About this site...

Back in 2010, the Western Writers of America surveyed its membership to choose the Top 100 Western Songs of all time. The list was printed on the website of American Cowboy magazine, where I happened to see it in early July, 2014. I started looking into the songs, and within a few days I had become hooked on the music and its fascinating history.

The material on these pages is the result of many enjoyable hours of research and web site construction. In addition to finding and organizing all this material, I made YouTube videos for songs that didn't have them, and I wrote Wikipedia articles for many of the songs, singers, and songwriters mentioned on the site. I also listened carefully to all the songs and made accurate transcriptions of the lyrics, which I double- and triple-checked. The results are 99.7% perfect. If you find any errors in the lyrics or elsewhere, please report them here.

(By the way — the photographs at the top of this page are some of the artists and songwriters whose work appears on this site. There are 70 photos, all different.)

My intention in all of this is to provide easy access some awesome material that is sitting out there on the Internet. Though I'm not a musician or a particular fan of Western music, my interest in it goes back a long way. In 1944 or 1945, before I was in first grade, I had a primitive 78 RPM record player with an electric motor and a mechanical sound system. I owned two or three records at most, one of which was Don't Fence Me In, sung, as I remember it, by Gene Autry. That song and the values it expresses have stuck with me for over seventy years. You can listen to it on this website, and maybe absorb some cowboy values.

Skip Skipson
Governors Ranch, Colorado
412-367-1376

Here's some stuff about about things that are still needed for this project, and about the videos and articles created for it so far...
Videos still needed for this project:
I can find only one artist's version of these songs. If you know of a YouTube or MP3 by any other artist, let me know. I can create the YouTube, but I need the music first.
#37 – The Last Comanche Moon. Great song. Seems unique to Mike Blakely. No covers.
#64 – Old Timer. Nobody seems to have covered this very popular Waylon Jennings song.
#66 – The Last Wild White Buffalo. Seems unique to Mike Blakely. No covers found.
#74 – The Old Cantina. Ditto.

Missing persons:
These folks are universally and unambiguously associated with the indicated songs. I haven't been able to find anything else about them, let alone enough to write a Wikipedia article. If you can provide clues or information about any or all of them, please send email.
George Alexander – Artist, El Dorado (#69)
Dave Gordon – Songwriter, Dust Eatin' Cowboys (#62)
Mike Phillips – Songwriter, North To Alaska (#41)
These videos were created for this project:
1. Call You Cowboy  (3:58)
2. Dust Eatin' Cowboys – The Hotmud Family (3:21)
3. Dust Eatin' Cowboys – KG and the Ranger (3:14)
6. The Old Cantina  (4:28)
7. When Roy Rogers Was Around – Bill Barwick (2:53)
8. When Roy Rogers Was Around – W. C. Jameson (2:36)
These Wikipedia articles were created for this project:
Bar D Wranglers (singers)
Bill Barwick (singer)
Buck Ramsey (singer)
Buddy Pepper (songwriter)
Carl Stutz (songwriter)
Curley Fletcher (songwriter)
D. J. O'Malley (songwriter)
Edith Lindeman (lyricist)
Eliot Daniel (songwriter)
Gary McMahan (songwriter)
Inez James (songwriter)
John A. Stone (song collector)
Ken Carson (singer)
Larry Russell (songwriter)
Mary Hadler (songwriter)
Mike Blakely (singer/songwriter)
Mike Taylor (songwriter)
N. Howard Thorp (songwriter/collector)
Tex Owens (songwriter)
V. C. Gilbert (songwriter)
W. C. Jameson (songwriter)


                                              
          My player was like this, but not as fancy
Please support The Skip Skipson Tortoise Rodeo Foundation — The voice of North American reptile riders
Here's a Bonus for those who have read this far: W. C. Jameson's I Dug the Postholes didn't make the
Top 100, but it's a heck of a song. Click Here to see it in a Skip Skipson YouTube.

Website Copyright 2020 Skip Skipson. All rights reserved. Copyright of all songs, lyrics, images, performances, etc. presented or linked to here remains with the owners of that material. This compilation is intended only for commentary, research, teaching, and scholarship. Other uses are strictly prohibited.
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