This sad news from Spectropop. Record producer, musician, songwriter, and publisher Scotty Turner (aka Scotty Turnbull) passed away peacefully in New York (with his son Trevor and daughter Adrienne at his bedside) on February 9th 2009.Born Graham Morrison Turnbull in Sydney, Nova Scotia, Canada in 1931, Scotty represented Canada in the long jump at the British Empire Games in 1954. After suffering a serious injury, Scotty turned his attention to music in 1955. He taught himself to play guitar and eventually purchased a Fender Stratocaster before moving to Lubbock, Texas to pursue post grad studies at Texas Tech as well as to teach part time at Lubbock High School. There he befriended a young Buddy Holly.
Scotty and Buddy ultimately wrote 13 songs together. Scotty also recorded at the Norman Petty Studios in Clovis, New Mexico, which Holly made famous.
Scotty went on to have an illustrious career in the music industry spanning over 50 years. It's hard to condense the highlights of Scotty's career into a few paras, but here goes. Scotty was lead guitarist for Tommy Sands's backing group 'The Raiders / aka The Sharks' (which also included the legendary drummer Hal Blaine) for some two years, during which time he toured Australia twice on the Lee Gordon rock'n'roll 'Big Show' tours. Scotty also wrote / co-wrote and played lead guitar on some of Sands's biggest hits including 'The Worryin' Kind' and 'Blue Ribbon Baby'. While in Australia, Scotty struck up a friendship with the legendary Australian rocker Johnny
O'Keefe. This friendship led to Scotty writing / co-writing four songs for O'Keefe, including his first No. 1 hit 'She's My Baby'. Scotty was also instrumental in getting O'Keefe a recording contract with Liberty Records.
Scotty subsequently joined pop vocalist Guy Mitchell as his lead guitarist and musical director and in turn Eddie Fisher in the same roles. While continuing to write, Scotty then turned to record production, initially joining his friend Herb Alpert at A&M Records. He then moved on to Central Songs in Hollywood, before becoming the executive producer for the country division of Liberty / Imperial
Records. This led to a transfer to Nashville where he went on to produce 20 plus albums for Slim Whitman, as well as producing sessions for many country greats including Willie Nelson, Tammy Wynette, Waylon Jennings, Mel Tillis, and Bobby Bare.
Scotty ultimately wrote in excess of 400 songs, collaborating with the likes of Buddy Holly, Audie Murphy (including the classic 'Shutters And Boards'), Herb Alpert, John Marascalco, Doc Pomus, Guy Mitchell, Nilsson, Tommy Sands, Diane Lampert, Cliffie Stone and many others. His songs were recorded by such artists as Dean Martin, Slim Whitman, Gene Vincent, Jerry Wallace, Tennesse Ernie Ford, Herb Alpert, and the list goes on.
In the early 1960s Scotty acquired a special guitar called a "lyric harp" which had been designed by a retired LA cabinetmaker. The guitar had a very unusual shape and the bracing caused the 12 strings to resonate or cut through without the predominant overtones that most 12 string guitars possess. Phil Spector happened to hear Scotty's
"strange" guitar (which Phil later dubbed 'The Animal') ringing in the booth of Gold Star Studios as Scotty worked with Harry Nilsson one evening. Phil duly asked Scotty to play on some sessions. Scotty recalls one particular session. "It's 2 a.m. and my phone rings and Phil asks if I can come down to Gold Star with 'The Animal.' I
arrived at the studio and Phil says `I'll play the cut so you can get the chords,' and full blast at 2:30 a.m. comes 'You've Lost That Lovin' Feeling' by The Righteous Brothers. When it was over I was paralysed! We spent about five hours getting it right. Phil said, 'I guess I owe you for two sessions' (Scotty recalls session fees as being $37.50 in those days). I said, 'No, pay me for one, but I want a test pressing on that record as it's the best one I've ever heard.' Sure enough Phil left one at Gold Star for me and I've still got it. All the money in the world couldn't buy the tricks I learnt from Phil production wise. He had the ultimate ears and proved it every time he went into the studio."
