Biography Bobbie Gentry: Bobbie Gentry (born July 27, 1944) is an American singer-songwriter. She was born Roberta Lee Streeter to Portuguese parents in Chickasaw County, Mississippi. She shot to international fame in the summer of 1967 with the quirky and intriguing Ode to Billie Joe, written by Gentry and sung in her warm, captivating style. “Ode” was listed as the most popular single of the year in many U.S. record surveys and was admired by Frank Sinatra and other singers.
Bobbie Gentry Biography, Wiki
Bobbie Gentry is one of the great legends of 1960s popular music, an artist who debuted with an enigmatic, enduring smash hit who then cultivated an idiosyncratic country-pop crossover sound for a few years before retreating from the spotlight, never to be heard from again. That hit was “Ode to Billie Joe,” a spare, elastic bit of storytelling that rocketed to number one after its release in 1967. So powerful and popular was “Ode to Billie Joe” that it spun off a film adaptation about a decade after its release, by which time Gentry’s career was effectively over. She didn’t manage a big pop hit after “Ode to Billie Joe,” instead transitioning over to the country charts after her trippy psychedelic-Americana album The Delta Sweete failed to generate hits on either chart. Glen Campbell chose her as a duet partner for a spell in the late ’60s — they had hit covers of the Everly Brothers’ “Let It Be Me” and “All I Have to Do Is Dream” — and as a solo act, she pioneered a splashy fusion of show biz pop and country-funk, a sound that reached its apex on 1969’s “Fancy.” Reba McEntire later turned “Fancy” into a standard, signaling how deep and pervasive Gentry’s influence was: she set the stage for generations of pop-savvy singers who blurred the lines between country and pop.
Of Portuguese descent, Gentry was born Roberta Streeter in Chickasaw County, Mississippi, on July 27, 1942; her parents divorced shortly after her birth and she was raised in poverty on her grandparents’ farm. After her grandmother traded one of the family’s milk cows for a neighbor’s piano, seven-year-old Gentry composed her first song, “My Dog Sergeant Is a Good Dog,” years later self-deprecatingly reprised in her nightclub act; at 13, she moved to Arcadia, California, to live with her mother, and soon began her performing career in local country clubs. The 1952 film Ruby Gentry lent the singer her stage surname.
Bobbie Gentry
Bobbie Gentry, who was not only a singer but also a writer of the lyrics of her own songs has been preserved the profile of a productive singer. In addition to that, she became famous in the first process with the project ‘’Ode to Billie Joe’’, in 1967. She does not actively continue her work. The singer who skillfully uses the guitar is now 77 years old and, of course, retired. The years 1966–1981 are the range in which the artist achieved the highest performance. It is possible to say that the artist has an extremely impressive performance in both vocals and guitar.
Bobbie Gentry Biography
Bobbie Gentry was born on July 27, 1942, in the United States, Chickasaw, Mississippi, USA. Unfortunately, this artist’s mother and father divorced shortly after her birth. After this divorce, the artist’s mother moved to a different region. Therefore, the childhood and adolescence of the artist were spent on a farm in Chickasaw County. After completing her high school education, the artist started to be interested in philosophy. So she decided to take a college education in the field of philosophy. Bobbie Gentry has moved to Los Angeles during this period to complete her college education. It is possible to say that 1967 was the most important famous date for the artist. The artist gained her popularity this year.
Early Life of Bobbie
Bobbie was born Roberta Lee Streeter, on the 27th July 1942, in a little farm outside the town of Woodland in Chickasaw County, Mississippi, she spent her childhood years on her paternal grandparents’ farm, after her own parents divorced, where she grew up without electricity or plumbing. In a 1973 Mid-South magazine cover story, she remembered, “My grandmother noticed how much I liked music, so she traded one of her milk cows for a neighbor’s piano,” she said, sounding like a line from one of her own songs. “When I was still very young, I used to sit and listen to jazz music and blues music from New Orleans on an old battery-powered radio, since we didn’t have electricity on the farm. Then I’d go over to the piano and try to pick out the tunes.” The story goes that, at the age of 7, she composed her first song, called My Dog Sergeant Is a Good Dog — using only the black keys, because that’s how she watched the church pianist play. Years later, she cheerfully performed the track at the piano in her 1968 BBC TV series. Her early life is peppered with such stories that over time have coalesced into a version of the classic American dream.
