Artists

Born in Lebanon, Indiana, a Viet Nam war veteran, and an accomplished singer/songwriter, Bill Wilson spends the late 1960s in Austin, Texas, serving the final year of his military service at Bergstrom Air Force Base (which since has become Austin's sprawling Austin-Bergstrom International Airport). Wilson meets Sonobeat co-founders Bill Josey Sr. and Rim Kelley (Bill Josey Jr.) through ManchacaManchaca, pronounced man-shack, where Cody is from, is a tiny town on the outskirts of south Austin troubadour Cody Hubach, with whom Wilson performs on weekends in south Austin bars and clubs and for whom he later writes the tribute song, Ballad Of Cody.

Wilson's first work with Sonobeat begins in 1969. He records a non-commercial song demo album for Sonobeat's publishing subsidiary, Sonosong, showcasing his original compositions. Songs From The Catalog Of Sonosong Music Company: Bill Wilson, Composer features an eclectic mix of folk, country, and pop tunes. We find a copy sold on eBay in August 2020 for $300, demonstrating that Wilson's music remains in high demand decades after recorded but also indicating how rare copies in circulation actually are (given that there appear to have been no other copies publicly available since 2020).

Because Wilson performs his Sonosong demo album with only guitar and harmonica accompaniment and, perhaps because the sole purpose of the album is to promote Wilson's songs and not Wilson as a performer, Sonobeat's archives contain only monaural mixes. Nonetheless, Wilson's vocal performances are solid and convincing and demonstrate his broad range of talents. Wilson is joined in harmony vocal by Cindy Reynolds on The Merry-Go Man, a song about living an ignorant life that addresses the Viet Nam war but that also may be inspired by, but remains distinctly different from, The Beatles' Nowhere Man. We find Big Train, a blues piece that was recorded during the same sessions as Wilson's Sonosong demo album but that doesn't appear on the album, hidden away in the Sonobeat vaults. These 50-year-old recordings demonstrate Wilson's versatility as songwriter and singer.

Sonobeat presses 100 copies of the demo album to circulate to national record company A&RArtist & Repertoire exeutives at record labels build and manage a roster of artists, connecting them to new songs and overseeing their recording activities. departments, hoping to solicit major artists to record some of Wilson's tunes. The album is issued in mid-November '69, even as Wilson continues to cut addition original tracks for Sonobeat. Prolific Sonosong composer Herman Nelson is so impressed with Wilson's song demos that when Herman begins work on Songs From The Catalog Of Sonosong Music Company: Herman Nelson, Composer, Volume 2, he asks Sonobeat to engage Wilson to perform the 12 songs on it.

Wilson returns to the Sonobeat studio in November '69 for additional sessions that yield The Man In Black, Wanna Go Back, Tastes Of Summer, and The Old Man, but none of these recordings are ever released. Sonobeat superstar drummer Vince Mariani adds cymbal flourishes to Tastes Of Summer, and Sonobeat regular Mike Waugh provides bass on The Old Man. Bill Sr. sends a master tape of The Old Man out for a 33-1/3 RPM acetate reference dub to be cut, likely sending it to his friend Ron Bledsoe at Columbia Records in Nashville, hoping to either sell a single by Wilson to Columbia or interest other Columbia artists in covering Wilson's material.

Wilson is as impressive a blues and rock singer as he is a composer and is tapped by the Joseys for Sonobeat's legendary Mariani sessions in 1970. Wilson contributes his strong and distinctive vocal talents to two songs on Mariani's only album, Perpetuum Mobile, which Sonobeat issues only as a non-commercial "advance" pressing circulated to the major national record labels. Wilson's powerful performances on Mariani's Last Milestone and I Can't Hurt Myself are reminiscent of Blood, Sweat & Tears' great vocalist David Clayton-Thomas.

After completing his tour of duty in the Air Force in 1970, Wilson returns to native Indiana, settling in Bloomington, where in 1972 he joins The Pleasant Street Band. He brings the band to Austin that year to record an album at Sonobeat. In fact, Wilson enjoys a banner year in 1972, when, partially on the strength of his Sonosong demo album and his work with The Pleasant Street Band, Columbia Records commissions his first solo album, Ever Changing Minstrel. Columbia has high hopes for Wilson as the next Bob Dylan, but a change in Columbia's management just as the album is released in 1973 interrupts Wilson's career on the label. Wilson formally resigns from The Pleasant Street Band in '74 and forms Bill Wilson and Friends. In 1983, Wilson relocates to Florida, but continues to make occasional appearances in Indiana, finally moving "home" in 1986. He goes on to record three independent albums (none recorded at Sonobeat), Talking To Stars, Made In The U.S.A., and Traction In The Rain. He is best known, perhaps, for his moving Soldier's Song, a reflection on the plight of returning Viet Nam war veterans.

Wilson dies suddenly on Thanksgiving, November 25, 1993, victim of massive heart failure.