Roy Clark

He was born April 15th, 1933 in Meherrin, Virginia. During his childhood his father, a guitar, banjo, and fiddle playing cotton picker moved the family to Washington DC to pursue a career as a computer programmer. Even then, the young father took odd jobs playing at local dances to supplement the family income. By the age of fourteen Roy had learned to play the banjo, the mandolin, and the guitar and was accompanying his dad on stage.

During his teens Roy divided his time between his music and his love for sports as he considered careers in both boxing and baseball. At sixteen and seventeen he won the National Banjo Championship, a two time feat that earned him an appearance on the Grand Old Opry, but he was still torn between his two loves. At eighteen he became a professional boxer and won fifteen straight fights, until, as he likes to say, the next fight convinced him to stick with music. It remains a very wise move.

Roy Clark was a bona-fide star before the age of thirty, recognized for his unique musical wizardry and smooth singing style. He scored a number of hits including “Yesterday, When I was Young” and “Thank God and Greyhound You’re Gone” and enjoyed widespread fame as the picking and grinning host of the long running television variety show, Hee Haw. Inducted into the Grand Old Opry in 1987, this multi-instrumentalist, all around entertainer with the great comic timing has amassed a host of major awards. Today he lives with his wife Barbara in Oklahoma. When he isn’t fishing, flying his airplanes or riding his motorcycles, he’s delighting live audiences more than half a century after first taking the stage.

We’ll seal today’s Southern Quote with a line Mr. Clark uses to end his live shows. Roy Clark likes to say, “We had to come, but you had a choice. Thanks for being here.”