Wiggins, Little Roy
The Professional Work of Little Roy Wiggins
Ivan Leroy “Little Roy” Wiggins (Jun. 27, 1926 ~ Aug. 3, 1999) Steel guitarist Little Roy Wiggins was born in Nashville, Tennessee and he found success just outside his front door. As a child, he liked both Hawaiian and country music and he quickly became proficient on the lap steel guitar. At age fourteen Wiggins was playing with Paul Howard and his Arkansas Cotton Pickers on the famed Grand Ole Opry radio show. Wiggins moved to the highly rated ensemble, Pee Wee King and the Golden West Cowboys when their steel guitarist, Cousin Jody, was enlisted into the military. When Jody returned, Wiggins played for the blind country singer Pete Cassell.
In 1943 Pee Wee King's vocalist, Eddy Arnold, went solo and asked Wiggins to play steel guitar in his Tennessee Plowboys band. Arnold was soon the biggest star in country music. I'll Hold You in My Heart (1947) topped the US country charts for 21 weeks, Anytime for nine weeks and Bouquet of Roses (1948) for 19 weeks, all featuring Wiggins. Wiggins' crying steel guitar was the hallmark of Eddy Arnold's early style, the style that made him country music's biggest star in the late 1940s.
Arnold, with his smart suits and smooth sound, was more sophisticated than other country stars and was viewed suspiciously by diehard country fans. Eddy relied on Wiggins's steel guitar for country flourishes, notable records including Cattle Call (1955) and Make the World Go Away (1965). Wiggins made two solo albums, Mister Steel Guitar (1962) and 18 All Time Hits (1966).
Wiggins spent 25 years with Eddy Arnold and he told Country Music People in 1975, "I never felt close to Eddy Arnold. It was more like an employer/ employee relationship." He was happier with his next employer, George Morgan, the father of country music singer Lorrie Morgan. Morgan featured him on the 1973 single Mr Ting-A-Ling (Steel Guitar Man).
George recorded an entire album featuring the steel work of Little Roy Wiggins. After Morgan's death in 1975, Wiggins worked as a session player and toured with Ernest Ashworth and the Willis Brothers. In 1978, he toured UK country clubs as a solo act, backed by Jon Derek's Country Fever.
Despite his reservations about Arnold, he made an album, Songs I Played for Eddy Arnold (1969) and also worked for Grammer Guitars, becoming the company president. During the early-1970s, Little Roy Wiggins operated a a steel guitar shop across the street from Tootsie's and Sho-Bud, on lower Broadway in Nashville, Tennessee. In 1985 he was inducted into the Steel Guitar Hall of Fame and then moved to a new shop in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee, where he sold his own cassettes and instructional videos. In recent years, despite diabetes and heart disease, he continued playing at steel guitar conventions.
The name "Little Roy" is misleading! He was considered an Icon during his early years and was the most imitated player at that time. That era is long past but the popularity of "Little Roy" continues today. Like so many other players Roy used the E13th tuning but had his own sound that complimented Eddy Arnold's singing style.
Country music lost one of its most distinctive sounds with the death of steel guitarist Little Roy Wiggins on August 3, 1999.
