Bobby Bare
Robert Joseph Bare Sr. (born April 7, 1935) is an American country music singer and songwriter, best known for the songs "Marie Laveau", "Detroit City", and "500 Miles Away from Home". He is the father of Bobby Bare Jr., also a musician.
Also recorded as Robert Joseph Bare Sr. · Bobby Bare Sr.
Bobby Bare
RCA Records/Jack Roberts Agency · eBay item photo front photo back · Public domain
- Name
- Bobby Bare Sr.
- Occupation
- Singer-songwriter
- Birth Name
- Robert Joseph Bare
- Born
- 7 April 1935
- Birthplace
- Ironton, Ohio, U.S.
- Full name
- Robert Joseph Bare.
- Nationality
- United States
- Fields
- country music
- Languages
- English
VALÉORINE Encyclopedia
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Documentary summary
Robert Joseph Bare Sr. (born April 7, 1935) is an American country music singer and songwriter, best known for the songs "Marie Laveau", "Detroit City", and "500 Miles Away from Home". He is the father of Bobby Bare Jr., also a musician.
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Authority files
museum · 19112083 · wikidata · Q888450 · wikipedia · Bobby Bare
In this article
Key facts
Key facts
• Name — Bobby Bare Sr. • Occupation — Singer-songwriter • Birth Name — Robert Joseph Bare • Born — 7 April 1935 • Birthplace — Ironton, Ohio, U.S. • Genre — * Country • progressive country • Instrument — Vocals, guitar • Years Active — 1956–present • Label — * Capitol • RCA Victor • Mercury • Columbia • Plowboy • Past Member Of — Old Dogs • Website — bobbybare.com
Early career
Early career
Bare was born in Ironton, Ohio, on April 7, 1935. In the 1950s, he repeatedly tried and failed to sell his songs. He finally got a record deal, with Capitol Records, and recorded a few unsuccessful rock and roll singles. Just before he was drafted into the United States Army, he wrote a song called "The All American Boy" and did a demonstration tape (demo) for his friend, Bill Parsons, to learn how to record. Instead of using Parsons' later version, the record company, Fraternity Records, decided to go with Bare's original demo. The record reached number two on the Billboard Hot 100, but Fraternity erroneously credited Bill Parsons on the label. The same track, with the same billing error, peaked at number 22 in the UK Singles Chart in April 1959. In 1965, an album of older recorded material, Tender Years (JM-6026), was released on the Hilltop label. That same year, the material was repackaged by Sears and released under the title Bobby in Song (SPS-115).
Career at RCA Victor (1962–1970)
Career at RCA Victor (1962–1970)
Bare's big break in country music came when Chet Atkins signed him to RCA Victor. His debut single for the label was 1962's "Shame on Me". Follow-up "Detroit City" reached number six on the Country and number 16 on the Hot 100 charts, and in 1964 earned him a Grammy Award for Best Country & Western Recording. Then, a surge of hits followed, including "500 Miles Away from Home" (based on a traditional folk ballad written by Hedy West as "500 Miles") and Ian Tyson's "Four Strong Winds". In 1965, he received two further Grammy nominations for Best Country & Western Vocal Performance and Best Country & Western single for the latter song. In 1966, he received a yet another Grammy Nomination for Best Country & Western Male Vocal Performance for his song "Talk Me Some Sense". He also recorded two duet albums with Skeeter Davis and recorded six tracks as a trio with Norma Jean and Liz Anderson, which produced a major hit with "The Game of Triangles", a wife-husband-other woman drama that hit number five on the Billboard chart and earned the trio a Grammy nomination. In 1968, he recorded an album with a group from England called The Hillsiders. In 1969, he had a top-five hit with Tom T. Hall's "(Margie's At) The Lincoln Park Inn".
