Roy Newman (born 12 November 1899 in Dallas, Texas, † 23 February 1981) was an American country musician on the clarinet. Even though he was not one of the best known, Newman is considered important for the development of Western swing with Roy Newman & His Boys About Roy Newman’s life is not much known. Newman was, according to sources, was born either 1899 or 1900 in Dallas, Texas. He started his career in the early 1930s and made recordings for Vocalion Records in 1934. Newman was one of the first musicians to blend rural hillbilly music with popular jazz and also recorded the so called Western Swing before Bob Wills. Between 1934 and 1939 Newman and the Boys repertoire ranged from standards as Corrine, Corinna to interpretations of the Match Box Blues, Kansas City Blues or the Down Hearted Blues. Everybody’s Tryin ‘To Be My Baby, later famous as a cover of Carl Perkins and the Beatles, was believed Newman’s original. Nowadays, however, it is proved that this is false, because in 1936, two years before recording Newman, Rex Griffin already played the title, which is probably more likely the original. Successful Singles by Newman and his band were also with the Devil Devil and I Can not Dance (I Got Ants In My Pants). By 1938 Newman & the Boys had the following members (in addition to Newman himself): Gene Sullivan (voice), Holly Horton (clarinet), Cecil Brower (fiddle), Jim Boyd (guitar), Walter Circe (banjo) and Ish Irwin (bass )) and Art Davis (fiddle / vocals, Thurman Neal (fiddle), Randall “Buddy” Neal (guitar), Ramon Dearman, Earl Brown (guitar / vocals), Ray Lackland (vocals), and Buddy Harris (vocals), but he appears only as a session musician. After 1939, no new recordings of Newman are known. Only some of his Vocalion, Conqueror Records and Columbia Records were re-released in the 1940s. Roy Newman died in 1981 at the age of 81. Read more on Last.fm. User-contributed text is available under the Creative Commons By-SA License; additional terms may apply.