Burl Ives - Biography
By J Poet
Burl Ives was the most famous and successful American folksinger of the 30s and 40s. His rich tenor and playful phrasing made him an easy to listen to singer and he released dozens of 78 RPM albums on three different labels during his heyday. In 1950 he made a series of records documenting American folksongs for Encyclopedia Britannia Films, Historical America in Song – six albums of five 78 records each. In the 1950s he was called before the House Committee on Un-American Activities and named his friends as Communists. This hurt his career as a folksinger, but Ives was also an actor and voice over artist and appeared in many popular films including East of Eden (1955), Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (1958) and The Big Country (1958) which won him a Best Supporting Actor Oscar. He also appeared on Broadway in Paint Your Wagon (1951-52) and the stage production of Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (1955- 56.) In the 60s Ives cut several country albums and had three country hits in 1962, “A Little Bitty Tear,” “Call Me Mr. In-Between” and “Funny Way of Laughing” and won a Grammy for best Country & Western Performance. He’s probably best known to baby boomers as the voice of Sam the Snowman in the Rankin/Bass TV cartoon Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer (1964). It’s the longest running Christmas film in TV history, and features “A Holly Jolly Christmas” one of Ives’ biggest hits. He retired in the late 70s and died in 1995.
Burl Ives was born in Hunt Township, IL in 1909. He came from a family of seven children. By the time he was four he was singing for change on street corners with his brothers and sisters. He also sang in church and performed in community theater productions. A pipe smoking, tobacco-chewing grandmother taught the kids many of the songs she knew and it must have opened Ives’ ears to the beauty of vernacular material. He played banjo from an early age and dropped out of college in 1930 to bum around the country to sing, play and collect songs. He finally settled down in New York City where he took vocal training from Ekka Toedt and got a music degree from New York University.
In 1938 he appeared in the Rodgers and Hart musical The Boys From Syracuse, although he didn’t get to sing. A gig at the Village vanguard jazz club turned into a four month residency, singing ballads, blues and other folk material. In 1940 he got a radio show he called The Wayfaring Stranger, again singing folk songs. He was drafted in 1942, but got into an entertainment division and sang in Irving Berlin’s This Is the Army. In 1944 he got another marathon gig, this time at the Society Uptown club. He also appeared in Sing Out Sweet Land, a folk and popular music review that won him a Donaldson Award for Best Supporting Actor. In the early 40s he made records for Stinson, Asch, Okeh, Decca and Columbia. In 1948 “Blue Tail Fly,” recorded with the Andrews Sisters, became a hit and his older recordings suddenly became popular including A Collection of Ballads and Folk Songs (1945 Decca), Okeh Presents The Wayfaring Stranger (1941 Okeh) and Ballads and Folk Songs, Volume II (1947 Decca).
Ives has at least 100 albums in his catalogue, including numerous repackagings and greatest hits collections. Try The Wayfaring Stranger (2000 Collectables) a compilation of early side for Columbia; Return of The Wayfaring Stranger (2000 Collectables); Little Bitty Tear (1994 Universal) a compilation of his country hits; Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer (1995 Uni); Best of Burl Ives (2001 Universal) with hits from every phase of his career; On Top of Old Smoky (2005 Columbia) more early folk recordings