Career at Mercury (1970–1972)
Career at Mercury (1970–1972)
Bare moved to Mercury Records in 1970 and immediately scored a top-three hit with "How I Got to Memphis", and also had two top-10 hits with early Kris Kristofferson compositions, "Come Sundown" and "Please Don't Tell Me How the Story Ends" (both 1971). He also scored a number-12 hit in 1972 with a version of Dr. Hook and the Medicine Show's pop hit "Sylvia's Mother", written by Shel Silverstein.
Return to RCA Victor (1973–1977)
Return to RCA Victor (1973–1977)
• Illustration — Bare in 1973 Bare returned to RCA in 1973, after two years at Mercury. and scored once more with Billy Joe Shaver's "Ride Me Down Easy", which nearly made the top 10. He started to release novelty songs recorded live with selected audiences. One such song, "Marie Laveau", topped the country chart in 1974; the song was Bare's only number-one hit. It was co-written by his friends Silverstein and Baxter Taylor, who received a BMI Award for the song in 1975. In 1977, Bare released an entire album of songs by songwriter Bob McDill called Me and McDill, which contained the popular hit "Look Who I'm Cheatin' on Tonight". Silverstein penned other songs for Bare, including a Grammy-nominated hit, "Daddy What If", which he recorded with his five-year-old son, Bobby Bare Jr. The song was an immediate success, as well, not only reaching number two on the country charts, but nearly reaching the top 40 on the pop charts. Bare's album, Sings Lullabys, Legends and Lies, became his most commercially successful album, finding him a new audience, with pop radio once again playing his songs and also gaining a new following with college kids. These songs, all 14 written or co-written by Shel Silverstein, however, became Bare's last top-10 hits. In 1975, Bare recorded a children's album with his family, mainly of Silverstein songs, called Singin' in the Kitchen. It was nominated in Best Group category in Grammy Awards. His biggest hits during this time included "Alimony" (1975), "The Winner" (1976), and "Drop Kick Me, Jesus (Through the Goalposts of Life)" (an unusual Christian-football waltz and a 1976 Grammy nominee for Best Country Song). In 1977, he recorded "Redneck Hippie Romance" and "Vegas" (a duet with his wife Jeannie).
Career at Columbia (1978–1983)
Career at Columbia (1978–1983)
Bare signed with Columbia Records and continued to have hits including "Sleep Tight Good Night Man", which barely cracked the top 10 in 1978, alongside continuing to score critical acclaim with his releases Bare and Sleeper Wherever I Fall. In 1979, he started off Rosanne Cash's career in a big way by being her duet partner on the top-20 hit "No Memories Hangin' Round". In 1980, he almost cracked the top 10 with "Numbers", which came from his album Down and Dirty. On that album, Bare started to experiment with Southern rock, which continued with his following album, Drunk and Crazy (1980). The next year, Bare returned to his country roots with his Rodney Crowell-produced album As Is, featuring the single "New Cut Road". Bare was still doing well chartwise into the early 1980s. In 1983, his duet with Lacy J. Dalton, "It's a Dirty Job", hit the top 30. His last foray into the top 30 came that summer with the novelty song "The Jogger". He also released "Used Cars", the theme song from the film of the same name.
Film career
Film career
Bare was also given an opportunity to star in movies. He acted in a Western with Troy Donahue, A Distant Trumpet, and had a memorable scene being branded for desertion, and a few episodes of the TV series No Time for Sergeants. He turned his back on Hollywood to pursue his country music career.
Later country career (1983–present)
Later country career (1983–present)
From 1983 to 1988, Bare hosted Bobby Bare and Friends on The Nashville Network, which featured him interviewing songwriters who sang their hit songs on the show. In 1985, he signed with EMI America Records, where he scored three low-charting singles. In 1998, he formed the band Old Dogs, with Jerry Reed, Mel Tillis, and Waylon Jennings. As of 2023, he is the last surviving member of the group. In 2005, he released his first new album in two decades, The Moon Was Blue, produced by his son Bobby Bare Jr., who is also a musician. He continues to tour today. In 2012, Bare performed a duet of the song "I'd Fight the World" on the Jamey Johnson album Living for a Song: A Tribute to Hank Cochran. On April 10, 2013, the CMA announced that Bare would be a 2013 inductee into the Country Music Hall of Fame. Other 2013 inductees included Cowboy Jack Clement and Kenny Rogers. After being inducted in the 1960s, but gradually drifting away, Bare was reinstated as a member of the Grand Ole Opry on April 7, 2018, by Garth Brooks.
