Country Music Hall of Fame chooses three

NASHVILLE — Jim Ed Brown said he was as nervous as a mosquito at a nudist colony at Tuesday's announcement that he and his sisters Bonnie and Maxine would be joining the Country Music Hall of Fame.

"I know what to do, but I don't know where to start."

The Browns, who recorded the 1959 crossover smash The Three Bells and several other country hits during the '50s and '60s, will join the Oak Ridge Boys and guitarist Grady Martin in the Hall's 2015 class.

"This means so much to us," Maxine Brown said. "I thought we'd never get it!"

Brenda Lee, who announced the inductees, called the Browns "perhaps the most influential vocal group of the Nashville Sound era. … They helped establish as Music City USA."

Jim Ed Brown also had hits as a solo artist and a duo act with Helen Cornelius after the Browns disbanded in 1967. He was diagnosed last year with lung cancer but told the audience at the Country Music Hall of Fame Wednesday, "Cancer's no fun, but I've made it through. I'm in remission."

The Oak Ridge Boys, a vocal quartet with roots in the gospel music of the 1940s, saw their career take off when they began recording secular music in 1977. They backed Paul Simon on Slip Sliding Away. "That opened the door to the pop music world," Lee said. Their biggest hits, like Elvira, Bobbie Sue and American Made, got play on both country and pop stations during the '70s and '80s.

The group's core lineup — Joe Bonsall, Duane Allen, William Lee Golden and Richard Sterban — has released more than 40 albums.

Bonsall said for the past several years, he'd listen to the radio broadcast of the Hall of Fame induction ceremony, hearing the likes of Garth Brooks, Kenny Rogers and Ronnie Milsap being honored, then he'd go to sleep thinking, "Maybe next year." This year, he says, "We're down here. Somebody else can turn over and go back to sleep."

Grady Martin, inducted in the category for recording and performing musicians prior to 1980, "may not be well known to the casual music fan, but many of his licks are instantly recognizable, his guitar licks," Lee said. "In a career that spanned five decades and touched millions of listeners around the world, he played guitar on some of the world's most important and memorable works, regardless of genre."

A member of Nashville's fabled A Team session players, Martin played guitar on Marty Robbins' El Paso, Roy Orbison's Oh Pretty Woman and Willie Nelson's On the Road Again. He also recorded with Elvis Presley, Bob Dylan, Joan Baez, Bing Crosby and Buddy Holly, as well as country acts Johnny Cash, Kris Kristofferson, Waylon Jennings, Patsy Cline, Ernest Tubb and Ray Price.

"He played on everything I ever recorded," Lee said. "I wouldn't do a session unless he was present."

His son Joshua Martin called him "one of the greatest guitar players to ever walk the earth."

The three new Hall of Famers will be formally inducted during a medallion ceremony later this year.