Field Recordings, Volume 2" recording project and joined Lankum on stage at new year in Bristol singing Old Man from over the Sea. 

Green Ribbons

In 2019, Folk Radio UK announced that Frankie had formed a new band called Green Ribbons with Alasdair Roberts, Jinnwoo and Burd Ellen. In July 2019, the band released their self-titled debut album consisting of purely unaccompanied singing through Matiere Memoir Records. 

In November 2020, Folk Radio UK announced that Frankie is due to release her 12th studio album 'Cats of Coven Lawn' in January 2021 to mark her 80th birthday. The album was produced by Bird in the Belly member Tom Pyor, and the first single 'Life Lived Well' features Laura Ward (Bird in the Belly, Hickory Signals). 

Her last live concert was during September 2025 although she was still presenting her Natural Voice Leaders Training workshops at the end of the year. 

(Edited from Wikipedia and Frankie Armstrong’s web page)

 

Trummy Young born 12 February 1912

James "Trummy" Young (January 12, 1912 – September 10, 1984) was an American trombonist in the swing era. 

Young was born in Savannah, Georgia, growing up in Richmond, Virginia, and Washington D.C. (He started off as a child playing trumpet and drums but, by the time he started working as a professional in 1928, he was a trombonist. His early gigs including working with Booker Coleman’s Hot Chocolates, the Hardy Brothers, Elmer Calloway, and Tommy Myles. While with Myles, he acquired the lifelong nickname of Trummy. 

From 1933 to 1937, he was a member of Earl Hines' orchestra; he then joined Jimmie Lunceford's orchestra in which he played from 1937 to 1943, scoring a hit on Decca Records with "Margie", which featured his vocal. With Sy Oliver he co-wrote "'Tain't What You Do (It's the Way That You Do It)", a hit for both Lunceford and Ella Fitzgerald in 1939. His other compositions include "Easy Does It" (1939; co-written with Oliver) and "Trav'lin' Light" (1942; co-written with Jimmy Mundy, with lyrics by Johnny Mercer). 

                                   

Bebop caused no difficulty for Young even though he did not alter his style much through the years. On Jan. 9, 1945, Young appeared with Gillespie on the original version of “Salt Peanuts,” plus “Be-Bop,” a modernistic transformation of “I Can’t Get Started,” and Tadd Dameron’s “Good Bait,” sounding quite at home. That year Young really displayed his versatility. He was part of Boyd Raeburn’s orchestra on “A Night In Tunisia,” was a member of the Benny Goodman big band (including soloing on “Gotta Be This Or That”), recorded with ensembles led by Georgie Auld, Johnny Bothwell, and Al Killian, was on V-Disc dates that teamed him with Roy Eldridge, and led his own swing session. 

1946 found him recording with Benny Carter’s big band, clarinetist Tony Scott, Buck Clayton, Illinois Jacquet, Tiny Grimes, a reunion session with Jimmie Lunceford (including a remake of “Margie”), Billy Kyle, and two sessions of his own. In addition, Young toured with Norman Granz’s Jazz At The Philharmonic, working alongside Billie Holiday, Lester Young, Buck Clayton, Coleman Hawkins, and Buddy Rich. 

Clearly Trummy Young was in great demand during this era. In 1947 he toured again with JATP and was on some Los Angeles jam session records. But after a record date with Gerald Wilson’s big band, he was off records altogether for five years. Young’s disappearance was because he had gotten married, his wife was from Hawaii, and he moved there. The trombonist freelanced and soon had his own band, playing swing and Dixieland while enjoying the climate and environment. But then his life changed again in 1952 when he was offered an opportunity to join the Louis Armstrong All-Stars, and stayed for twelve years. He performed with Armstrong for the ninth Cavalcade of Jazz concert held at Wrigley Field in Los Angeles. 

