BOBBIE GENTRY
Bobbie Gentry (born Roberta Lee Streeter; born July 27, 1944) is an American singer-songwriter notable as one of the first female country artists to compose and produce her own material. Her songs typically drew on her Mississippi roots to compose vignettes of the Southern United States. Gentry rose to international fame with her intriguing Southern Gothic narrative “Ode to Billie Joe” in 1967. The track spent four weeks as the No. 1 pop song on the Billboard Hot 100 chart and was fourth in the Billboard year-end chart of 1967 and earned her Grammy awards for Best New Artist and Best Female Pop Vocal Performance in 1968. (More from Wikipedia)
The two brothers also had some early success as songwriters. In 1967, P. J. Proby had his biggest U. S. hit song with the Top 30 release “Niki Hoeky” that was written by Pat Vegas, Lolly Vegas and Jim Ford; Bobbie Gentry performed the song in 1968 on the Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour.
(August 2013)