Eurovision 2012
Eurovision 2012
In January and February 2012, Bare joined Petter Øien at the 2012 Melodi Grand Prix to compete for Norway's entry to the 2012 Eurovision Song Contest to be held in Baku, Azerbaijan, in May. His song "Things Change" got through to the Norwegian final, in which Øien and Bare finished third.
Filmography
Filmography
• A Distant Trumpet (1964)... Pvt. Cranshaw • Bobbie Jo and the Outlaw (1976)... Singer
Identity and origins
Identity and origins
Bobby Bare was recorded at birth as Robert Joseph Bare. The authorities additionally record the headings Robert Joseph Bare Sr. And Bobby Bare Sr. His recorded language was English. One child is recorded: Bobby Bare, Jr.
Identity
Identity
Bobby Bare is recorded as singer, singer-songwriter, musician and bandleader.

Bobby Bare performing at the Grand Ole Opry in 2017
Rilobarnes

"God Bless America Again" (#XWKS-2418) by Bobby Bare. Side-A label of the US single release (#74-0264)
RCA Records
Life and career
Dated record
Life and career
Explore 1965–2010
The full dated record · 3 entries
1965
Skeeter Davis & Bobby Bare – Tunes For Two (1965) is digitised and catalogued by Internet Archive.
2009
Bobby Bare Jr. Live at Hideout Block Party 2009-09-12 (2009) is digitised and catalogued by Internet Archive.
2010
Bobby Bare Jr. Live at The Fillmore on 2010-10-31 (2010) is digitised and catalogued by Internet Archive.
Places
Named by the record
Places
Only places the record itself states, plotted where the house gazetteer settles their coordinates. Nothing is inferred from a name or a nationality.
United States.
Country
Ironton.
Birth place
Ohio.
Administrative region
Primary material
Documents and archives
reference work
- “Bobby Bare”, English Wikipedia, consulted as further reading
Reputable secondary · Wikipedia
- Wikidata, structured authority record Q888450: Bobby Bare
Reputable secondary · Wikidata
scholarly publication
- I saw Bobby Bare kiss Marty Stuart, The Girl Singer, 2021
Scholarly · Crossref registry · 2021
Awards and nominations
• Year — Organization — Award — Nominee/Work — Result • 1964 — Grammy Awards — Best Country & Western Recording — "Detroit City" • 1965 — "Four Strong Winds" • Best Country & Western Vocal Performance - Male — "Four Strong Winds" • 1966 — "Talk Me Some Sense" • 1968 — Best Country & Western Performance Duet, Trio or Group (Vocal or Instrumental) — "The Game of Triangles" • 1975 — Best Country Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal — "Daddy What If" • 1999 — Country Music Association Awards — Musical Event of the Year — "Old Dogs"
Other sources
Other sources
• Vinicur, Dale. (1998). "Bobby Bare". In The Encyclopedia of Country Music. Paul Kingsbury, Editor. New York: Oxford University Press. pp. 28–29. • Bobby Bare Sr. Interview at NAMM Oral History Collection (2017)
References
Citations
References
Each reference names the institution holding it, so a reader may go to the document itself.
scholarly publication
I saw Bobby Bare kiss Marty Stuart, The Girl Singer, 2021Crossref registry
Verifiedreference work
Partially resolvedreference work
Partially resolved
A further 1 witness is held back from this article because the person or object named in it is not yet resolved to this record. They are kept, not discarded, and return once the identity is established.
The Encyclopedia exists whether or not anything is for sale. Corrections are recorded rather than overwritten, and every version of this record is kept. Published 14 August 2026.
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