Jimmy Dickens, an Outsize Country Singer, Dies at 94

[Fansome]

Jimmy Dickens, an Outsize Country Singer, Dies at 94

By BILL FRISKICS-WARRENJAN. 2, 2015

Little Jimmy Dickens had hits like “May the Bird of Paradise Fly Up Your Nose” (1965).

NASHVILLE — Little Jimmy Dickens, the diminutive but big-voiced country singer best known for his novelty recordings and his self-deprecating sense of humor, died on Friday at a hospital here. He was 94.

Michael Manning, a staff member of the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum in Nashville, confirmed the death.

For decades a fan favorite at the Grand Ole Opry — and still active there into his 90s — Mr. Dickens stood 4-foot-11 and liked to joke about his stature, often referring to himself as “Mighty Mouse in Pajamas.” The label that stuck with him, though, was Tater, a nod to his 1949 hit “Take an Old Cold ’Tater (and Wait).” Hank Williams, his fellow Opry star at the time, supplied him with the nickname.

As good a ballad singer as he was a belter, Mr. Dickens had seven singles in the country Top 10 — and a total of 13 in the Top 40 — during his more than two decades on the country charts. Bearing titles like “Hillbilly Fever,” “Out Behind the Barn” and “A-Sleeping at the Foot of the Bed,” many of his records were unabashed paeans to rural life that evoked his years growing up in Appalachia. In his 1949 hit “Country Boy,” he sang:

I’m a country boy

A good old-fashioned country boy

I’ll be behind the ol’ gray mule

When the sun comes up on Monday.

Most of the numbers in Mr. Dickens’s repertoire were madcap and amusing, perhaps most notably “May the Bird of Paradise Fly Up Your Nose,” which spent two weeks at No. 1 on the country charts in 1965 and crossed over to the pop Top 20, securing Mr. Dickens guest spots on “The Tonight Show” and Dick Clark’s “Where the Action Is.” But one of his final hits, an over-the-top recitation released in 1970 called “(You’ve Been Quite a Doll) Raggedy Ann,” was more maudlin than funny.

James Cecil Dickens was born on Dec. 19, 1920, into a large coal-mining family in Bolt, W.Va. He began singing on the radio near Bolt in the late 1930s, initially billing himself as either Jimmy the Kid or the Singing Midget. Before long he was hosting shows in larger markets like Indianapolis and Cincinnati, where his talents came to the attention of the country star Roy Acuff in 1947.

Mr. Acuff introduced Mr. Dickens to the management of the Grand Ole Opry, which Mr. Dickens joined in 1948. He also brought him to the attention of the talent scout Art Satherley, who signed him to the country division of Columbia Records.

After moving to Nashville, Mr. Dickens hired members of the Western swing artist Paul Howard’s band and named them the Country Boys. Led by the twin lead guitars of Grady Martin and Jabbo Arrington, Mr. Dickens’s group pioneered a raucous, knee-slapping style that was a precursor to rockabilly.

He is survived by his wife, Mona, whom he married in 1971; two daughters, Pam and Lisa; and a number of grandchildren. Mr. Dickens was elected to the Country Music Hall of Fame in 1983. Radio stations were no longer playing his records by then, but he remained a popular performer on the Opry, sporting rhinestone-studded outfits rivaling those of the flamboyant old-timer Porter Wagoner while rubbing shoulders with 21st-century stars like Carrie Underwood and Brad Paisley. Mr. Dickens also continued to perform his early hits on the show, including his statement of purpose, “I’m Little but I’m Loud,” with its larger-than-life chorus: “I’m puny, short and little — but I’m loud!”