Gary Stewart

Description

Gary Stewart (May 28, 1945 – December 16, 2003), a country musician known for his drinking songs, was one of the first so-called "outlaw" country performers of the 1970s. <p>A singer, songwriter, guitarist and pianist, he was born in the Letcher County, Kentucky town of Jenkins, the son of a coal miner. His father sustained in 1958 an injury while working in the mines, and shortly after the family moved to Fort Pierce, a city on Florida's Atlantic coast. <p>Stewart began recording at twelve, moved on to songwriting, and married Mary Lou Taylor when he was eighteen. While playing a Honky-Tonk club in Okeechobee, Florida, known as the Wagon Wheel, he met country singer Mel Tillis, who advised Stewart to travel to Nashville to pitch his songs. He recorded songs for the small Cory label in 1964. In Nashville, Jerry Bradley, the son of record-producer Owen Bradley, worked with Stewart and collaborator Bill Eldridge to refine their songs, and in 1965 Stonewall Jackson's recording of their "Poor...