Byrd was pickin', grinnin'-Senator recalls ‘HeeHaw' stint

yikes-some things should be kept in the vaults

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While he was appropriatin',
Byrd was pickin', grinnin'
Senator recalls ‘Hee Haw' stint
as episodes released

Karin Fischer
Daily Mail Washington bureau

Thursday May 20, 2004


WASHINGTON -- Sen. Robert Byrd built his reputation in Washington on legislating and orating, but on "Hee Haw," he proved that he was more than adept at "pickin' and grinnin'."

The West Virginia Democrat, who was then the highest ranking Senate leader, appeared on the country music variety show twice in the fall of 1979.

Time Life this week is releasing several full episodes of the show on videotape and DVD, the first time the folksy music and comedy performances will be available for the home market.

"Hee Haw" first aired on CBS in June 1969, a summer replacement for the "Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour." It caught on so well it made the regular schedule beginning the following December.

The weekly show, with its trademark hee-hawing donkey, became a television institution and was on the air until 1997. It's one of the longest running programs in television history.

The phrase "pickin' and grinnin' " describes hosts Roy Clark and Buck Owens' brand of guitar playing and joke telling.

Celebrities signed up to perform and crack corny jokes with the show's regulars, who included Minnie Pearl and Grandpa Jones. Country music stars like Garth Brooks and Willie Nelson appeared, as did personalities like Regis Philbin.

"I will be coming to you direct from Cornfield County, and I tell you, there are some real birds down there," Byrd said in a promo for the show, typical of its down-home humor.

more:
http://www.dailymail.com/news/News/2004052030/

:)

OK. Color me embarrassed.

...I forgot who the other musicians where on it, but I do recall that album, from around the time he was on the show.

The 70s where just an odd decade.

The Honorable senior Senator from the state of West Virginia, Robert C. Byrd, had a second career as a fiddler. Byrd, born in 1917, had played in various square dance bands from his teens, and once he entered politics, he used his fiddling skills to attract attention and win votes. The man once known as "Fiddlin' Bob Byrd" was elected to the U.S. Congress in 1952 and the Senate in 1958, but he never lost his interest in making music.
In 1978, when Byrd was Majority Leader in the Senate, he found time to record an album called U.S. Senator Robert Byrd: Mountain Fiddler (County, 1978). Byrd was accompanied by Country Gentlemen Doyle Lawson, James Bailey, and Spider Gilliam. Most of the LP consists of old-timey mountain music. Coincidentally, Byrd covers "Don't Let Your Sweet Love Die," a Zeke Manners song that later appeared on Chris Hillman's Morning Sky (Sugar Hill, 1982). Byrd and friends also perform "Will the Circle Be Unbroken," a song to which Hillman and Roger McGuinn contribute backing vocals on Nitty Gritty Dirt Band's Will the Circle Be Unbroken, Vol. Two (Universal/MCA, 1989).

Hes pretty good.