Hank Locklin

Born Lawrence Hankins Locklin on February 15, 1918, in the modest community of McLellan amid the lumbering region of Florida’s Panhandle, Hank Locklin stood among country music’s finest tenors. The youngest of four siblings, he attended a single-room schoolhouse while already displaying musical aptitude in childhood. An accident at age eight left him sidelined for an extended period, during which he first turned to music. Though drawn to the guitar from an early age, he achieved genuine command of the instrument only in his mid-teens. Active in music throughout high school, which he never completed, Locklin captured first prize in a talent contest at eighteen. He soon appeared on local radio, his growing desire to perform leading him into regular entertainment work. By the middle of the 1940s he was broadcasting and appearing live across Florida and adjacent states. Over the following decade he balanced assorted jobs, both musical and otherwise, performed with several ensembles, and steadily advanced through repeated setbacks toward wider country recognition, a period chronicled in detail in Otto Kitsinger’s liner notes for the Bear Family box set.

Because of the lingering effects of his childhood leg injury, Locklin received an exemption from wartime service. During World War II he played guitar in bands around Mobile, Alabama, and began singing and composing his own material. Initially shaped by Ernest Tubb’s phrasing, he gradually forged a personal vocal approach. Late in the conflict he joined Jimmy Swan’s dance band on guitar, an outfit that occasionally featured Hank Williams, and spent much of 1945 and 1946 performing throughout the Southeast from Florida into Alabama.

Locklin’s connection with the Four Leaf Clover Boys directly prompted the creation of his own first ensemble. Following their dissolution he established the Rocky Mountain Playboys in 1947. The original roster—Locklin handling vocals and guitar, Clint Holmes on rhythm guitar, “Tiny” Smith on bass, Felton Pruett on steel guitar, and Douglas “Dobber” Johnson on fiddle—secured his initial opportunity. Enjoying strong radio popularity, the group received sponsorship from prosperous businessman and songwriter Elmer Laird, who intended to launch a label centered on Locklin and his own compositions. Laird’s death in a stabbing the night before the first recording session ended that plan.

The musicians continued regardless, cutting sides for Gold Star and later Royalty without notable impact; the band eventually disbanded, after which Holmes and Pruett joined Hank Williams. Locklin settled in Houston and signed with Four Star, scoring his first significant regional successes with “The Same Sweet Girl” and “Send Me the Pillow That You Dream On.” At that stage his style reflected Texas dance-band traditions, still lacking the polished, romantic finish that later characterized his RCA work. National prominence arrived in 1953 with the number-one country hit “Let Me Be the One,” though sustained progress remained uneven owing to a restrictive contract that required him to record for Decca while remaining tied to Four Star and its catalog. The situation finally shifted in 1955.

His trajectory accelerated upon joining RCA Victor that spring. Nearly all of the resulting recordings benefited from Chet Atkins’s production, with Atkins frequently contributing rhythm or lead guitar and Floyd Cramer supplying piano fills and trills. The spare settings highlighted Locklin’s clear tenor to striking effect. While “Send Me the Pillow That You Dream On,” written by Locklin himself, “Geisha Girl,” and “Please Help Me I’m Falling” became widely known, dedicated listeners often favored the direct emotional simplicity of pieces such as “Who Am I to Cast the First Stone,” “A Good Woman’s Love,” “Seven or Eleven,” “I’m Tired of Bummin’ Around,” “Golden Wristwatch,” and “Sitting Alone at a Table for Two.” These early recordings, issued first as singles and later on RCA’s budget Camden imprint, later appeared in the Bear Family collection Please Help Me I’m Falling. Locklin remained with RCA until the mid-1970s.

He helped introduce the concept-album format to country music, exemplified by Foreign Love and Irish Songs, Country Style, and he also released A Tribute to Roy Acuff, King of Country Music. His interpretations of Irish material remain especially authoritative. Although vocal choruses gradually appeared more prominently on later albums than some traditionalists preferred, his crystalline tenor stayed constant. In 1968 he returned to the Top Ten with “The Country Hall of Fame.” Throughout the 1970s he toured extensively overseas, enjoying particular favor in Ireland and Great Britain, and at least once traveled to Japan with Chet Atkins. After departing RCA he recorded for MGM and Plantation; his sixty-fifth and final album, The Grace of God: The Gospel Album, appeared in 2006. Locklin spent his retirement in Brewton, Alabama, roughly twenty miles from his birthplace, and passed away there on March 8, 2009.