On her records, sorrowful men and women acted out their emotional dramas through her plaintive vocals accompanied by crying steel guitar. Wells’s subsequent records followed the same pattern of deep emotion and restrained hurt expressed from a woman’s point of view. It also crossed over to Billboard’s pop chart, hitting #27. The #1 country single took off during the summer of 1952 and sold more than 800,000 copies in its initial release. The record was controversial and received some resistance from radio executives, but audiences couldn’t get enough of it. The sentiments of “It Wasn’t God Who Made Honky Tonk Angels” are similar to 1894’s “She Is More to Be Pitied than Censured,” with its premise that deceitful men are responsible for fallen women. Thinking primarily of the $125 recording fee she would earn, Wells went into Nashville’s Castle Studio on May 3, 1952, to cut the song for Decca Records. Wells was a thirty-three-year-old wife and mother when her 1952 recording of “It Wasn’t God Who Made Honky Tonk Angels”-an answer song to Hank Thompson’s hit “The Wild Side of Life,” which features the line “I didn’t know God made honky-tonk angels”-suddenly made her a star. Wells’s recordings for RCA in 19 found no success, but Johnnie & Jack’s “Poison Love” took them to the Grand Ole Opry in 1952 (they’d previously performed on the Opry in 1947-1948). As “Rag Doll,” she spun records and sold quilting supplies. When they reunited after the war, Wells traveled with them to join the new Louisiana Hayride radio show on KWKH in Shreveport. It was during this time that Wright began to refer to his wife as “Kitty Wells,” a name taken from a nineteenth-century tune recorded in 1930 by the Pickard Family.ĭuring World War II, Anglin served in the army and Wright worked at a DuPont chemical factory north of Nashville.
After Wright and Jack Anglin formed the duo Johnnie & Jack in 1939, Wells performed as their “girl singer” on radio shows while they traveled throughout the South in the early 1940s. The couple and Wright’s sister Louise performed as Johnnie Wright & the Harmony Girls. On October 30, 1937, at age eighteen, Wells married Johnnie Wright.
With her two sisters and a cousin, Wells also performed on radio as the Deason Sisters. In 1934, with the Great Depression at its darkest depths, Wells dropped out of school to work at the Washington Manufacturing Company, where she was paid nine dollars a week to iron shirts. Her father and uncle were country musicians, and her mother was a gospel singer. 17 August 2022.Born Ellen Muriel Deason in Nashville, Kitty Wells’s country roots ran deep. "Wells, Kitty." Discography of American Historical Recordings. In Discography of American Historical Recordings.
"Wells, Kitty," accessed August 17, 2022. I don't want your money, I want your timeĭiscography of American Historical Recordings, s.v. Gathering flowers for the master's bouquetįemale vocal solo, with string band and male vocal harmony Recordings (Results 1-25 of 503 records) Companyįemale vocal solo, with string band and male vocal duo = Recordings were issued from this master. = Recordings are available for online listening. Roles Represented in DAHR: vocalist, leader Wells' success and influence on country music garnered her a title "Queen of Country Music'.īirth and Death Data: Born Aug(Nashville), Died J(Nashville)ĭate Range of DAHR Recordings: 1949 - 1972 In 1991, she became the third country music artist, after Roy Acuff and Hank Williams, and the eighth woman to receive the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award. In 1976, she was inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame. Wells ranks as the sixth-most successful female vocalist in the history of the Billboard country charts, according to historian Joel Whitburn's book The Top 40 Country Hits. Her chart topping hits continued until the mid-1960s, paving the way for and inspiring a long list of female country singers who came to prominence in the 1960s. Wells is the only female artist to be awarded top female vocalist awards for 14 consecutive years. “It Wasn’t God Who Made Honky Tonk Angels” would also be her first of several pop cross over hits. country charts, and turned her into the first female country superstar. She broke down a female barrier in country music with her 1952 hit recording, "It Wasn't God Who Made Honky Tonk Angels" which also made her the first female country singer to top the U.S. Ellen Muriel Deason (Aug– July 16, 2012), known professionally as Kitty Wells, was an American pioneering female country music singer.