During his years with the All-Stars, Young performed in the musical film, High Society (1956). He appeared in the Universal-International biopic, The Glenn Miller Story (1954) and constantly traveled the world. He was part of nearly all of Louis Armstrong’s triumphs during that long period including the W.C. Handy and Fats Waller tribute albums, performing “St. Louis Blues” with the New York Philharmonic, all of the “Ambassador Satch” world tours, Armstrong’s “Musical Biography” recordings, the Timex All Star Jazz television specials, the album that had Duke Ellington with the All-Stars, Dave Brubeck’s musical The Real Ambassadors, and the original versions of both “Mack The Knife” and “Hello Dolly.” 

Trummy Young was not heard outside of the Louis Armstrong All-Stars very often but there were a few exceptions. He was a major part of the famous Buck Clayton Jam Session records of Mar. 31, and Aug. 13, 1954, playing a roaring solo on “How Hi The Fi” that stole the show. He was on a posthumous Jimmie Lunceford tribute project led by Billy May in 1957, an album by the Lawson-Haggart Band (Boppin’ At The Hop), and played with Teddy Buckner at the 1958 Dixieland Jubilee in Los Angeles. But mostly he was associated with Armstrong. 

Shortly after “Hello Dolly” caught on, the 52-year old trombonist decided to finally quit the road and settle back in Hawaii. Louis Armstrong was very sorry to see him go. During his final 20 years, Young worked with a variety of bands in Hawaii, sometimes led his own groups, and occasionally went on European tours (including with Chris Barber in 1978) and returned to the mainland for special appearances and jazz parties. 

Sally & Trummy Young, Lillian Taylor, Sep.1984

Trummy Young remained active up until the very end. He was featured next to Billy Butterfield, Kenny Davern, and Eddie Miller at the Peninsula Jazz Party in July 1984. Two months later, on Sept. 12, he died suddenly from a cerebral hemorrhage in San Jose, California, at the age of 72. Beloved by all, the always-smiling Trummy Young had succeeded in carving out his own place in jazz history.

(Edited from The Sycopated Times & Wikipedia)

Scott English born 10 January 1937

Sheldon David "Scott" English (January 10, 1937 – November 16, 2018) was an American songwriter, arranger and record producer. He is best known as the co-writer of "Brandy" which he wrote with Richard Kerr. The song became a No. 1 hit for Barry Manilow in 1974, with the title changed to "Mandy". English had also released a single of "Brandy" which reached No. 12 on the UK Singles Chart in November 1971, and entered the US charts in March 1972. 

English was born in Brooklyn, New York City. In 1960, he released his first single, "4,000 Miles Away", on Dot Records. In 1964, English had a regional doo-wop hit called "High on a Hill", written by Frank Cariola and A. Mangravito. "High on a Hill" has consistently been voted an all-time top song on oldies radio stations in the Pittsburgh metropolitan area. It also reached No. 3 in popularity on the San Francisco Bay Area radio charts, and peaked at #4 in Los Angeles (source: KRLA Top 30 Survey, Feb.-Mar. 1964). 

                                       

With Larry Weiss, he wrote "Bend Me, Shape Me", which became a hit for the Chicago-based band the American Breed, reaching No. 5 on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100 chart in 1968 and also becoming a hit in the UK for Amen Corner. The song had been recorded a year earlier by the Outsiders as an album track on In (1967). 

English and Weiss, whom he met through arranger Claus Ogerman, became good friends. Together, they penned "Help Me Girl" (1966), which was a hit for two acts in late 1966: Eric Burdon (solo for Decca, a UK No. 14 hit) and the Outsiders. They also penned Lynne Randell's "Ciao Baby" (1967) and Jeff Beck's hit "Hi Ho Silver Lining", originally recorded by English group the Attack in early 1967. 

English produced the song "West Virginia" by the Elves in 1969 (a band later known as Elf) which featured Ronnie James Dio on bass and vocals. He later produced Thin Lizzy's eponymous debut album Thin Lizzy (1971). He co-wrote the song "Words Don't Mean a Thing" with Lynsey de Paul, who released her version of the song on her album Just a Little Time. The song was also featured on the 2008 album Songs from the British Academy, Vol. 1. A Spanish version was released by Cadafal on their album En La Carretera. 

