Austin City Limits Goes Live ( Part 3 - Nov 2, 2024)

by Scott Sosebee

This will conclude the series on the beginning of the ‘Austin City Limits.”

Bill Arhos had received the go-ahead from the Committee on Public Broadcasting’s Board of Directors to begin his project, but he still had to put together a show. His vision was to recreate the look, feel, and vibe of a live concert at a typical Austin venue, and he knew that he wanted to showcase the local music scene, but he also realized that for his first show, he had to find someone who could perhaps check all those aforementioned boxes: be emblematic of what was going on musically in Austin—and to some extent Texas writ large—but also appeal to a national audience. Trying to make all that happen, Arhos chose B.W. Stevenson to appear in the first “Austin City Limits” show.

Born Louis Charles Stevenson in Dallas, Stevenson was a member of an amazing high school class at Dallas’ Adamson High School as his classmates included Michael Martin Murphey, Ray Wylie Hubbard, and Larry Groce. He began performing at small bars around Dallas as Buckwheat Stevenson and moved to Austin in 1970 to become one of the many who were bringing “Progressive” or Outlaw Country to the city’s stages. Stevenson hit “lightening in a bottle” in 1973 when he, along with Daniel Moore, co-wrote what one executive once called “a bubble-gum sounding pop” ditty titled “My Maria.” A demo of the recording went to Linda Blaskey at ABC/Dunhill Records, and while she thought it had potential, she also thought it needed something extra. She asked Stevenson to write another verse. He added to and reworked the verse that began “gypsy lady. . .” and Blaskey thought it could be a hit. Stevenson recorded the song and an album for Dunhill and “My Maria” hit #9 on the Billboard Pop Charts in September 1974.  At the time, it made him the most successful of the new Austin musicians.

Arhos and his production team faced a very tight window to get their pilot shot. It was now deep into the summer 1974, and they had to have a show ready for broadcast in early 1975. They were going to use the University of Texas Communications Department stage, and also begged and borrowed equipment from numerous sources. Arhos' vision of staging was “a rug and a microphone,” and that was not that far from the truth of the final preparation. He also had to find an audience and they only had three or four days to somehow cobble together enough people to make the small auditorium on campus resemble having a crowd. They posted flyers and posters around the UT campus, as well as at the Armadillo World Headquarters, and other traditional venues. In the end, they convinced and cajoled about a hundred and fifty people to fill the audience, but it was still not more than half full.

Stevenson came out and did a traditional set of about an hour of music. The audience was enthusiastic, Stevenson was happy with his performance, and all seemed to be in order. Then, everything wasn’t. When the technicians played the tape after the concert the sound was barely audible, and the audience was bathed in darkness. Arhos knew he had a catastrophe on his hands because there was no way he could let this take onto the air. But, he had to have something ready. His bosses expected a pilot, and a debut had been scheduled. He had to think fast. Stevenson’s show was scrapped (he would come back and record a latter show in the first season), and Arhos reached to probably the person he should have called first anyway.

Willie Nelson, an Abbott, Texas native, had fled Nashville and its slick, corporate, heavily produced recording industry in 1970 and moved back to Texas. He then grew his hair long, stripped his music down to its bare bones, and began to “reinvent” himself in Austin. He was a regular at the Armadillo World Headquarters and had been a pioneer of the new sound in the city. His music, his lifestyle—Nelson, a heavy drinker in his early years had given up alcohol and now extolled the virtues of cannabis—and his persona was the perfect representation of the new Progressive Country sound. Nelson, at the time, was working on his concept album “Red Headed Stranger,” a work that most mainstream record executives wouldn’t touch when he had proposed it in 1973, but one that Columbia Records decided to take a chance on. It would go on to become a groundbreaking record that helped to take Progressive Country mainstream. Arhos asked and Nelson agreed to come tape a show on October 17, 1974. This time publicity—along with the main act—was enough to fill the studio auditorium and the sound quality was also much, much better.

Arhos now had his pilot, but he needed one more thing. A mentor of mine, Paul Carlson, once told me, “Scott, titles mean things,” and he was absolutely correct. Be it a movie, a book, or a television series, a good title can mean the difference between a hit and a bomb. It also has to accurately reflect the nature of the product and also entice the viewer (or reader) to want to tune in to watch. Arhos had bounced around a number of titles to his staff. He wanted the show’s banner to honor and point to its city of origin. He had first thought “River City Country” would work, a moniker that called to mind Austin’s locale on the Colorado River. A staffer pointed out that who outside Austin would realize that, and also that “country” in the name might lead an audience to thing the music in the show was something it was not. Another suggested “Hill Country Rain,’ a play on Jerry Jeff Walker’s country-rock song of the same name, but Arhos thought that was too obscure. Arhos mused that he had really liked the title of the 1974 movie “Macon County Line,” an independent movie that had become a moderate. But did ‘Travis County Line” have a ring? Probably not. Someone suggested (Arhos was not sure who) changing it to “Austin City Limits” and a title was born.

Arhos shipped the pilot out to PBS headquarters and the wait for the reaction began. Arhos fretted that his show was “too local” and would not appeal to a national audience. Fortune, however, was watching out for Bill Arhos. Nelson finished and Columbia released “Red Headed Stranger” near the March 22, 1975, airing of the ACL pilot. The album created a buzz, and the show did the same. “Austin City Limits” became PBS’ first musical show hit, and it would continue to draw an audience fifty years later—all because a few iconoclast musicians combined with a TV producer not afraid to take a risk. The result was a Texas cultural phenomenon that continues today.

The East Texas Historical Association provides this column as a public service. Scott Sosebee is a Professor of History at Stephen F. Austin State University and the Executive Director of the Association. He can be contacted at sosebeem@sfasu.edu or via www.easttexashistorical.org.