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Friday, January 16, 2015

Calendar Clarification: Buddy Holly

Inside The Rock Era is about halfway through our overhaul of the popular Calendar* feature.  When we are finished, we are confident it will be the best and most reliable source of past music events available.  We know that you DJ's rely on accurate information, and when we find discrepancies with other websites, we will point that out.  We have come across yet another instance in which information from those other sites is incorrect.

You will find many websites which say that Buddy Holly recorded his last songs on January 22, 1959 in his apartment in New York City.  This is not true, for Holly left early that day for Milwaukee for the infamous Winter Dance Party, a tour on which he would never return from. 

While it is true that Holly had been recording 14 songs that included just Holly and his acoustic guitar, he did not record them on the 22nd.  After much research, we have determined that  Holly made his last recordings ( "That's What They Say", "What To Do", "Peggy Sue Got Married," "That Makes It Tough", "Crying, Waiting Hoping" (often shown incorrectly as just "Crying"), "Learning The Game", "Wait 'Til The Sun Shines Nellie", "Drown In My Own Tears", "Maria Elena" (which is mostly Buddy's wife Maria talking and the noise of the apartment), "Dearest", "Love Is Strange", "Smoky Joe's CafĂ©"  "Buddy's Guitar", and "Slippin' And Slidin'") from early December to late January alone with an acoustic guitar and an Ampex reel to reel tape recorder in his apartment in New York City.  The website http://edsel.myrmid.com/buddy/buddy.html appears to be the most reliable information on these last recordings. 
The first two were recorded December 3, "Peggy Sue Got Married" was recorded December 5, "That Makes It Tough" was recorded December 8, "Crying, Waiting, Hoping" was recorded December 14, and "Learning The Game" was recorded on December 17.  The last eight songs were recorded sometime between January 1 and January 19, but there is no exact record, and they definitely were not recorded on December 22.  The songs were later released posthumously with dubs added and are referred to as "The Apartment Tapes".

Thankfully, these songs were finally put into CD form, which you can buy, called Down the Line:  Rarities.

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