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Born 99 Years Ago in Kentucky, the First Woman To Join Nashville’s “A-Team” and Help Shape Country Music Alongside Willie Nelson and Roy Acuff
Velma Smith, born on 27 July 1927 in Epley Station, Kentucky, was a pioneering session musician who broke several barriers for women in Nashville's country music industry. She became the first woman to perform solo on the Grand Ole Opry, the first female session guitarist in Music City, and the first woman to join the famed "A-Team" of top-tier session players during the Nashville Sound era, cementing her role in shaping the genre's sound.
Discovered alongside her sister on a Kentucky radio station by Bill Monroe, Smith went on to play bass with Roy Acuff's Smoky Mountain Boys before joining the backing bands of Ernest Tubb and Carl Smith. As a rhythm guitarist, widely regarded as the first to play the role on Nashville recordings, she worked with artists including Willie Nelson, Roy Orbison, Waylon Jennings and Jim Reeves. She was inducted into the Musicians Hall of Fame in January 2014 and died later that year.
In short
- Velma Smith, born 1927, was a trailblazing Nashville session musician
- First woman on Nashville's "A-Team" of session players
- Recorded with Willie Nelson, Roy Orbison and Waylon Jennings
Explained simply
Velma Smith was a pioneering musician who played a crucial role in shaping Nashville's country music sound from the 1940s onwards. Born in rural Kentucky in 1927, she was discovered alongside her sister by prominent musician Bill Monroe and went on to become one of the most influential players in the city's recording studios during a transformative period for the genre.
As a session musician—a performer hired to play on recordings—Smith broke multiple barriers for women in Nashville. She was the first woman to perform solo on the Grand Ole Opry, country music's most famous stage, the first female session guitarist in the city, and the first woman to join the "A-Team," an exclusive group of the city's most skilled and sought-after session players who shaped country music's evolving sound.
Smith worked with some of the genre's biggest names, including Willie Nelson, Roy Orbison, Waylon Jennings and Jim Reeves, as well as established stars Roy Acuff and Ernest Tubb. Her work as a rhythm guitarist is widely recognised as pioneering, establishing the role on Nashville recordings and demonstrating that women could compete at the highest levels of the industry.