Amoeblog > Tag > arizona Amoeblog posts marked with arizona. Billie Maxwell - The Cow Girl Singer <div style="text-align: center;"><img width="500" alt="" src="" /></div> <div><br /> The 1920s and &lsquo;30s were full of cowgirl singers like the <strong>Girls of the Golden West</strong>&nbsp;(<strong>Millie and Dolly Good)</strong>, <strong>Patsy Montana</strong> and <strong>Texas Ruby</strong>, most of whom were just as inauthentic as their better known male counterparts like <strong>Gene Autry</strong> and <strong>the Sons of the Pioneers</strong>. However, one western performer was the real deal: <strong>Billie Maxwell</strong>.<br /> <br /> <img alt="" style="width: 153px; height: 295px;" src="" />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; <img style="width: 323px; height: 295px;" alt="Springerville Arizona" src="" /></div> <div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: smaller;">One of the two known photos of Billie Maxwell (left), Springerville, Arizona in the 1920s (right).</span></div> <div></div> <br /> <div>Billie Maxwell was born in 1906 and raised near <strong>Springerville, Arizona</strong>, same place where <strong>Ike Clanton</strong>, one of the<strong> <a href="">Missourian</a>&nbsp;</strong>players in the Gunfight at the OK Corral, was shot dead by a detective not 20 years earlier. Her father, <strong>E. Curtis Maxwell</strong>, was locally renowned as a fiddler who'd amassed a massive repertoire of songs learnt from his father,<strong> William Beatty Maxwell</strong>, an <strong>Illinoisan</strong> who&rsquo;d moved first to <strong>Nevada</strong> and then Arizona in the 1800s. Curtis Maxwell formed a string band called the<strong> White Mountain Orchestra</strong> who toured (on horseback) the ranches in the area, playing dances. Not only did Maxwell know many traditional songs, but he composed his own work too, including &ldquo;Escudilla Waltz&rdquo; and &ldquo;Frolic of the Mice.&rdquo; In her teenage years, Billie joined her father&rsquo;s band, where she played guitar alongside her brother, <strong>Marion</strong>, who played mandolin. Eventually she occasionally struck out on her own, performing solo shows in the backcountry.</div> <br /> <div style="text-align: center;"><img width="500" alt="" src="" /></div> <br /> <div>In 1929, at the age of 23, she married a local schoolteacher, <strong>Alvin Chester Warner</strong>, and settled down to raise a family. A few months later, in June, her uncle <strong>Frank Maxwell</strong> (a lawman over in <strong>Silver City</strong>) noticed a classified in the local paper advertising an upcoming field recording session for <strong>Victor</strong> over in <strong>El Paso</strong>. At an audition, the White Mountain Orchestra were deemed worthy and two weeks later Chester Warner drove his wife, Marion, Curtis and Frank to a recording session where they met <strong>Ralph Peer</strong>.<br /> <br /><div style="clear: both;"><a style="font-size:13px;" href="/blog/2009/03/eric-s-blog/billie-maxwell-the-cow-girl-singer.html">Continue reading...</a></div></div> Fri, 06 Mar 2009 05:00:00 GMT