In 1998, English was credited as a co-writer with Simon Stirling and Phil Mankiza on the UK entry in the Eurovision Song Contest, "Where Are You?", performed by Imaani. In 2014, English appeared on BBC Radio London's Jo Good Show, debuting new song "Holla" which he wrote for WestWay Beats. 

English died in England on November 16, 2018, at the age of 81, from liver disease. 

(Edited from Wikipedia & IMDb)

 

Frank Hovington born 9 January 1919

Franklin Hovington (January 9, 1919 – June 21, 1982), also known as Guitar Frank, was an American blues musician. He played the guitar and banjo and sang in the Piedmont blues style. He lived in the vicinity of Frederica, Delaware. 

Hovington was born in Reading, Pennsylvania to a working class family in an industrial area although he spent much of his childhood in the Frederica area of Delaware, where his family owned a farm. Little is known about his parents or any siblings, though the family faced the economic hardships common to many in the post-World War I era, including limited opportunities for African American residents. 

Music was present in his family background, with his grandfather belonging to a fife and drum corps and his paternal uncle playing piano and organ, providing early exposure to musical traditions within the household. Hovington's childhood in Delaware's African American community, including attendance at local house parties with his father, shaped his worldview amid the social conditions of the time. Hovington's introduction to music occurred during his childhood, shaped by the oral storytelling traditions in his family. His father played a significant role in fostering this interest, passing down stories and songs that would later influence Hovington's repertoire. 

At around age seven, Hovington received his first instrument, a ukulele, marking the beginning of his musical exploration. Inspired by the sound of a local banjo player named William Walter Stanley. Hovington persistently asked his father for one until he acquired a banjo. He was also influenced early on by neighbor Adam Greenfield, a former Pullman porter and guitarist, whom he watched play at age five or six during Saturday night gatherings. This progression from ukulele to banjo highlighted his early fascination with stringed instruments and self-directed learning through observation of community musicians. 

                                  

By early adulthood, Hovington had expanded to the guitar, adapting his banjo-picking technique—known as the "banjo roll"—to the new instrument. He absorbed songs informally from traveling migrants and elders in his community, including tales like that of Railroad Bill, which he encountered through locals such as Steamboat Charlie. These formative experiences in family and neighborhood settings, without formal training, laid the groundwork for his distinctive Piedmont blues style, rooted in the folk and blues traditions of his surroundings. 

In the late 1930s and 1940s, Frank Hovington partnered with fellow musician William Walker to perform blues and related music at house parties and local dances in the Frederica area of Delaware. These informal venues provided key opportunities for Hovington to develop his Piedmont blues style amid the vibrant but undocumented regional scene.

Following his move to Washington, D.C., in the late 1940s, Hovington contributed guitar work to several ensembles, including backing Stewart Dixon's Golden Stars and Ernest Ewin's Jubilee Four, as well as collaborating with Billy Stewart's early band. This era, spanning the post-World War II years through the 1960s, saw Hovington maintain a low-profile presence in music circles, with performances largely confined to local and supporting roles before his relocation to Delaware in 1967. 

In the years that followed Hovington participated in the 1972 Festival of American Folklife, performing blues on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., and was interviewed in December 1971 as part of related fieldwork. He was rediscovered in the mid-1970s during the folk-blues revival, when musicologists Bruce Bastin and Dick Spottswood sought out traditional Piedmont blues performers in the Delaware region. Their fieldwork led to intimate recording sessions at Hovington's home near Felton, in Frederica, Delaware, capturing his raw, expressive style unadorned by studio production. 

