Tammy Graham - Biography.

It was bound to happen. As the potent mixture of solid tradition and cutting edge excitement fueled the country explosion, a few gifted artists would develop their styles from a natural, unforced combination of the two. Anyone still insisting on categorizing music was left with the only label that has ever mattered to country fans: real.

Enter Tammy Graham, the young vocal dynamo whose rise to stardom is also bound to happen. She was named for a country legend-- her mother liked the sound of it-- and by age three, Tammy Wynette Graham was teaching herself piano. At eight, she set fellow church members on their heels with her rendition of "I'll Fly Away."

"I rocked it up pretty good, and I guess they weren't quite ready for it," she recalls. She won local and regional Imperial Miss Arkansas talent titles a year later, and placed second in the World competition. Her first "job" found nine-year-old Tammy demonstrating pianos for a store in the North Little Rock Mall (proceeds from her tip jar were saved for a giant teddy bear from one of the mall's toy stores).

Encouraged to move to Nashville by legendary session musician Harold Bradley, whose credits include sessions with Patsy Cline, Loretta Lynn, Kitty Wells and others, Tammy spent her early teens billed as "Little Miss Jerry Lee Lewis" at Music Row venues. By age 14, she was touring with her own band: "It was my parents, three band members, and I pulling a U-Haul all over creation. We had a great time and I learned so much. I wouldn't trade that time for anything." Focused on a shot at big-time bookings, Tammy and her family chose Las Vegas as the next logical step.

"It was a rough go at first," the young singer remembers. "I was 17-- too young to play the casinos, so I entered a talent contest at one of the clubs." She won 13 straight weeks. "We literally lived on my winnings. Those were pretty slim times, but my family was so supportive. They just kept believing." As the saying goes, "talent will find a way," and her family's faith in Tammy would pay off. She was booked at Caesar Palace, and began one of the longest continuous runs by a performer in Las Vegas.

Inevitably, word of Tammy's success in Las Vegas would cycle back to country music's capital. Arista/Nashville President Tim DuBois flew in to catch one of her shows. "The moment Tammy came out on stage," he remembers, "the world just seemed to stop and come to attention. I knew right away that there was something very special about the way she connects with people." DuBois signed Tammy to Arista's sister label, Career Records, and enlisted veteran Barry Beckett as producer.

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