George Jones
American country musician (1931–2013)
George Glenn Jones (September 12, 1931 – April 26, 2013) was an American country musician, singer, and songwriter. He achieved international fame for a long list of hit records, and is well known for his distinctive voice and phrasing. For the last two decades of his life, he was frequently referred to as "the greatest living country singer", "The Rolls-Royce of Country Music".
In 1959, Jones recorded "White Lightning", written by The Big Bopper, which launched his career as a singer. Years of alcoholism and drug addiction severely compromised his health and led to his missing many performances, earning him the nickname "No Show Jones". He died in 2013, aged 81, from hypoxic respiratory failure.
Life and career
Early years (1931–1953)
George Glenn Jones was born on September 12, 1931, in Saratoga, Texas, and was raised with a brother and five sisters in Colmesneil, in the Big Thicket region of southeast Texas. His father, George Washington Jones, worked in a shipyard and played harmonica and guitar; his mother, Clara (née Patterson), played piano in the Pentecostal church on Sundays. When Jones was born, his arm was broken when one of the doctors dropped him. He heard country music for the first time when he was seven, when his parents bought a radio.
Begin with the source’s own compact description: “George Jones” is american country musician (1931–2013). The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through George, Jones and American, not as a finished interpretation.
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Chronology provides the most reliable spine for this subject; interpretation should follow only after identities and dates are secure. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 24, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q508202. VIAF identifies the subject as 24787498. The Library of Congress control number is n83066270. 4 of 4 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1931, 2013, 1959 and 1953.
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This entry incorporates text from “George Jones” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.