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Tommy Allsup
Allsup in 2009
Background information
Born	November 24, 1931 (1931-11-24) (age 78) Owasso, Oklahoma, US
Genres	Rock and roll, country
Occupations	Musician, producer
Instruments	Guitar
Years active	1949 - present
Labels	Liberty
Associated acts	Buddy Holly, Waylon Jennings

Tommy Allsup (born November 24, 1931 in Owasso, Oklahoma) is an American musician.

Allsup began his career in music in 1949 as a guitarist with the Oklahoma Swingbillies. In 1958, recording at Norman Petty's studio in Clovis, New Mexico, he was asked to work with Buddy Holly. Allsup agreed, and played with Waylon Jennings, who played bass guitar, and Carl Bunch, who played the drums. His guitar work can be heard on "Wishing", "Heartbeat", "It's So Easy", "Love's Made a Fool of You", "Lonesome Tears", and "Come Back Baby".

During their winter tour, Buddy Holly was killed in an airplane crash on February 3, 1959 at Clear Lake, Iowa, in what has become known as "The Day the Music Died". The crash also took the lives of the Big Bopper, the pilot, and singer Ritchie Valens, who won the privilege of riding on the ill-fated plane in a coin toss with Allsup. The coin-toss scene was depicted in the film La Bamba. According to Allsup, the coin toss occurred in the ballroom and not on the airfield as depicted in the movie, and that it wasn't Holly that initated the toss, that it was a member of the ballroom staff.

After Holly's death, Allsup moved to California, where he did session work for Liberty Records, and eventually became one of their record producers. In 1968, he moved to Nashville to manage Metromedia Records.

Allsup was elected to the Oklahoma Music Hall of Fame in 2005.

He currently lives in Azle, Texas, where he operates Common Ground Studios.

Tommy has toured the UK and Europe recently with Kevin Montgomery from Nashville, Tennessee.

[edit] See also

• The Day the Music Died

[edit] Further reading

• Lehmer, Larry (2004). The day the music died: the last tour of Buddy Holly, the Big Bopper and Ritchie Valens. Music Sales Group. ISBN 0825672872. http://books.google.com/books?id=yY-qrbtfonUC. 
• Patterson, R (2004). Take a Walk on the Dark Side: Rock and Roll Myths, Legends, and Curses. Simon and Schuster. ISBN 0743244230. http://books.google.com/books?id=9Wt_v0eZVx4C. 

[edit] External links

• Online biography
• Oklahoma Music Hall of Fame—Tommy Allsup
• Encyclopedia of Oklahoma History and Culture - Allsup, Tommy