I started playing the fiddle when I was eight years old. Dad played fiddle, and Mom played rhythm guitar, and in the early years, we played lots of music together for dances both in my hometown of Norborne, Missouri and around Kansas City. Mom and Dad never really played professionally, but they did whatever they could to encourage and support me.

In 1950, with my parents’ help on stage, I won the talent contest at the Cowtown Jubilee, which was broadcast live on WHB (before they went “pop”), and from then on, the dances and stage performances never stopped. I still have the matching sterling silver candlesticks Bruce Grant alias “Pokey Red” presented to me for winning the contest.

I joined the Westport Kids in the early 1950s, and in addition to the Cowtown Jubilee, we appeared on the Brush Creek Follies, and we were regulars on the Tidwell Jamboree, another country music show sponsored by the Tidwell Furniture Store. At that time, all three shows were playing to nearly full houses, and all three were being broadcast live on radio. The Brush Creek Follies were live on KMBC [now KMBZ], the Cowtown Jubilee was live on WHB, and the Tidwell Jamboree was live on KCMO and KCKN, and tape delayed by one day on KIMO in Independence (a daytime-only station). Pretty “big-time” for then, huh?

In the early 1950s, The Westport Kids and I worked a full day on NBC’s Today Show with Dave Garroway, when they broadcasted from the American Royal in Kansas City. This was before the days of videotape or even kinescope, so it was all live! They featured us often, and it was a real kick! (Ask me about it sometime.)

In 1953 and 1954 the Westport Kids and I played the “Million Dollar Cowboy Bar” in Jackson Hole, Wyoming. We shared the billing with Hank Penny, whose big hit was “Won’t You Ride In My Little Red Wagon”; along with Sue Thompson (”I’m Red-Hot Henrietta Brown”) and an old-west quartet called Andy Parker and the Plainsmen out of California, who had just finished a movie with Marilyn Monroe called The River of No Return.

After graduating high school and completing two years of electronics engineering school, I hit the road for two summers with Maggie and Scotty and the Dude Cowboys out of Eau Claire, Wisconsin, where we had a weekly radio show on WEAU-AM. In 1957, we were the opening act on a road tour for Homer and Jethro. (What a hoot!)

In the late 50s and into the 60s, I played fiddle for Jimmy Dallas on his live Saturday night television show which started on WDAF-TV (Channel 4), and later moved to KMBC-TV, Channel 9. It was while we were on Channel 4 in 1959 that I married Norma Jean (Boyd). (I call her “Sug,” and you can too.) We have four children: two girls and two boys, as well as a number of grandchildren.

During the decade and a half from the late 50s to the early 70s, while I fiddled on live radio shows, stage shows, and such, I was the chief engineer for a number of radio stations: KCKN, KANS, KUDL, KCMO, and others.

It was in the early 60s, shortly after we left KCKN, that we lost a dear friend and co-worker in a car/truck accident, “Cactus Jack Call.” Jack, who had been program director for KCKN, left no insurance money behind, so friends from Nashville came to Kansas City to do a benefit for Jack’s family at Memorial Hall in Kansas City, Kansas.

You probably know the rest of this story.

We partied late into the night in the penthouse of the Townhouse Hotel in downtown Kansas City and the next day, in a flight back to Nashville, Tennessee, we lost Patsy Cline, Cowboy Copas, Hawkshaw Kawkins, and Randy Hewes. (The memory of being so close to them still lingers.)

Since that time, I’ve had the pleasure of playing backup fiddle for the likes of Little Jimmy Dickens (a real ball of fire and energy), Kenny Price (a real gentleman), and Justin Tubb.

I played on an album with Johnny Nace (Warrensburg, MO disk jockey) recorded at Porter Waggoner’s studio in Nashville. I did some tracking on an album for Boxcar Willie at B.J. Carnahan’s studio in Mack’s Creek, MO, and I managed Midwestern Recording Studio in Kansas City.

Somewhere along this time I was able to mix in about six and a half years with Larry Smith, playing weekends at the Fun House Pizza in Independence, MO.

Like most folks who spent as much time as I did in radio, I wanted to own my own station, so in 1976, Norma and I bought KESM-AM & FM, and moved to El Dorado Springs, Missouri. I took care of the engineering and sales, and Sug ran the business office. Every Saturday night, we produced our own “Opry-style” show in the local cattle sale barn, called the “KESM Jamboree,” until a fellow came along and made us an offer we couldn’t refuse. We moved several times, but finally came back to Kansas City about a dozen years ago.

Perhaps the “peak” of my fiddlin’ career (not counting this time with Annie’s Country Jubilee) would be the four years with Hank Thompson and the Brazos Valley Boys. Hank and his wife, Ann, are two of the most genuinely loving people we know. I was pleasured to be with Hank when he played the casinos at Henderson, Nevada (a suburb of Las Vegas).

Fiddles?
I always carry two fiddles with me. My favorite fiddle is a copy of the Cobette Stadivarius, made by one of the finest luthiers in the world, the late Earsel Atchley. I purchased this violin (new) from Mr. Atchley before I was old enough to drive (in 1952), and rode the bus to his violin shop once a week to make payments on it.

The second fiddle I carry is a really good five-string Barcus-Barry fiddle that I bought from Tiny Moore, who played fiddle and electric mandolin with Bob Wills, Merle Haggard, and many more of the older Western Swing bands out of Texas and California. Tiny, who died a few years ago, had his own music store in Sacramento, California, and was one of the kindest musicians I’ve ever met.

And now?
To be a member of the family at Annie’s Country Jubilee goes beyond what most folks understand or appreciate (unless you’re one of those who come week after week). We really do enjoy our audiences. We really do enjoy visiting at intermission. We really do enjoy playing the songs you want to hear.

For photos of Marvin and more about his solo exploits, visit Marvin’s Web site.