The album “Lonesome Road Blues” was released on Flyright Records in the UK in 1975 and on Rounder Records in the US. His LP was a masterpiece, and alerted many in the blues community to his abilities. Hovington disliked travel and did not play away from his Delaware home, afraid that he would lose his welfare support payments, and so did not get the publicity from music festival appearances alone that his talent deserved. In his final years, Frank Hovington resided near Frederica, Delaware, where he had lived for much of his adult life, and he performed infrequently, occasionally playing guitar for church programs in the local community and working sporadically as a truck and bus driver while supporting his family on a small plot of land he owned. 

He died from heart failure at Milford Memorial Hospital in Milford, Delaware in June 1982, at the age of 63 and was buried at Gibbs Memorial Gardens, Woodside, Delaware

(Edited from Grokipedia, AllMusic & Wirz’s American Music)

Marcy Lutes born 8 January 1927

Marcy Lutes ( born January 8, 1927) is a former big band and jazz singer, and radio and television personality, active mainly from the mid 1940s until the late 1950s.

Marcy and her brothers

Marcella 'Marcy' Love Lutes was born in the town of Edinburg, Indiana, to John Ralph Lutes, an insurance salesman, and Verna Essa Jones, a homemaker. She had three brothers, all of whom have predeceased her, Lyman Curtis, Wendell Ralph, and Marvin Lee Lutes. 

She is a former American big band and jazz singer, and radio and television personality, who began her career in 1945 as a singer and radio host of W.A.K.E. radio at Wakeman Hospital in the U.S. Army's Camp Atterbury in Indiana. She got her first big break in 1947 when she joined Ray McKinley and his orchestra. 

                                    

They achieved their first commercially successful recording together with, "A Man Could Be A Wonderful Thing," in December of that year. She would continue to tour with McKinley's orchestra on and off throughout her brief career, when she wasn't attached to another orchestra or project. 

She left Ray McKinley's orchestra in 1949 to pursue a television career alongside Artie Malvin, the two going on to produce a show for New York City's Mutual Broadcasting System, which broadcast its first episode in October of 1949. However, her television opportunities vanished by the mid 1950s, and so, she once again began to tour as 'Vocal Stylist' with the likes of Benny Goodman, Tommy Dorsey, Tex Beneke, and later smaller groups such as the Jack Keller Trio and Herbie Fields and his Sextet. 

In early 1952, her father died of a heart attack while on a train just outside of Jacksonville, Florida. The tragic year was tempered, however, by her marriage to Joseph Barrett 'Barry' Galbraith on July 23rd of that year in Greenwich, Fairfield, Connecticut, and the couple settled into their new home in New York state. Barry Galbraith was a freelance, session guitarist with bands and for radio and television shows, and at the time of his marriage to Marcy Lutes was working with the Perry Como Show's band. Unfortunately, the marriage didn't last long and the couple divorced in 1955. 

Marcy Lutes brought out only one solo album in her lifetime entitled, "Debut," which 'debuted' in 1956 on Decca Records. The album was arranged by Gil and Marion Evans (no relation to each other), and the twelve-track project was overseen by Ralph Burns. It received lukewarm response in the newspapers, and a search online now, will still offer mixed reviews about her vocal abilities. By late 1956, Lutes was again touring with Ray McKinley and his orchestra. One of Lutes' last advertised performances was at the Commodore Club in Windsor, Ontario, Canada, in February of 1960, as mentioned in "The Windsor Star," on the 29th of February. 

She would marry one last time, in November of 1961, to Lloyd Carville Nickerson, an executive with General Electric's Corporate Communications Division, a widower with two children. Nickerson would be put in charge of General Electric's pavilion at the 1964 New York World's Fair, collaborating with Walt Disney in designing an 'animatronic' theatre telling the history of electricity. This marriage too, would end in divorce in late 1964. 

Marcy Lutes was one of the brightest and most promising new voices of the late 1940s and early 1950s, sought after by band leaders, and radio and television shows alike. However, by the early 1960s her star was fading quickly as evidenced by her lack of appearances on television and radio programs, and her name being visibly absent from the newspapers. 

It is unknown why her career made such a sharp fall, but contrary to what some current music critics believe, she is still alive and living quietly in New York City (A.T.O.W. - April 2024). 

