Customer Reviews

Cowboy Fiddler in Bob Wills' Band

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Heart-warming memoir by an old-style Texas Fiddler and Cowboy. The reader can count on some candid remembrances of life on the road with Bob Wills. Excellent book; but if you're Old School Texas, as this South Texan reviewer is, be prepared to sigh every time you turn a page. They just don't make'em like Mr.McWhorter anymore, and we are all the poorer for it...

This book is written about a man who not only talks the talk, he walks the walk as well! A well written little book about a living, breathing, piece of our modern music history, a fiddler in Bob Wills' band. WOW!

As a young man, McWhorter broke horses for a living and dreamed of playing fiddle for Bob Wills. Later on he played fiddle for Wills and dreamed of going back to the ranch ridin' broncs! Sometimes it's a little hard to tell which was the wilder life, busting broncs, or being out on the road riding with Wills! For any young dreamer who ever had visions of the bright lights and everything that goes with it, this book is an absolute must!

Writing biography is hard work, says the author of this book, John Erickson, who's written fine books about his own cowboying and ranching experiences, as well as a series of hilarious children's books "Hank the Cowdog." In this book, he lets his subject Frankie McWhorter talk in his own voice, and what we get is a transcription of more or less free-association anecdotes from the Texas cowboy fiddler who once played in Bob Wills' famous western swing band.

The result is rough around the edges and freewheeling in a kind of one-darn-thing-after-another way. And it captures maybe as well as you can in the printed word the cowboy culture of Panhandle Texas - its values, preoccupations, and down-to-earth points of view. What you miss, of course, are the visual and oral dimensions of this kind of storytelling. And because McWhorter was a fiddler who counted himself among Bob Wills' most trusted band members, you also yearn to hear the music that he's talking about.

Laboring a bit under these disadvantages, the book is a worthy introduction to a colorful and talented cowboy who has never lost his roots in the soil of Hall County, Texas. There are 35+ great black and white photos of McWhorter as both fiddler and cowboy. But to get to know the full dimension of the man, the best thing is to go directly to the music section of amazon and order yourself a McWhorter CD.

Meanwhile, readers hoping to know more about the career of Bob Wills will find that McWhorter came along after the peak of Wills' success. The big band leader is beginning to age here, and not gracefully, relying over much on the bottle to get him through the days on the road. There are, however, some entertaining and informative Wills stories, including examples of the firm hand he took with band members and an explanation of how the classic "San Antonio Rose" began as a "mistake" and then, thanks to Irving Berlin, needed to be rechristened "New San Antonio Rose."