Hank Williams Sr. The Haunting Story of "Your Cheatin' Heart". Told by Don Helms

hi this is Joe chambers thanks for watching musicians Hall of Fame backstage vault series the vault series is a series of interviews that we shot starting back in 2004 two years before the musicians Hall of Fame and Museum opened to the public if you like what you see please be sure to hit like subscribe and the notification bill so you don't miss any of our new content thanks for watching today's clip is for steel guitarist with hain't William seniors the drifting Cowboys band Don Helms we did this interview with Don in my office at the first Museum during the first year we were open somewhere around 2006 if if you're a hank senior fan you're you're really going to enjoy this to me the one of the high points of it is when he tells the real haunting story of the recording of your cheatin heart I hope you enjoy it Don Helms we formed a little band down south alabama and stuff like that and so he's doing pretty good little club down there would work about four days and be off two or three days and one of the guys and you had met Hank Williams and Hank Williams was on the radio up at Montgomery just him and his guitar Hank Williams the drifting cowboy so he went up to Montgomery and when he came back the well he ran into Hank and he said Hank said we were I'm thinking about putting a band together he said wants to talk to us we got a band it's already together and he said well get him up here and we'll talk so he came back down and he said would you guys like to go to work for Hank Williams and I said I had heard Hank but I'd never met him I said what I probably wouldn't be any worse than this so we left there and went up to Montgomery and met him at a at a music store where guys hang out and this long guy tall guy walked in and said hey all that band so yeah he's a lot Hank Williams follow me we went into a hock shop next door and he said Jacob you got any more than Black Jacks back there and he said yeah he said give me five of them and he took them billy clubs and passed them out and said lord if people gonna play to me you're gonna need these in South Alabama that a lot latter part of World War two and a honky tonk on Saturday night ain't the safest place to be it's a highway about 16 did you ever look back there was that was it from that was it Full Tilt from then on from then on yeah we started working for Hank Williams and I worked with him a couple of years and then I went into the service Hank was fixing to go to Shreveport and he said you don't go with me I said how much they paid he told me and I said I think I'm making a lot more than that here he said well I'll tell you what I'll let y'all this time but I had was go over that grinder will offer you going with him I said okay that's a deal hazal called he wants you to call Hank Williams it's Shreveport and I did and he said you promised me that if I ever went to the Grand Ole Opry the woman I said yeah he said we'll have your butt up there next Friday night we're gonna show him how it's done and we did and what instrument did you play rock playing seal I never what actual instrument what was your what I was playing there was a Rickenbacker elapsed there were six string-- lap steel like jailbird Malay kind of pants yeah yeah well before a frying pan it was someone little black and white he looked like a little guitar but it's a Rickenbacker well Terry Byrd played one of them and I uh I had one like that that's what I was playing then I got a Fender a double-neck fender double eight and I was playing that when I came to Nashville I had just gotten there but I still had the Rickenbacker and when I first recorded it I recorded with Ernest Tubb before I did Hank what because we we played the grand ole opry ranked at first verse Saturday night and then we left to go on tour and first date we played was on Sunday in Middletown Ohio I believe it was and no Monday we went into Cincinnati to do a session that was already scheduled and Jerry bird played the steel on it and and I got to watch that that's a first studio that I was ever in and I was very impressed by all of that so that Hank recording there meant that he wouldn't record again for another four or five months well immediately on playing on the Opera they started booking us on tour with Ernest Tubb and his band and Ernest didn't have a steel player at that time and he asked me if I would fill in with him I said yeah and so I played and so Ernest would record before Hank did and so he asked me to play on this session and and I did and the very first song that I ever recorded was Ernest two letters have no arms and three other songs I'll take a back seat for you unfaithful one and then the next time the Hank recorded I was on that and we did long going along some blues why don't you love me like he used to do my son calls another man daddy and I forgot what the other song whoa but two or three of those were hits and and I started doing from then on I did everything that Hank recorded and so what was your progression of instruments you said you got the fender Hey we played Baltimore Maryland for a week at a theater and one day about the middle of the week a guy came in and said I've come to trade guitars with you I want that get to her that played on long and blue that's well that's it there I said what kind of trade you're talking about and he said come here I'll show you and he opened this thing up and boy that was a pretty ghetto I ever seen smelled good now you know how like a new car you know and I said what kind of trade you got in mind he said I'm gonna trade you you give me $200 and that guitar I said man I don't have $200 he said you got hundred I said yeah so I said you realize now that I'm going to play this rest of the day because I'll have to take it to the room tonight but the kind of strings on it that I have to have to get the sound that I