( IMDb mini biography by: Hans Victor von Maltzahn)

Danny Williams born 7 January 1938

Danny Williams (7 January 1942 – 6 December 2005) was a South African-born British pop singer who earned the nickname "Britain's Johnny Mathis", for his smooth and stylish way with a ballad. He is best known for his 1961 UK number one version of "Moon River" and his 1964 U.S. top ten hit, "White on White". 

Born in Port Elizabeth, Eastern Cape, South Africa, he sang his first solo with a church choir at the age of six. His father, a professional soldier, died in the Korean war, and Williams was brought up by his grandmother. At 14, he won a talent contest and joined a touring show called Golden City Dixies that played throughout South Africa. Its members included jazz saxophonist Harold Jephtah and, in later years, the singer-songwriter Jonathan Butler. 

The musical King Kong and the Golden City Dixies were among several black South African shows to come to Europe; and, in London in 1959, Williams impressed Norman Newell, the recording manager of EMI's HMV label. Newell was a composer and arranger of the Tin Pan Alley old school, and was unhappy at being the British executive responsible for issuing Elvis Presley's early hits. In Williams' good looks and mellifluous high tenor, he saw the makings of a new Johnny Mathis, and signed him to a recording contract. The first single was Tall a Tree, but it was not until 1961 and his fifth record, We will Never Be as Young as this Again, that Williams achieved a minor hit. 

                                   

That was also the year of the Blake Edwards film Breakfast at Tiffany's, starring Audrey Hepburn. The film's catchy theme tune, Moon River, composed by Henry Mancini with lyrics by Johnny Mercer, won an oscar. The American hit record of Moon River was by another tenor, the soul singer Jerry Butler, and, at first, Williams was unwilling to record the song - mainly, he later explained, because he did not understand the lyric reference to "my huckleberry friend". 

After seeing the film, however, he relented, and his Moon River outsold the instrumental version by Mancini himself and replaced Frankie Vaughan's Tower of Strength at No 1 in the charts at the end of December. Williams was fond of telling the story that his boyhood hero Nat "King" Cole had declined to record the song because he regarded Danny's version as unsurpassable. The following year brought some Top 20 hits for Williams: Jeannie (based on a Russ Conway instrumental), the Wonderful World of the Young .(by Sid Tepper and Roy Bennett, composers of several Cliff Richard hits) and Tears.

These led to his appearance in the film Play It Cool (1962), directed by Michael Winner and starring Billy Fury as pop singer Billy Universe. Then, in February 1963, he joined a 20-city package tour headed by a new star, Helen Shapiro. Also on the bill was a guitar group, the Beatles. By the end of the tour, Please Please Me was No 1 and the beat group era was born. Also in 1963 Williams appeared in the Tommy Steele film It's All Happening. 

It was an uncongenial era for ballad singers, and Williams had no more British hits, although White on White reached the US Top 10 in 1964. He continued to record for HMV until 1967 and worked steadily in nightclubs. In 1968, he had a nervous breakdown followed, two years later, by bankruptcy, a consequence of a profligate lifestyle that centred for several years on the Playboy Club in Park Lane. 

Williams resumed his singing career in the early 1970s but did not come to national attention again until 1977, when his record Dancin' Easy, based on a jingle from a well-known Martini commercial, reached the Top 30. After the collapse of apartheid in 1990, Williams returned to South Africa on several occasions, but continued to live in Britain.  In the early 1990s, he recorded for the Prestige label and, in 1994, starred in a Nat "King" Cole tribute show. Scripted and narrated by Elliot Brooks, this was taken by Williams on several more British tours, the last being in 2004. 

He died in December 2005 of lung cancer, at the age of 63 in London after a short hospitalization. Williams was married three times, and is survived by his two daughters (Natali and Melody Williams) and two sons, the actor Anthony Barclay and Michael Stewart.

