Roger Miller: biography

Born and raised in America's cotton belt and claimed by lung-cancer before he was sixty, Roger Miller produced some of Country music's most memorable songs.

Roger Miller - Beginnings

Roger Miller was the Country singer who became King of The Charts.
He gave the world some of the genre's classic hits and won his way into the pop music charts when his biggest hits, "Dang Me" and "King of The Road" made the charts across the USA and Europe in the mid 1960s.
Born in Fort Worth, Texas on January 2, 1936, Miller was just 13 months old when his father died. His three uncles took over the role of caring for the boy. Raised in Erick, Oklahoma, Miller learned to play the fiddle, but what he really wanted was a guitar. He crossed into Texas and stole one, but guilt took hold and he turned himself in next day.
The authorities offered 17-year-old Miller a choice - jail or the army. He took the army and saw service in Korea. When he signed out of the service he won - then flunked - an audition with RCA.
He got his break when hired as fiddle player for Ray Price's band but it was Roger Miller's music which brought him success.

"I just don't want to be forgotten." (Career and achievement)

Price scored a major hit with the Miller's song "Invitation To The Blues," and he found his writing services in huge demand. Top singers like Ernest Tubb , Faron Young and Jim Reeves all benefited from Miller's writing skills. Miller co-wrote one huge hit, "When Two Worlds Collide", with Bill Anderson but in 1964 decided to try acting. He was paid $1800 for a single recording session which created 18 songs for Mercury's Smash Hits label. One of the songs was a number called "Dang Me", and Miller quit acting to promote the song which spent six weeks at the top of the charts in 1964. The follow up - "King Of The Road" - became one Roger Miller's best known songs and topped the charts for five weeks in 1965. The opening line of the "King Of The Road" lyrics- "Trailers for sale or rent, rooms to let, fifty cents," is one of Country music's most iconic lyrics.
Miller later won seven Tony awards for the score of the Broadway Musical, "Big River".
In 1991, Miller found out he had lung cancer and died on October 25, 1992 aged just 56. In 1995, he was posthumously awarded a place in the Country music hall of fame. When asked how he wanted to be remembered, Miller said: "I just don't want to be forgotten."