Most people who know at least a little bit about rockabilly music from the 1950s realize that small independent record labels--most notably Sun Records, Starday Records, Jaxon Records, and a few others--drove the phenomenon called rockabilly. It was these small labels that were willing to try something new and unproven. They gave unknown musician after unknown musician their chance at becoming a rock and roll star. But although the big labels weren't about to be the first to take a chance on these unknown rockabilly cats, it didn't take them long to jump on the bandwagon once those rockabilly records started selling in real quantities!
Sun Records out of Memphis, Tennessee was a particularly fertile ground for commercially-successful rockabilly artists. Elvis Presley recorded his first hit songs on Sun Records in 1954 and of course his career took off like a rocket. By 1956, Elvis was such a fast-rising star that the huge RCA Victor label noticed and bought his contract from Sun Records' owner Sam Phillips for $35,000 plus a $5,000 signing bonus for the young Elvis. Although this was considerable money back in those days, it was of course a pittance when compared with the money Elvis eventually brought into RCA Victor's coffers.
Johnny Cash also had his first smash hits on Sun Records and soon signed to another giant record label, Columbia where he recorded for years and like Elvis brought big, big money into the Columbia accounts. Other Sun Records stars who signed with a major record label and had hugely successful careers include Roy Orbison, Jerry Lee Lewis, Harold Jenkins (later recording under the name Conway Twitty), and Charlie Rich.
Other rockabilly artists such as Buddy Holly, Gene Vincent, Johnny Horton, and Eddie Cochran also went on from their original small labels to sign with a label in the big leagues. This was definitely one way that the big labels cashed in on the rockabilly craze.
But new artists who made enough noise on small labels to get noticed by the majors weren't the only artists who made money recording rockabilly music for the major record labels. Many already established acts--mostly county artists--saw that they could realize their own further success with the rockabilly style. Or, perhaps some of them fell in love with the style too. In any event, several established, major country stars recorded some great rockabilly tracks of their own.
Marty Robbins, Patsy Cline, Joe Maphis, The Maddox Brothers and Rose, Little Jimmy Dickens, and many others turned out several really fantastic rockabilly recordings. In some cases, these rockabilly recordings helped revitalize an otherwise lagging career. In other cases rockabilly was just a natural expansion of the artist's repertoire.
But whatever the reason, the major record labels were all for it. When an established star recorded the new style of music, it was either money in the bank for the label, or a low-cost experiment in the new genre. It was a lot easier for a major record label to support the desire of an established artist to slip a rockabilly tune into their recording schedule than it would have been to take a chance on a new, unknown rockabilly artist.
Regardless of the motivation that a major labels felt for getting into the rockabilly act, in the end it benefited all of us rockabilly fans. While the small, independent label recordings are more than likely the ones that rockabilly purists will point to as their favorites or most influential, the music released by major record labels enriches the overall rockabilly pot.
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