A Narvelous Evening: Narvel Felts brings country and rockabilly stylings to Cape

Southeast Missouri's own country and rockabilly music star, Narvel Felts of Malden, will reprise big hits such as "Lonely Teardrops" and "Reconsider Me" on Jan. 18 at Isle Casino Cape Girardeau, 777 N. Main St.

Backed by the seven-piece Double Edge group from Memphis, Tenn., Felts plans to mix country and rockabilly, saying he likes both genres too much to neglect either one.

The 75-year-old native of Bernie, Mo., 60 miles southwest of Cape Girardeau, got started when a talent scout caught his act in a show at Bernie High School.

He soon found himself a member of Jerry Mercer and the Rhythm & Blues Boys, performing in August 1956 with Roy Orbison and Eddie Bond on the concession stand roof at the Family Drive-in in Dexter, Mo.

Orbison recommended him to Sun Records in Memphis. Two weeks later he was recording 10 songs for producer Jack Clement with an audience of Johnny Cash, Jerry Lee Lewis, Carl Perkins and Harold Jenkins, who was not yet calling himself Conway Twitty.

Narvel Felts performs at the Rogers Theater in Poplar Bluff, Mo. on June 1, 2013. (Photos courtesy of Leonard Fulbright)

"I realized I was at the same mic that Elvis, Johnny and Carl used," Felts said from home in Malden, where he and his wife Loretta live on Narvel Felts Avenue.

"It was quite a thrill to be there. I was in awe of it. I was always real shy as a kid. I traded my BB gun for a beat-up old Gene Autry guitar when I was 13, and I picked cotton and ordered a playable Sears and Roebuck guitar the next year."

Clements told the 18-year-old tenor he liked some of the songs, especially "Kiss-a-Me Baby," but it would be a year before anything was released.

Felts did not want to wait and signed with Mercury Records in Chicago, but a long grind awaited.

"I finally broke through in 1973 with 'Drift Away,' and my new label, ABC Dot, sent me to Muscle Shoals, Ala., to cut 'Reconsider Me' with Johnny Morris," he said.

Narvel Felts performs at the Rogers Theater in Poplar Bluff, Mo. on June 1, 2013. (Photos courtesy of Leonard Fulbright)

"It was pushing the envelope for country music at that time, and I was afraid radio wouldn't play it. But they did, and it turned out to be the biggest hit of my career (peaking at No. 2). It was really an honor and a thrill after searching for 17 years and 30 records.

"It takes the right record at the right time with the right label and the right promotion. So when it did happen, it was like an impossible dream coming true."

A member since 2006 of the International Rockabilly Hall of Fame in Jackson, Tenn., the curly formerly black-haired man sometimes billed as "Narvel the Marvel" had 23 straight Top 40 country hits from 1973 to 1979, including "Funny How Time Slips Away," "Somebody Hold Me (Until She Passes By)," "My Prayer," "I Don't Hurt Anymore" and "Everlasting Love."

He and his wife have a daughter, Stacia Stone of Malden, three grandchildren and four great-grandchildren. Their son Bub died in 1995.

Felts said he will particularly enjoy doing a keynote song from his rockabilly repertoire, "Pink and Black Days," which he cowrote with his one-time bandleader, Steve Schaffner, who retired in 2012 after 22 years as orchestra director at Cape Girardeau Central High School.

Narvel Felts performs at the Rogers Theater in Poplar Bluff, Mo. on June 1, 2013. (Photos courtesy of Leonard Fulbright)

Felts said he performed "almost every night for years," but now averages one show a month.

His first area appearances were in 1957 and 1958 at Tiny's Dance Land near Scott City and Onie Wheeler's Ozark Corral in Cape Girardeau. He played the Arena Building "two or three times" in the 1970s, he said, and about six years ago he sang at the Cape Girardeau Eagles Club.

The show begins at 7 p.m. Jan. 18. Advance tickets are $10.