want so he stood around and waited for me to finish that date he took the guitar and was going with it and I took the Gibson console ran that I still played today took it up to the room put some different strings on it and I started playing it and I still played today what kind of amplifier jeez back then I've used an offender when I when I was with Hank and ever what Pro any Pro 15 inch Jenson speed what Studios did you play with Hank at Castle in Nashville it was in the old two-lane hotel and two engineers from WSM radio Karl Jenkins and see what the other guys Erin Shelton they've two engineers and they put the studio together and and they had a suite there and they just made it into a recording studio and that's where a lot of people did a lot of the red Foley hits and Ernest Tubb and Hank Williams lefty so that so your cheatin heart no that was recorded in castle mmm in downtown Nashville yes the hotel is not there anymore it's a parking lot now it's called the tea lane to Lane Hotel and the studio was Castle yeah Nashville was called the radio station was the air castle of the south and the use that was that wzm mm-hmm what's the air castle himself WC him to air castle over the south and so that was on Bradley affiliated with that at that time he wasn't but oh and Bradley had the staff orchestra the WM staff Orchestra at that time and and Hara Bradley his brother played guitar and when you were the session with doing a session with Hank senior what was the what was a typical session like how did it start out and and you know was there a producer or did y'all just do it or did the bread rolls was always kind of he was always on hand for advice if you needed any advice and so Hank leaned on Fred a lot he thought Fred Rose would be the greatest writer in the world and and Fred had a lot of confidence in Hank and so they got along pretty good most of the time and so Hank could come in and he and he had always start by saying this first one goes like this and he had sang a couple of lines somebody come up with an intro and how we're going in this thing young stuff like that pedal you play in the middle and so until and that was about to extend them so there weren't really a dedicated producer or there was a range what y'all just did it he had the wrong song you just he probably had it written down and he just put it up and sing from that from that copy and we just learned to learn the tune and play you have a favorite cold cold heart was my favorite of all the Hank Williams song Hank came back into Nashville I hadn't seen him since he had been expelled from the Grand Ole Opry except that on that record session he came in and we did four songs we did collide you and we did take these chains from my heart we did one call I could never be ashamed to you and he said this next one goes like this and he sang a couple of lines he said Don give me something so I gave him a little intro and he sang it all the way through and we played it all the way through nobody made a mistake bad enough to have to do it again and I never saw him alive again the song is here cheating heart we played it only once so what you hear on that record had no rehearsal we just played it one time through and and the proof is on the record where were you when he died Charleston West Virginia and Canton Ohio I went the promoter of that show called me just before Christmas and said I've got Hank Williams booked in Charleston on New Year's Eve Canton Ohio New Year's Day and if he does real good I think he's gonna be able to come back to the Grand Ole Opry will you do me a favor and he said you can ride up with me but if you ride up there take your guitar play behind him and encourage him he said I appreciate it I said okay I'll do that and I wrote up there with him and Hank didn't make the Charleston date and we didn't make the Charleston we got into an icing condition and weather and so we went on up to Kenton and checked in the hotel and the next morning I got up had breakfast and I went to the auditorium and the promoter mr. Bamford was already at the auditorium he's gone over to check the box office and tickets and all that and and he met me at the door to the dressing room and said we've got a bad problem brother Hank Williams didn't make it he died and round capsized me pretty good so there went my best friend my source of income so I thought no but with the show wound the guy the DJ who was the emcee of the show took a mic and went out and from the curtain and the whole cast got behind the curtain and played and sang I saw the light he could hear people weeping in the audience when he made the announcement if hanged to death some of them had already heard it on the radio but the ones who had just you know where'd you go went back to Nashville and picked miss hazel look and we drove to Montgomery Alabama in the city auditorium where the funeral was held the casket was down in front of the stage and we were on the stage the musician and the singer Ernest Roy Webb Pierce all the biggies you know dreadfully and they've sang and I played and where I stood I was looking right down I'm angry and that's that's the most unusual predicament that I was ever in I would I hope I never have to do that you [Music] you [Music]

Channel: Musicians Hall of Fame & Museum

Views: 132,665

Rating: 4.929471 out of 5

Keywords: Don Helms, Joe Chambers, Musicians Hall of Fame, Country Music Hall of Fame, Nashville, Music City, Hank Williams Jnr, Hank Snr, Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, Steel Guitar, Drifting Cowboy, Rickenbacker, Fender, Ernest Tubb, Grand Ol Opry, Jerry Byrd, Letters Have No Arms, Unfaithful One, Long Gone Lonesome Blues, My Son Calls Another Man Daddy, Gibson, Castle Recording Studio, Bullet Recording, Songwriting, Owen Bradley, Harold Bradley, Hank Williams, Your Cheatin Heart

Id: PQstb_94AFU

Length: 15min 2sec (902 seconds)

Published: Mon Jun 22 2020