Honky Tonk Angel (20 page)

Then it was back to Fayetteville to get to Springfield, Missouri, where on the twenty-second Patsy was Red Foley’s guest star on the Ozark Jubilee, which was telecast the next night on ABC.

In early May, “Winchester’s singing gal” returned home for the Apple Blossom Festival Parade. Arriving two days before the event, Patsy met with Lion’s Club officers to have a convertible assigned. When she was told she was too late, that all the spots in the parade were filled, she grew fuming mad.

That night she ran into thirty-nine-year-old Charlie Armel (cousin to band-leader Bud Armel of the Kountry Krackers), a friend who worked as a salesman at Winchester’s Kern Motors on South Loudoun. Armel was also, according to a musician, a “half-assed” guitarist, and sometime flagman at the speedway. Henry Kern, who owned the Edsel/Studebaker dealership with his brother Richard, said, “Charlie was someone who liked to help everyone, and he adored Patsy.”

The next morning, Armel came into Kern’s office, all excited. “Mr. Kern, we gotta help Patsy. She’s in a jam. Those Lion’s Club guys won’t let her have a slot in the parade. Would you loan me the black Edsel convertible?”

Kern, like other Winchester car dealers, furnished parade cars to the Lion’s Club, and there was one that hadn’t been spoken for.

“I’ll drive it,” said Armel, “and take good care. I’ll be fully responsible.”

“Why do you want to do this, Charlie?” asked Kern.

“Well, you know how it is with Patsy. She’s always struggling and this goddamn town’s never given her her due. I think we oughta make ’ stand up and take notice.”

Armel decorated the car himself and made a big sign: “Winchester’s Own Home-Grown Star, Miss Patsy Cline—TV & Decca Records Star.” With whatever clout he had, he drove the car to the start of the parade route on Saturday afternoon and somehow snuck into the lineup and, reported Kern, “took off as big as you please.”

All along the route, Patsy received more recognition and applause than the celebrity grand marshal. The Lion’s Club wasn’t pleased and swore this would be Patsy’s last parade appearance.

The following weekend in Nashville at the Opry, Jean Shepard again saw Patsy, now past her fifth month, as she rushed into the backstage ladies’ room waving a corset

“Jeanie, give me a hand!”

“Patsy, you’re not gonna put that on,” Jean said. “You can’t in your condition!”

“Yes, I can. I need you to help me.”

“I’m sorry, Patsy. I just can’t. You’ll kill that baby.”

“I don’t give a goddamn!”

Patsy slammed the corset on the basin counter. “I can’t go out there and sing looking like this. Jeanie, I look awful!”

“No, Patsy. You don’t know what you’re doing.”

Patsy opened the door and yelled, “Get in here, Essie!”

The beloved black woman who was a veteran backstage helper to the women performers said, “What you want, Miss Patsy?”

She handed Essie the corset. “Here. Make it as tight as you can.”

“Oh, no, Miss Patsy. I can’t do that!”

“Goddamn it, Essie. Do as I tell you!”

“Yes, ma‘am. Yes, ma’am. But—”

“No buts, just do it!”

Jean looked on in disbelief. “Patsy, you’re out of your mind.”

“I know what I’m doing,” she replied. “I don’t do anything halfway. Halfway is half-assed, and that ain’t for me.”

Late that spring, at the Gaithersburg, Maryland, Agricultural Exposition, where Patsy was headlining the show, Roy Deyton saw her and met Charlie for the first time. He didn’t like what he saw.

“Charlie, you remember Roy from Bill’s band,” Patsy said.

“I don’t want to hear about Bill Peer.”

“Patsy, maybe we oughta sit down and get a bite to eat,” Roy advised.

Charlie, leaning on Patsy, stumbled to a table off the dance floor in the covered hall. Patsy and Roy ordered food. Charlie had another drink.

“Charlie, it’s almost showtime. Why don’t you stay here while I go—”

“I don’t want you to go up on that stage!”

“But, honey, we’re here and I’ve gotta or I don’t get paid.”

“Don’t worry about that, goddamnit! I can support you. I don’t want you in this business. You ought to be home like other wives.”

“Charlie, calm down. You’re embarrassing me.” As she stood to leave, he grabbed her.