(Edited from Dave Laing obit @ The Guardian  & Wikipedia) 

 

Bob King born 6 January 1934

Bob King (January 6, 1934 - January 20, 1989) was a country singer, guitarist and songwriter, who was one of Canada's first country stars to earn recognition beyond national borders. 

Robert George King was born in Ottawa, Canada on January 6, 1934. His mother, Katie Brown King emigrated from the United Kingdom to Canada during the First World War. Bob's father, a native Canadian named Roy King, abandoned his wife and son and moved to the U.S. when Bob was only three years old. Bob's mother soon remarried and they moved to a farm in the Joyceville area, outside Kingston, Ontario where Bob spent most of his childhood years. The family later moved north to nearby Ottawa after a fire destroyed their home. 

He got his first guitar from his mother when he was seven years old and quickly developed a love of country music, most notably the work of Hank Williams. His other idols included Canadian country stars Hank Snow and Wilf Carter (aka Montana Slim). With the support of his stepfather, Bob mastered the guitar during his teenage years and formed a trio with two friends—soon dubbed the “Country Cousins.” The group quickly made a name for themselves by winning a series of amateur contests throughout the Ottawa Valley. At just 16, King decided to pursue a full-time career in country music. His solo talent quickly shone through, and in one memorable competition, he bested a young Paul Anka for first place. 

                                   

Ottawa DJ “Long John” Corrigan helped arrange Bob's first big break—a guest spot with Mac Beattie and the legendary Ottawa Valley Melodiers. Then, in 1954, King released his debut single “Laurel Lee,” which sold over 40,000 copies—an extraordinary feat for a Canadian country artist at the time. 

The single’s success caught the attention of American country stars Wilma Lee and Stoney Cooper, who invited him to join their Clinch Mountain Clan. Bob became a featured performer on their daily West Virginia radio broadcasts, where he also toured with artists like Doc Williams and Hawkshaw Hawkins. A highlight of this period was sharing the stage with Elvis Presley during a show in Norfolk, Virginia. 

Upon returning to Canada, Bob toured briefly with Canadian country pioneer Wilf Carter before settling back in Ottawa. At the invitation of Ken Reynolds, he became a founding member of the CFRA Happy Wanderers, alongside “Papa” Joe Brown and virtuoso fiddler Ward Allen. From 1957 to 1965, the Happy Wanderers became a fixture of Ottawa radio and television, performing on thousands of live radio shows and 59 nationally broadcast television episodes. Bob’s warmth and charisma earned him the affectionate nickname “Mr. Sunshine.” 

Bob and Marie

Bob King’s recording career blossomed in the 1960s and 1970s. Moving from RCA Victor to Rodeo Records, he released over 40 singles and 13 full-length albums. His 1965 single “Texas Leather and Mexican Lace” reached No. 1 on the Canadian charts and remains one of his best-known recordings. Germany’s Bear Family Records later recognized King’s importance with a series of retrospective compilations, including Rockin' the Jukebox (2013), which celebrated his contributions to early Canadian rockabilly and country music. 

Beyond his own career, Bob King was instrumental in launching and nurturing the musical career of his wife, Marie King (née Farley). As her manager and producer, he oversaw the recording and promotion of her breakout single “The French Song,” which sold over 50,000 copies. He produced Marie’s first ten albums, including the gold-certified Allo Mon P’tit Bobby, and was central to the development of her career in both English and French-language markets. 

Bob also encouraged the musical paths of his children, supporting them in their creative endeavors. In the later years of his career, he toured extensively as road manager and featured singer with the Marie King Road Show, bringing country music to communities across Canada. . He was inducted into the Ottawa Valley Country Music Hall of Fame in 1984, in recognition of a lifetime of contributions to the country music landscape. 

Bob King passed away on January 20, 1989, in Ottawa, following a short battle with lung cancer A gifted performer, compassionate mentor, and true pioneer of Canadian country, Bob King’s legacy endures in the music he left behind and in the generations of artists he inspired. 

(Edited from Citizen Freak & Bear Family notes)