‘Tennessee Bird Walk’ flew to No. 1 spot
Most music lovers are aware that songs have been written about most any subject you could imagine and perhaps a few subjects you might not imagine, but this week in 1970, a husband and wife duet with a song about bird baths and fowl in underwear was on the way to the top of the music charts.
Jack Blanchard says he got the idea for “Tennessee Birdwalk” from an old standard love ballad titled “Don’t Take your Love From Me.” The first line in the song was “Would you take the wings from birds so that they can’t fly?”
Blanchard said, “I was always looking for the cute twists to songs and song ideas. I made a wisecrack to Misty (his wife), “Would you take the wings from birds so that they have to walk? It was then that one line lead to another, and we finished the song in about 20 minutes.”
The husband and wife duo recorded the tune in Nashville at 12:55 a.m. on a Saturday morning recording session which had started the night before. The musicians were tired as it was their last session of a long work week.
At ten to one in the morning, the band started packing up their instruments when Misty hollered, “Hey hold on — we have another song to do.” The musicians grumbled at first but as they got into the practice of the tune, they liked it.
The song was recorded in one take, with no overdubs — three minutes to run through it and three minutes to record it. Jack would later beg the record label not to release the recording. He was worried about being tagged as a novelty act. Jack now admits that it was the only time he was ever wrong!
The single became a smash hit, crossing over in many areas of the country. For a while, the record seemed to be playing everywhere. And after many years in the musical trenches of trying to get a hit record, Jack Blanchard and Misty Morgan became overnight sensations.
“Tennessee Birdwalk” entered the country music charts Feb. 7, 1970, made it to No. 1 the week of April 4th and stayed there for two weeks. It was on the country charts for 19 weeks.
The single also scored a No. 23 on the pop music charts.