Legendary Performances

Marty Robbins

Overview

"Patrick Milligan and LeAnn Bennett were the production supervisors on Legendary Performances:Tammy Wynette as they are on this excellent archival retrospective on another country music icon, Marty Robbins. Country Music Hall Of Fame and Museum curator Mick Buck writes three pages of liner notes on the slick six-page insert and, as with the Wynette collection, the attention to detail is flawless with dates and credits giving the true fan a wonderful bookshelf collection of performances and a lengthy - forty minute - interview with Robbins conducted on March 8, 1982, nine months to the day prior to his untimely passing. Both Robbins and Wynette passed on in their mid-50s but, unlike Wynette, at least Marty Robbins got to witness and appreciate his own induction into the Country Music Hall of Fame on October 11, 1982. As also with the Wynette collection, there are 15 performances here, beginning with the singer in his early thirties performing a black and white ""Knee Deep in The Blues"". The first fourteen minutes are not in color, these early tapes displaying surprisingly fine audio which give the proceedings a vintage feel. As enlightening as the vocalist's musical maturity is to watch on the screen - from a non-cowboy-ish suit and tie in the 50's to glittering John Travolta 70s garb (on the Pop Goes The Country program which concludes the DVD) - so too are the technical advances in television from the 1950s to the 1970s for capturing country music on audio and video. This is a wonderful time capsule with definitive performances and an historical interview featuring another artist whose contributions were, and still are, invaluable."

Product Details

Release Date:	08/19/2008
UPC:	0826663108781
Original Release:	2008
Source:	Shout Factory
Region Code:	2
Sound:	[Dolby Digital Stereo]
Language:	English
Time:	1:20:00
Sales rank:	7,013

Special Features

Interview with Marty Robbins (March 8, 1982); Marty Robbins' Country Music Hall of Fame induction

Cast & Crew

Performance Credits

Marty Robbins

Primary Artist

Technical Credits

Lisa Glines	Design,Art Direction
Jay Orr	Editorial Supervision
Robert Y. Kim	Project Assistant
David McLees	A&R
Brian Blum	Production Supervisor
Patrick Milligan	Project Supervisor
Jeff Palo	Producer
Georges Bellias	Editing
Dorothy Stefanski	Editorial Supervision

Editorial Reviews

With someone whose career as a country (and sometimes pop) hitmaker spanned more than 25 years, it's inevitable that a video retrospective of his career can only hope to sample some highlights. This DVD, however, does present a reasonably strong survey of 15 songs/performances by Marty Robbins from 1957 to 1979. Plenty of his biggest hits are represented, including of course "El Paso" (taken from an episode of a 1965 series where Robbins played a singing cowboy), but also "Devil Woman," "Knee Deep in the Blues," "Singing the Blues," "The Story of My Life," "A White Sport Coat (And a Pink Carnation)," and "El Paso City." The clips certainly get slicker in presentation as the years go on; some guys in the band backing him on the pair of 1957 performances from Country Style USA seem almost embarrassed to be on-stage, though Jack Pruett certainly plays sparkling guitar on the first of these, "Knee Deep in the Blues." Marty himself, however, is always at ease; in fact, it seems like nothing short of a tornado would ruffle his calm self-assurance. If there's any disappointing aspect to this DVD, it's that the musical performances actually only fill up 40 minutes. Too, the 1957 pop smash "A White Sport Coat (And a Pink Carnation)" would surely have been better represented by a clip of earlier vintage than the 1977 one selected for this disc. As some compensation, as a bonus feature there's a 40-minute interview (conducted in 1982, only nine months before his death) that's much more thoughtful than the usual Q&A with a country star, especially when Robbins discusses writing "El Paso" (though not so much when he talks about his auto racing exploits). Also included is a brief clip of Marty being inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame, less than two months before he passed away. ~ Richie Unterberger