Faron Young (February 25, 1932 – December 10, 1996) was an American country music producer, musician, and songwriter from the early 1950s into the mid-1980s. Hits including "If You Ain't Lovin' (You Ain't Livin')" and "Live Fast, Love Hard, Die Young" marked him as a honky-tonk singer in sound and personal style; and his chart-topping singles "Hello Walls" and "It's Four in the Morning" showed his versatility as a vocalist.
Known as the " Hillbilly Heartthrob ", and following a singing cowboy film role as the "Young Sheriff ", Young's singles charted for more than 30 years.
In failing health, he died by suicide at the age of only 64 in 1996.[1] Young is a member of the Country Music Hall of Fame.
Young was born in Shreveport, Louisiana, the youngest of six children of Harlan and Doris Young. He grew up on a dairy farm his family operated outside the city.
Young began singing at an early age, imagining a career as a pop singer. However, after he joined some friends watching Hank Williams perform with nine encores on the Louisiana Hayride, Young switched to country music instead. He performed at the local Optimist Club and was discovered by Webb Pierce, who brought him to star on the Hayride in 1951, then broadcast on KWKH-AM.
He graduated from Fair Park High School that year and attended Centenary College of Louisiana.
Young recorded in Shreveport. His first releases were on Philadelphia's Gotham Records.[2] By February 1952, he was signed to Capitol Records, where he recorded for the next ten years. His first Capitol single appeared that spring.
Young moved to Nashville, Tennessee, and recorded his first chart hit, "Goin' Steady" in October 1952. His career was sidetracked when he was drafted into the United States Army the following month. "Goin' Steady" hit the Billboard country charts while Young was in basic training. It peaked at No. 2, and the US Army Band took Young to replace Eddie Fisher on tours—its first country music singer—just as "If You Ain't Lovin'" was hitting the charts.[2] He was discharged in November 1954.
From 1954 to 1962, Young recorded many honky-tonk songs for Capitol, including the first hit version of Don Gibson's "Sweet Dreams". Most famous was "Hello Walls", a Willie Nelson song Young turned into a crossover hit in 1961.[2] It sold over one million copies, and was awarded a gold disc.[3]
During the mid-1950s, Young starred in four low-budget films: Hidden Guns, Daniel Boone, Trail Blazer, Raiders of Old California and Country Music Holiday. He appeared as himself in cameo roles and performances in later country music films and was a frequent guest on television shows throughout his career, including ABC-TV's Ozark Jubilee. His band, the Country Deputies, was one of country music's top bands which toured for many years. He invested in real estate along Nashville's Music Row in the 1960s and, in 1963, co-founded, with Preston Temple, the trade magazine, Music City News.
The same year, Young switched to Mercury Records and drifted musically, but by the end of the decade he had returned to his sound including "Wine Me Up". Released in 1971, waltz-time ballad "It's Four in the Morning" written by Jerry Chesnut[citation needed] was one of Young's records and his last number one hit, also becoming his only major success in the United Kingdom, where it peaked at No. 3 on the pop charts.
By the mid-1970s his records were becoming overshadowed by his behavior, making headlines in 1972 when he was charged with assault for spanking a girl in the audience at a concert in Clarksburg, West Virginia, who he claimed spat on him,[2] and for other later incidents. In the mid-70s, Young was the spokesman for BC Powder.[4]
Young signed with MCA Records in 1979; the association lasted two years. Nashville independent label Step One Records signed him in 1988 where he recorded into the early 1990s (including a duet album with Ray Price), then withdrew from public view. Although country acts including BR549 were putting his music before audiences in the mid-1990s, Young apparently felt the music industry, which had undergone a revolution of sorts in 1991, had mostly rejected him.[2]
Faron Young's son Robyn followed him into the country music business starting in 1975. Robyn was the main headliner at his father's night club, Faron Young's Jailhouse. In the early 1980s Robyn began touring with his father, performing as an opening act.[citation needed]
Young briefly dated Billie Jean Jones before she became the second wife of country music superstar Hank Williams. It was through Young where Jones was first introduced to Williams, who went on to wed Williams in October 1952.[citation needed]
In 1952, while Young was stationed at Fort McPherson, he met his future wife Hilda Macon, the daughter of an Army master sergeant and the great-granddaughter of Uncle Dave Macon. The couple married two years later in November 1954 after Young was discharged from the Army. They had four children, sons Damion, Robyn and Kevin, and a daughter Alana.[citation needed]
Young's later life was plagued with bouts of depression and alcoholism. In 1972, Young was arrested and charged with assault for spanking a girl in the audience at a concert in Clarksburg, West Virginia, after claiming she spat on him.[2] Young appeared before a Wood County, West Virginia, justice of the peace and was fined $24, plus $11 in court costs.[5] On the night of December 4, 1984, Young fired a pistol into the kitchen ceiling of his Harbor Island home. When he refused to seek help for his drinking problem, Young and his wife Hilda separated, sold their home, and bought individual houses. When asked at the divorce trial if he feared hurting someone by shooting holes into the ceiling, Young answered "Not whatsoever." The couple divorced after 32 years of marriage in 1986.[citation needed]
A combination of feeling he had been abandoned by country music and despondency over his deteriorating health were cited as possible reasons as to why Young shot himself on December 9, 1996, then died in Nashville the following day and was later cremated.[6] His ashes were spread by his family over Old Hickory Lake outside Nashville at Johnny Cash and June Carter Cash's home while the Cashes were away.[7]
In 2012, the UK-based Jasmine Records released a budget-minded 2-CD box set entitled Live Fast, Love Hard, Die Young: The Early Album Collection. The set focused on Young's first four albums. Later in 2012, Real Gone Music released a similar compilation which combined Young's first six albums with key singles.
Two years before Young's death, the German independent record label Bear Family Records released a box set entitled The Classic Years 1952–1962, which showcased Young's early recordings for Capitol. It did not include Young's recordings for Mercury or Step One.
Young's final recordings were released on a CD entitled "Are You Hungry? Eat Your Import," by the record label Showboat Records, which was founded by fellow country music star Liz Anderson.
Actor Fred Parker Jr. portrayed Young in the biopic I Saw the Light, released on March 25, 2016.[10]
