Jenkins "Tex" Carman (May 14, 1903 – February 2, 1968) was a truly eccentric country music entertainer active from the 1920s to the 1960s, of questionable ability, but boundless energy, known for playing the Hawaiian Guitar.
Jenks Tex Carman was one of the more dubious but interesting talents ever to achieve stardom, however fleeting, in country music. A player of great dexterity but severely lacking in any sense of rhythm, and even more lacking in a voice, Carman succeeded on the basis of the sheer enthusiasm of his performances, achieving some respectable record sales and a national following based on his television appearances.
Jenkins Carman was the seventh of eight children born to Alford Carman and his wife. They were a farm family with a great love of music -- throughout his career, Carman also claimed part Cherokee ancestry, and tried to emphasize this by wearing Native American regalia in some of his public appearances and later album cover art.
By age 12 he was on his way to becoming an accomplished guitarist, and he left home in his teens to pursue a career in music. He started out in vaudeville and playing Chautauqua shows, and by the end of the 1920s had emerged as a solo-guitar novelty act. He cut a pair of songs in late 1929 for the Gennett label in Indiana, but neither was ever issued.
In the early '30s, he hooked up with Hawaiian guitar virtuoso Frank Plada, who taught Carman the basics of Hawaiian guitar technique. This instrument became the core of Carman's music from the early '30s onward, and it was using the unamplified acoustic Hawaiian guitar, hung from his neck and fretted with a steel bar, that he began making a name for himself in country music.
By the late '40s, he had signed to the Four Star label and begun recording under the name Jenks Tex Carman, "the Dixie Cowboy," as well as appearing on local radio. Soon after, he started to perform regularly on television on the country music showcase Town Hall Party, hosted by Tex Ritter and Johnny Bond, and later still became a regular on Cliffie Stone's Hometown Jamboree. His contract with Four Star ended, and Stone brought Carman to Capitol Records and producer Ken Nelson in 1951.
While Carman had previously performed solo Nelson insisted on a session band including veterans including at various times Joe Maphis (electric guitar and banjo), Jimmy Bryant (electric guitar), Cliffie Stone (bass), Eddie Kirk (guitar), Jimmy Pruett (piano) and Harold Hensley (fiddle). The band had trouble adapting to playing with Carman who was not used to playing with other musicians. Carman's unwillingness to stay to a steady beat or regular chord changes left band members scrambling to keep track of the songs.
These problems were exacerbated by Carman's heavy drinking and lack of rehearsals some which shows in the quality of some of the singles. Carman's drinking was in turn exacerbated by his nervousness about recording and some sessions had to be cancelled. There were five recording sessions between 1951 and 1953 resulting in twenty singles, of which five were not released.
The material recorded for Capitol ranged from Carman's preferred Hawaiian themed songs like "Hillbilly Hula", "Hilo March", and "Samoa Stomp" to sentimental ballads (many written by Carman) as well as a modern covers chosen by Ken Nelson who produced the sessions; "I Could Love You Darling" (originally done by Hank Locklin and a version of "Dixie Cannonball" originally done by Gene Autry and Red Foley. Carman included a novelty song with a version of "When The Caissons Go Rolling Along" (ALA "The Army Goes Rolling Along") during which he imitated various sound effects on the fret board. This was a particular audience favourite.
The sales of Carman's singles were too low to justify the renewal of his Capitol contract, and after a lapse of several years, he signed to the small Sage & Sand label, even as he continued to work on television as a regular on locally produced variety series. His later albums tended to emphasize his unverified claims to Cherokee ancestry, which were reinforced by his unusual physiognomy -- as one onlooker recalled, Carman dressed like a cowboy and looked like an Indian; occasionally, he even donned a feathered headdress.
Carman's last album was called The Ole Indian, released by Sage & Sand in 1962. By the mid-1960s Carman returned to Kentucky where he continued to make television and radio appearances until his death aged 64.
Jenks Tex Carman was not in a league with the best steel or Hawaiian guitarists, and his vocal skills were even more limited. He was a master showman, however, and accomplished with sheer enthusiasm and reckless abandon what he couldn't do with technical skills or musical instincts.
(Edited from AllMusic & Wikipedia)