Pete Burke

About Pete Burke

I started playing music professionally in 1973 but music has been my life since I was five years old. My mother would take me to the old Hay Barn Opry in Shepard Texas to see my grandfather Pete Burke Sr play his Piano with some of Nashville's recording artists like Jean Shepard and Gordon Terry.

My dad played the old stand up Bass with Willie Nelson, Hank Thompson and he was one of the original Cherokee Cowboys with Ray Price in the 60's

In the late 70's my best friend David Bates and I started writing songs and we formed a rock band called Last Page. We created and recorded more than we played live because it was very hard to book an all original band in night clubs. I enjoy writing songs more very much.

I also played in some of the best local bands around. In the middle 80's I teamed up with a very young but very great guitar player named Kenny Jackson. We formed a group called "The Sudden Urge Band" with Kennys brother Mike Jackson on drums and Big Wally “Larry Witt” who not only played a mean blues guitar but he hauled us to the gigs.

We played Country, Blues, Southern Rock, Classic (expired link) Top 40 The versatility of the music we played was the magic of The Sudden Urge band because when we played Country music it sounded like Country music. And when we played Rock we always Rocked the house down.

To this day I use the same versatility on the band stand so everyone can enjoy their favorite songs. That's what music's all about anyway. I was blessed to play with the greats such as Randy Cornor, Mundo Earwood, Roy Head, Joey Long, Gene Thomas, and Kelly Schoppa.

In 1996 I had the honor and the privilege to play with Gene Watson and become a member of his Farewell Party Band. I never thought I would ever play at the Grand Ole Opry much less ever think I would play with a country legend such as Gene Watson but I had to leave the Farewell Party Band after just two years due to family illness. But those days will stay with me for the rest of my life. I played many concerts and a few TV shows with Gene After I came off the road I spent a lot of time at home with my wife and family.

But since my touring days were over I missed playing the shows. I was going crazy to do something with my music. I would work at RT Studio helping Kenny Jackson engineer when he would have to record lead guitar and Steel.

It’s not easy twisting knobs and reading charts. So with the help of Roy Mullins Kenny Jackson, Travis “Snake Smith” Claude Wooley and Don Carole we cut ."Baby I'm Sorry" one of Claude Wooleys songs. He is not only one of the best bass players around but one of the greatest writers I ever know and I truly like the song. I added fore more songs to the CD.

Again I was blessed because the song was put in major rotation and got a lot of local air play at Kstar Country 99.7 FM I hope to re-release the song on a label soon with ten more songs I wrote. I’ll keep playing until my fingers fall off.