Don Everly
Musician · 1937–2021 · Brownie, Kentucky
Best known for
Harmony Vocals
Guitar
Songwriter
Don Everly was the elder half of the Everly Brothers, the harmony duo whose crystalline two-part singing and driving acoustic rhythm guitar bridged country, rockabilly, and pop in the late 1950s and set the template for nearly every close-harmony act that followed. As the pair’s principal songwriter and rhythmic engine, he helped make records like “Bye Bye Love,” “Wake Up Little Susie,” and “Cathy’s Clown” foundational texts of American popular music.
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- Born Isaac Donald Everly on February 1, 1937, in Brownie, Kentucky, he was the elder son of guitarist Ike Everly and his wife Margaret. The family performed as a radio act, and by grade-school age Don was appearing on The Everly Family Show over KMA in Shenandoah, Iowa, billed as “Little Donnie” alongside younger brother Phil.
- After the family relocated to Nashville, the brothers drew the attention of guitarist Chet Atkins, who helped open doors on Music Row. In 1957 they signed with Archie Bleyer’s Cadence Records, the label that would carry them through their breakthrough years.
- Their first Cadence single, “Bye Bye Love” (1957), written by Felice and Boudleaux Bryant, reached No. 2 on the pop chart after being turned down by dozens of other acts, launching the duo as national stars.
- “Wake Up Little Susie” (1957) went to No. 1 pop and country; Don’s hard-strummed, open-tuned acoustic rhythm guitar gave the record its urgent pulse and became one of the most imitated sounds in early rock & roll.
- A remarkable run of Bryant-penned hits followed on Cadence, including the No. 1 “All I Have to Do Is Dream” (1958), “Bird Dog,” “Devoted to You,” and “Problems,” cementing the brothers as one of the era’s defining hitmakers.
- Don emerged as a gifted songwriter in his own right, writing “(Till) I Kissed You,” a Top-5 hit for the duo in 1959, and later the aching ballad “So Sad (To Watch Good Love Go Bad).”
- In 1960 the brothers signed a landmark contract with Warner Bros. Records and issued “Cathy’s Clown,” written by Don; it topped the charts on both sides of the Atlantic and became their best-selling single.
- The duo enlisted in the Marine Corps Reserve in 1961 and continued to chart into the early 1960s with “Walk Right Back,” the Carole King–Howard Greenfield “Crying in the Rain” (1962), and “That’s Old Fashioned,” their last major American hit before the British Invasion reshaped the charts.
- The Everlys’ blood-harmony blend became a direct model for the Beatles, Simon & Garfunkel, the Byrds, the Beach Boys, and countless folk-rock and country-rock acts, an influence that later artists acknowledged repeatedly.
- Years of tension culminated in a bitter onstage split in July 1973 at Knott’s Berry Farm in California, after which Don pursued a solo career, releasing the albums Don Everly (1971), Sunset Towers (1974), and the country-leaning Brother Juke Box (1977).
- The brothers reconciled a decade later, reuniting for a celebrated September 1983 concert at London’s Royal Albert Hall; their 1984 comeback album EB 84, produced by Dave Edmunds, yielded the Paul McCartney–written single “On the Wings of a Nightingale.”
- Honors accumulated across their career: the Everly Brothers were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame with its inaugural class in 1986, received the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 1997, and entered the Country Music Hall of Fame in 2001.
- Following Phil Everly’s death in 2014, Don lived quietly in Nashville, where he died on August 21, 2021, at age 84, remembered as a founding architect of rock & roll harmony and one of its most consequential rhythm guitarists and songwriters.
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Jimmy Martin and the Sunny Mountain BoysPlayed on recordings with Jimmy Martin and the Sunny Mountain Boys
