14 DAY TRIAL // With a career that spanned nearly 70 years and amassed over 100 hit songs, Ray Price was certainly a well known name within the country music industry. He was also a member of the Country Music Hall of Fame. He died
on Monday in his home in Mount Pleasant, Texas at age 87, following a battle with pancreatic cancer.
He is billed with reinventing the honky-tonk genre, developing his personal style in the early '50s and thus bringing country music back to the public's attention, at a time when its popularity had begun to fade.
Making use of lush rhythms and a powerful shuffle beat, Ray Price founded the Cherokee Cowboys, who, over time, also featured names such as Willie Nelson, Roger Miller and Johnny Paycheck.
It was during this time that he wrote hit songs like “Crazy Arms” and “Heartaches By the Number.”
Later, “Crazy Arms” would be known as the “Ray Price shuffle,” of which he said “I don't know were it came from. It's just what I wanted. Everybody at the [recording] session thought it was the funniest thing they ever heard. They just thought it was strange. It was – and it was on the charts for 45 weeks.”
When he was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer back in 2012, Price showed much resilience, claiming that his only complain was the upset stomach that radiation treatment was giving him.
He continued to play during shows, despite his advanced age, often being the opening act for his son Cliff's shows. It is said that he planned to record a new album to be called “Love Songs.”
He also displayed a sharp sense of humor when he was quoted as saying “The doctor said that every man will have cancer if he lives to be old enough. I don't know why I got it – I ain't old.”