Born 84 Years Ago Today in Mississippi, the Trailblazing Country Star Who First Wrote and Recorded This Reba McEntire Classic

It was a few years later, I showed up here / And they still tell the legend of how you disappeared, Taylor Swift sings in “The Lucky One”, a non-single track from her 2012 album Red. How you took the money and your dignity and got the hell out /They say you bought a bunch of land somewhere. While Swift has never explicitly confirmed the subject of this song, many believe she was referring to country singer Bobbie Gentry, who achieved international fame with her 1967 Southern Gothic hit “Ode to Billie Joe”.

Charting 11 singles on the Billboard Hot 100 and winning several Grammy Awards—including Best New Artist in 1967—Gentry retired from performing in 1982 and hasn’t been publicly spotted since. But today, we’re diving into the life and career of this country-folk trailblazer, born in Chickasaw County, Mississippi, on this day (July 27) in 1942.

Who Is Bobbie Gentry?

Born Roberta Lee Streeter, Bobbie Gentry grew up on a farm sans electricity or plumbing with her paternal grandparents after her parents’ divorce.

The story goes that she composed her first song, “My Dog Sergeant Is a Good Dog”, at age seven, on a piano for which her grandmother had traded one of the family’s milk cows.

At 13, she moved to Palm Springs, California, to live with her mother, and the two briefly performed as the duo Ruby and Bobbie Meyers. She began performing at a local country club while still in high school, adopting her stage name from the 1952 film Ruby Gentry.

Upon graduating from Palm Valley School in 1960, Gentry studied philosophy at UCLA before transferring to the Los Angeles Conservatory of Music. Supporting herself with clerical jobs, she majored in theory, counterpoint and composition.

She Didn’t Even Want To Sing on Her Breakout Hit

All Bobbie Gentry ever wanted to do was write songs for other artists. She never wanted the spotlight. In fact, Gentry told The Washington Post that she only sang on the recording of “Ode to Billie Joe” that she took to Capitol because it was cheaper than hiring someone to sing it.

Gentry brought that one, along with “Mississippi Delta,” to Capitol Records, which officially signed her on June 23, 1967. “Ode to Billie Joe” is a sparse, half-spoken recounting of the suicide of Billie Joe McAllister, a local boy who “jumped off the Tallahatchie Bridge.”

“Ode to Billie Joe” spent four weeks atop the Billboard Hot 100, selling more than 300 million copies across the globe and prompting producers to quickly cobble together a full-length record from the 12 demos Gentry had recorded.

Released in August 1967, her debut LP, Ode to Billie Joe, dethroned the Beatles’ Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band at the top of the Billboard 200.

From 1968 to 1971, she hosted her own variety series on the UK’s BBC Two, becoming the first female songwriter to do so.

Finding (And Leaving) the Spotlight

Before retiring, Bobbie Gentry released seven studio albums, including a 1968 duets album with Glen Campbell and 1970’s Fancy, featuring the self-penned title track that Reba McEntire would take to the top 10 in 1990.

One of the first female artists to write most of her own material, Gentry’s final studio album, Patchwork, came in 1971. In addition to writing every single song, she also produced the album entirely on her own.

Bobbie Gentry has not been publicly seen or interviewed since attending the Academy of Country Music Awards ceremony on April 30, 1982.

Her whereabouts remained unknown until a 2016 investigation by The Washington Post revealed that Gentry was living in a gated community near Memphis, Tennessee—roughly two hours from the site of the Tallahatchie Bridge that made her famous.

Four years later, she was inducted into the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame in 2020.

[RELATED: Bobbie Gentry’s “Ode to Billie Joe” Isn’t About What You Think It Is]

Today, Bobbie Gentry is 84 years old. And despite more than 40 years out of the spotlight, her talent and tenacity continue to light the path for artists like Miranda Lambert, Kacey Musgraves and Tanya Tucker.

Featured image by Larry Ellis Collection/Getty Images

The post Born 84 Years Ago Today in Mississippi, the Trailblazing Country Star Who First Wrote and Recorded This Reba McEntire Classic appeared first on American Songwriter.