Life throws curveballs to everyone now and then. Some are small, others are big. Sometimes people get knocked down by them, but others, like Ray Roberts, a local country and folk singer, songwriter and harmonica player, faced them head on, refusing to give up. Roberts may be known for his music, but the story behind his music and the man himself are nothing short of inspiring.
Image caption: Zoomer Roberts (Photo courtesy of Zoomer Roberts)
During a stimulating conversation with me, he fondly talks about the early years of his musical career, the threatening obstacle that confronted him and his views on contemporary music. Turning 70 this year, he appears calm and gentle, content with the many decades he devoted to country and folk music, and expresses a vivid awareness of the music industry and how it has evolved.
Roberts became interested in music when he was about 11 years old after hearing a Hank Williams record on the radio which he describes as “the most haunting thing I had ever heard.” After pausing for a second, he says, “That kind of started the seed.” After another pause, he adds, “Two years later, the Beatles came on Ed Sullivan, and that sealed the deal right there.”
During his first paid job in 1969 as bass player for a bluegrass group called The Shadetree Boys, frontman banjo player and comedian Henry Beebe introduced the band members. When he got to Roberts, Beebe said, “This is our bass player. His name is—” Turning toward Roberts, he puzzlingly asked him, “What the hell is your name?” Before Roberts had a chance to respond, Beebe turned back to the crowd and said, “This is our new bass player. We call him Zoomer.” And the name stuck! Ray Roberts would forever be Zoomer.
When I ask why folk and country music specifically appealed to him, Zoomer thinks for a moment and then says country music “had a sincerity to it that appealed to me.” He then elaborates: “I liked the sounds of the old country music. I liked the rhythms. I liked the fiddle. I liked the steel guitar. I liked the nasal harmony singing. It seemed like the most natural thing in the world. I found it very appealing.” In short, he exclaims, after searching for the right words, “It sounded good.” Who can argue with that?
As Zoomer continued his music career, as is true with almost anything, the people he met and the things he saw influenced him, and he reflected them in his music. Zoomer notes that there is a reason music is different today than in the 1950s, and that is because people have changed music. He says, “We have all heard Elvis. We have all heard Dylan. We have all heard rap. It influences the way you address things. You can change a note here, you can change a chord there, and you write a song, and you address it differently, metrically, than you would have earlier.” Stopping for a moment to think, he carefully chooses his words and continues: “Your resonation of music matures. It ripens till you feel confident about it, you feel good about it.” Zoomer changed as much as his music and became more confident in creating music he enjoys instead of simply doing covers of whoever was popular on the radio. At the very least, when he did a cover song, he put his twist on it.
During the early part of his career, Zoomer played various stringed instruments: guitars, steel guitars, basses and mandolins. He particularly enjoyed the guitar, and nothing can define a musician’s career better than being praised by your idol, mentor and all-around inspiration for your own guitar playing.
As Zoomer tells the story, his friend Sharon Cobb arranged for Zoomer and his wife to fly to Nashville to the Grand Ole Opry to meet Country Music Hall of Famer and Zoomer’s hero since childhood, Hank Snow. He identifies this meeting as the most defining moment of his career. Snow was a Canadian-American country music artist with a career spanning over 50 years, with 140 albums and 85 singles on the country charts. Zoomer gave him a tape of his guitar playing. Snow later sent Zoomer an email, which was later followed by a letter, praising Zoomer, telling him how great the tape sounded and how well he played. Zoomer affectionately ended the story with, “It doesn’t get any better than that!” Zoomer and Snow remained close friends and continued to correspond for the next ten years, up until the time Snow passed away.
Sadly, though, Zoomer’s guitar playing came to a halt when he was diagnosed with neuropathy, a disease or dysfunction of one or more peripheral nerves, causing numbness and muscle weakness. Symptoms can range from tingling or numbness in a certain body part to more serious effects, such as burning pain or even paralysis. For Zoomer, it meant losing most of the use of his arms and hands. In 1988 Zoomer was told he had Lou Gehrig’s disease, also known as ALS, a progressive neurodegenerative condition affecting nerve cells in the spine and brain that can eventually lead to the loss of movement and breathing, and that he had only three years to live. Thankfully that proved to be a misdiagnosis because he is still alive today!
Looking adversity in the eye, Zoomer was not about to let neuropathy, or anything else, stop him from performing music. He left the guitar and took up the harmonica: “I resorted to the harmonica because I could hold it and lift it to my mouth, and playing something is always better than playing nothing…and that saved my sanity, switching to the harmonica.” Through the harmonica, Zoomer continued to express himself, putting his unique twist on it just like everything else in his career. “While most musicians play the blues on the harmonica, I was trying something more melodic on it.”
Zoomer laments that he still prefers string instruments over the harmonica and misses the days when he could play them. As he puts it, “You miss anything that has been that much of a part of your life.” After playing guitar for most of his life, when it got to the point that he couldn’t “It was culture shock… it felt like I was burying my sweetheart... but you soldier on.”
Zoomer quotes the wise words of Carl Perkins, a 1950s singer-songwriter best known for “Blue Suede Shoes,” “Matchbox” and “Everybody’s Trying to Be My Baby”: “It’s not what you lose, it’s what you got left and what you do with it.” That is precisely what Zoomer did. He soldiered on, pushing forward with his music, continuing his brand of country and folk. As he puts it, the reason he was motivated to play music was not because of any one person, but because, to put it simply, “It is what I do. It’s what I know. It’s what I love. It is the only thing in the world that makes any sense to me. It’s how I think.”
Zoomer is quite hopeful about contemporary music. He stresses that more local musicians are reaching greater heights. “In the ‘50s,” he says, “we had The Bobby Fuller Four, but it has gotten bigger than that,” referencing Khalid. He listens to today’s music with great interest. While he admits the country music genre is not as big in El Paso as it once was, which he cites to a change in demographics, “music is music,” and El Paso’s music is definitely “growing and improving.” That optimism does not stop Zoomer from being a bit surprised by what people listen to today. He shared a humorous anecdote about watching the Grammys and seeing Cardi B. perform “WAP” before quickly turning to his wife and exclaiming, “They didn’t do that in the old days!”
In short, from Hank Snow to Khalid, music has definitely changed. And, to all aspiring singers and songwriters out there today, Zoomer offers some words of advice: “Learn your craft and take care of your health.” Wise words from someone who honed his craft and overcame hardship.
Zoomer’s life is a tale, not just about music necessarily, but about overcoming obstacles and remaining determined. It is a tale of one person finding his niche in life and bulldozing through adversity. Today Zoomer is retired from live performances and is remembered as a pioneer in the music scene. He plays with El Paso guitarist and Star City Studio owner Buddy Winston, with whom he has played, on and off, since the mid-1970s. During the pandemic, Zoomer engaged in what he calls “one-man recordings,” which can be found on the Zoomer Roberts YouTube channel and are well worth the listen.
All in all, Zoomer Roberts is an inspiration to us all to find that one thing we love, whether it be music, or anything else, that one thing that motivates us, and work to master it despite any curveballs life may pitch.
Tags: Biography
