Birth name Lloyd A. Sparks Name Randy Sparks Years active 1958–current | Instruments guitar, banjo Role Musician | |
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Movies The Big Night, The Young Land Albums The New Christy Minstrels' Greatest Hits Music group The New Christy Minstrels (Since 1961) Similar People Dolan Ellis, Barry McGuire, Diane Jergens, Gayle Caldwell, Jerry Yester | ||
today by randy sparks 4 1 2012
Randy Sparks (born 29 July 1933, Leavenworth, Kansas) is a musician, singer-songwriter and founder of The New Christy Minstrels and The Back Porch Majority.
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Sparks grew up in Oakland, California and attended the University of California at Berkeley. His first musical engagement was at the Purple Onion in San Francisco. In the late 1950s, he had a solo career and released two albums on the Verve label, a self-titled album in 1958 and Walking the Low Road in 1959. The single "Walkin' The Low Road" had previously reached the Cashbox magazine Top 60.
In 1960, he formed a trio called "The Randy Sparks Three" and had an album by that same name. He wrote the song "Today" which was a hit for the New Christy Minstrels for their 1964 album of the same title for Columbia Records (CL 2159/CS 8959) and he wrote "Green, Green" with Barry McGuire for the 1963 album Ramblin (CL 2055/CS 8855).
Sparks had the starring role in a 1960 film drama, The Big Night.
Sparks also sang the opening credits of the theme song of the movie Thunder Road. In an email to DJ Allyn in 2009, he explains how Robert Mitchum had asked that he play his kid brother in the movie and writing the music, but ended up just singing the theme song written by Mitchum.
In 2009, a Golden Palm Star on the Palm Springs, California, Walk of Stars was dedicated to him and The New Christy Minstrels.