Who was/is Beverly Long ? - CDs, Vinyl LPs, DVD and more
Beverly Long
While working at the Frisco Railroad depot in Sapulpa, Oklahoma, in 1928, Gene Autry met a 38-year-old dispatcher, originally from Arkansas, named Jimmy Long. Discovering that they both enjoyed singing, they began performing as a duo at local dances and parties, a partnership they extended into their many joint recordings made between 1931 and 1937. Like Autry, Long admired Jimmie Rodgers and wrote a number of songs in his manner. As well as his studio work with Autry he also recorded on several occasions with his teenaged daughter Beverly Marie, both as a duet and in a trio with her and his niece Ina Mae Spivey, whom Autry would marry in 1932. Beverly could play piano, and probably did so on some of her recordings with her father, but Jimmy accompanied her on guitar at a 1933 session for Gennett (issued on Champion) on which she sang The Soldier's Sweetheart. Beverly Long may thus be the first woman to record a Jimmie Rodgers song. She was certainly one of the youngest to do so, being, at the time of this recording, just seventeen and a half. (Tony Russell)
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