Bobbie Gentry Children & Marriage and More
She has a child named Tyler Stafford. Bobby Genty married three times. The artist’s ex-husband’s names are Jim Stafford (e. 1978–1979), Bill Harrah (e. 1969–1970), William F. Harrah (e. 1969–1970). The artist, whose last marriage ended in 1979, is not currently married to anyone. 5ft 6in is the heigh size of Bobbie Gentry. According to the most accurate information received, the artist’s weight is known as 125lb. Of course, with the retirement of the artist, the information about her in the market began to decrease over time. It is possible to say that these numbers are especially valid for the sixties / early seventies.
Bobbie Gentry Net Worth
Bobbie Gentry’s retirement right now does not prevent us from knowing Bobbie Gentry’s net worth. Especially in the years when she became very popular and rested internationally, the artist’s net worth had reached 100 million. She also has income from TV syndication and other sales. You can listen to Mississippi Delta, Fancy, I’ll Never Fall in Love Again to discover the general artistic style of Bobbie Gentry.
Personal life of Bobbie
She was married twice. The first, to casino magnate William F. Harrah in 1969, when she was 25 and he was 58, lasted only three months, a victim of her fame. The second, to novelty singer-songwriter Jim Stafford, ended in 1979, after only eleven months of marriage and the birth of a son, Tyler. The details of Gentry’s personal life after her retirement are little known, but it is generally believed that she has settled into a happy life, and enjoys being a private citizen, unhindered by the scrutiny that fame brings. As of January 2003, she was living in Los Angeles County, California.
Recording Career and profession
Whilst intermittently gigging with Jody Reynolds, Bobbie formed a Hawaiian themed troupe called the International Four, that picked up a local following performing in Vegas, Tahoe, Oxnard and Palm Springs, during this time she began recording a total of 12 songs that would form the basis of her debut album. Despite performing regularly, initially Bobbie’s sole ambition was to write songs to sell to other artists, telling the Washington Post that she only sang on the recording of Ode to Billie Joe she took to Capitol because it was cheaper than hiring a professional.
Also delivered to Capitol was the track Mississippi Delta, and it was this recording rather than Ode that initially got her signed. It was only after the now famous string arrangement by Jimmie Haskell had been dubbed onto Bobbie’s original recording of Ode To Billie Joe that Capital’s A & R team decided definitively that it would be the A-Side. The song was released on 10th of July, and hit the number one spot on the 26th of August. Despite protracted debate about what the narrator threw ofF the bridge (Bobbie always said it wasn’t important), the essential mystery of Bobbie’s song is one that can never be fully resolved, hence its endurance.
Stage Career and profession
The first six years of her career Bobbie was primarily a recording artist, and for the next six she was an entertainer appearing on stages all over the world but primarily in Las Vegas and Reno. Bobbie had started playing Vegas as early as 1968 when Howard Hughes put her on at Caesar’s Palace but it wasn’t until her recording career ended that her stage career really took off. Bobbie had regularly performed live, generally in a conventional rock setting, the difference now was that she had accumulated extensive experience on her own TV series and variety show performances on networks all over the world – their lavish sets and production values inspired her to create her own spectacular one woman show where she could dramatise her music with sets, costumes and choreography backed by a rock band: Clearly relishing the creative freedom Bobbie stated “I write and arrange all the music, design the costumes, do the choreography, the whole thing, I’m completely responsible for it. It’s totally my own from inception to performance”. Vegas had simply never seen anything like it; indeed one would have to look at modern parallels to find an equivalent.