Listen to the Stories Behind the Hit Makers of Yesterdays and Today Great Country Songs as the writers share their stories and experiences. Mission Statement
Every once in a while a song comes along that is so touching and profound, so motivational and inspirational, so fun and joyful, or sometimes so wrenching and painful, that you never forget it, and you simply need more. Behind the Songs is ab
out strengthening a connection. It is about honoring the intimate conversation between two human beings, the Artist and their Audience, through music and storytelling
What to Expect
Behind The Songs concert series gives music fans the opportunity to experience feeling of being
backstage and of getting to know the artist behind their favorite songs. The way music touches your soul, that experience that made you feel like the song on the radio was written for you, Behind the Songs is finding out firsthand those stories and life experiences that inspired the songs and the artists who perform them. Songwriters perform their music, share the moments their creations became hits, and sing songs you may have never heard before, often collaborating for the first time with each other on stage. Why
I built Behind The Songs around the idea that people who have loved music there whole lives, or who may not realize how profoundly music effects and inspires our dreams, in ways that can be hard to imagine this gives the building blocks from which “Hit Songs” and “Songs” that even touch just a few lives are formed. Realizing the stories behind the songs that drive and inspire emotion, especially those who truly love music can bring about a since of familiarity with these songs at a much deeper and more intimate level knowing where someone came from or “walking in someone else’s shoes” as is often said. Growing up as 4th Generation Hatter under brim of Manny E. Gammage’s Texas Hatters, if your from South Austin then you’d know “Topping The Best” meant just about any and every Guitar Picker around grabbed a lid, the Likes of Jerry Jeff Walker long before Mr. BoJangles” the first of who were to follow him Willie Nelson, Waylon Jennings, Merle Haggard, Charlie Pride, Ray Benson... along side many others the world over.. Of every shape size and talent. Even a young Bob Dylan. I may not yet have been born around the era of where this all began folks, but that never stopped me even after “Manny” aka Marvin Emmanuel Gammage’s passing in December of 1995. Folks always told me after him, that “You didn’t have to know Manny to know Manny” to be able to turn to your neighbor who’d know him. That was and has still been true to this day y’all. It didn’t take me long to find myself on search behind the stories I’d always been told by his wife and my Grandmother Norm L. Gammage, I’d await till she’d finished the first story then ask for just one more story from her about the Good Ole’ Days. Stories from Poodie Locke among many other of theGammage family friends, “Yep you must be Manny’s” he said out back of a Willie’s Picnic.. Those are the thoughts and kind words of Manny’s friends and like family folks who seemed to be always looking out for a way to help “Manny’s “ there are so many folks who have supported me immensely over the past and present 19yrs all for a memory and in a desire for the “Old Austin” way of life. Folks who’ve carried me thru what it meant to be Austin, A close to the heart friend of Manny and Norma who I came to call friend Stephen Mendell Bassist/Recording Artist/Producers.. And a few other title’s.. Stephen always sought to help encourage me to be apart of and Support the Austin way of Life even after we moved the store (Texas Hatters) to Lockhart Texas,. There was no drive to long to keep Steve from making it out to a Music Series out back of the Hatters, yep me and with the help of few new and good friends Ratliff Dean Theibaud and “Waltz Across Texas Dance Hall Tours” Lee Kothman managed to build a little stage out back. Steve had a way of brining folks around “Musicians” of course. It was Steve who brought me around Ray’s Birthday Bash back at La Zona Rosa a few years back and introduced me to Ray, and manager MJ Mendell family of course. MJ when she wasn’t busy running the show, she’d stop a time or two and check to see how we we’re, it wasn’t till just a while back I remember that, she knew he kept up with me regularly around the store. I’m sad to say past tense August 23rd, 2012 he was taken by cancer, not before he passed on his fondness of live music, “big or small he topped them all” a phrase first coined by my Mother Joella M. Gammage, after being lifted up on Manny’s shoulders for a photo op. “Big or small we top em all” he’d say...
That’s how I’d like to remember Stephen because it didn’t matter who you were he made you fell “Topped” by the best that is Stephen Mendell as Manny remembered him “Two Finger T” he had printed in his hat. Life is made of paths in my case I think I chose the one with the widest lanes carved out by a good family and memories of a man who seemed to touch more lives, thru a few “Toppers” than an Ole Country tune. These are just a short few of the family and friends who’ve inspired and inspire me still thru this venture, to share stories like sitting around talking to old friends if only to hear them thru another’s words. Encouraged by a customer and friend Amanda I was told that Koke FM had made it back on the Radio waves, my folks made me aware they’d supported Texas Hatters back in Bob Cole’s earlier years on Koke. Thanks to some support of Mary Clarke my Rep at the time and Station Manager Jim Ray, they finagled me on to the Air promoting at that time our 85th Anniversary, with a few phone calls Mary had wrangled my Mother Joella M. Gammage and Husband David A. Torres and myself, into a Revision of our 1967 Senate Resolution naming Texas Hatters “Official Hatters of The State of Texas”
Our 85th was a huge collective collaboration of friends and family and music of course. Production By Joel Aaron Gammage www.HatRodProductions.com