“I told you I don’t want you to sing! Didn’t you hear me?”

“Yeah, I heard you. Everybody heard you. Even the goddamn cows heard you. But I’m going!”

Charlie shot up. Patsy pulled away from him.

“I’m your husband, and you’ll do what I say!”

“Charlie, you must be confusing me with someone who gives a good goddamn about what you say!”

He picked up his drink and poured it over her.

“I hope to hell you don’t think that’s gonna stop me! Like I told you, I’m singing!”

Patsy changed and went onstage. Charlie, mumbling, excused himself and headed for the rest room. Deyton saw him stagger off, but into the ladies’ room, where loud squeals erupted.

Jean Shepard sighed with relief when she heard that on August 25, Patsy delivered her “bundle of joy.” She had gone from Fayetteville to Winchester, to her mother’s
house. When Patsy went into labor, Charlie was able to get emergency leave and sped home to be by her side.

Patsy became the epitome of a doting mother. “Her entire life seemed transformed,” Mrs. Hensley said. “Everything centered around Julie. She loved all the things associated with motherhood, feeding the baby, singing to her, changing her diapers. Even I was surprised.”

Patsy wrote Brenda Lee:

A week later, Charlie returned to Fort Bragg, but when Patsy decided to remain with Julie at her mother’s, he gave up the house on Pool Drive and moved on base.

It didn’t take long for the constant drone of “changing diapers and powdering the baby’s behind” to get to Patsy. “Sitting around the house playing the wife and mother is starting to drive me crazy. I’ve gotta get out. I’ve gotta sing.” Charlie had hoped the baby would get show business out of Patsy’s blood. Though he admitted he wasn’t taking home a terrific salary on a soldier’s pay, he thought of himself as the breadwinner and it hurt him to see Patsy having to work. But, as Patsy saw it, they were broke. Even if her recording career had hit a dead end, touring and the occasional one-nighters would bring her the type of big money Charlie could never earn.

Owen Bradley, who became head of country A&R for Decca in 1958 when Paul Cohen began devoting all his time to developing the company’s Coral label, never lost faith in Patsy’s potential. He wanted to sign her to Decca, but the idea was quickly shot down by Sidney Goldberg, vice-president of sales, who pointed out the disastrous downhill trend after the high of “Walkin’ After Midnight.” After one big record, Patsy showed no staying power and hadn’t identified with the public.

As evidence of the quandary Decca executives were in regarding what Patsy Cline product to put out and how to promote it, they released “Dear God” and “He Will Do for You,” two quasi-spirituals recorded December 15, 1956. Maybe it was in the spirit of Christmas. Great thought must have preceded the selection of singles, but more than a few mystifying decisions were made. With blunders such as this, it’s amazing Patsy Cline had any career at all.

Bradley felt Decca was as boxed in as Patsy. On January 8 and 9, 1959, for the first time in almost a year, he had Patsy in the Decca studio recording. Ever the innovator, he had installed stereo equipment. These were Patsy’s first such sessions; though recording techniques had drastically changed, Patsy and other artists still recorded live with the studio musicians.

The sessions marked the first time Bradley used the Jordanaires, a gospel quartet who’d been providing backup for Elvis, as backup for Patsy. There was above-average Four-Star material: “I’m Moving Along,” “I’m Blue Again,” “Love, Love, Love Me, Honey, Do,” “Gotta Lot of Rhythm in My Soul” and “Yes, I Understand.” The session musicians included Floyd Kramer on piano, and Hank “Sugarfoot” Garland and Grady Martin on electric guitar. On “Yes, I Understand,” in the style of Patti Page’s “Tennessee Waltz,” Patsy overdubbed the harmony.

Gordon Stoker, leader of the Jordanaires, has insightful memories of Patsy.

“We began working with Patsy on those January 1959 sessions. A lot of people took Patsy to be unfriendly, which we certainly found out about right away. She didn’t want us, and, after a few minutes, we didn’t want to be there. She yelled at Owen, ‘I’ve never had anything like this! I don’t want four guys singing and covering me up.’ We stood there redfaced and didn’t know what to do. Owen gave a sign to take a break. And we’d just gotten there! He took Miss Cline aside and they had a powwow, and we could see the smoke signals rising.