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Singer Had Broken Hearts, Homes And Health, But Never A Broken Spirit
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Published: May 24, 2008
I don't know much about gospel music. So when I got the call eight years ago that Dottie Rambo was coming to town, I said something stupid like, "Who?"
The caller was taken aback. "You don't know Dottie Rambo?" he said incredulously.
His tone made it clear that this was Somebody and I needed to get myself educated fast.
I'm glad that caller lit a fire under me. I not only researched Dottie, but I also made it a point to meet her when she came to teach a gospel music songwriting clinic in St. Petersburg.
Aretha Franklin may be the Queen of Soul, but Dottie reigned in her genre.
It would be my first and last encounter with the Nashville-based performer.
She died early Mother's Day morning when her tour bus crashed into a highway embankment in southwest Missouri. Seven others in the bus, including her manager, remain hospitalized with moderate to severe injuries.
On Monday, she was put to rest in a private funeral.
She was 74 and on her way to Texas to perform at a Golden Girls of Gospel concert. The only comfort in losing this legend so suddenly is in knowing that she wasn't some washed-up star who had faded from memory. No, Dottie was still belting out the music and bringing down the house. A new album, "Sheltered," which includes a duet with the late Porter Wagoner, is scheduled to come out this summer.
Bad weather and a skidding bus ended the song for Dottie.
Singled Out As Songwriter Of The Century
She has left us plenty to keep her in our memories. Of the reportedly 2,500 songs she wrote and published, many are considered classics: "He Looked Beyond My Fault," "We Shall Behold Him," "Holy Spirit Thou Art Welcomed" and "I Just Came to Talk With You Lord."
Remember "I Go to the Rock"? Whitney Houston gave it a soulful rendition in the movie "The Preacher's Wife." Elvis, Johnny Cash, Vince Gill and Dolly Parton are among the notables who sang songs penned by Dottie.
Her fans adored her, and her colleagues admired her. In 1994, the Christian Country Music Association named her Songwriter of the Century. She has been put in the Gospel Music Hall of Fame twice - once with her group The Rambos and again as a solo artist. On June 14, she was due to be formerly inducted into the Christian Music Hall of Fame.
But all those accolades and honors did not define Dottie's life. For her, it was about putting God first and staying mindful from whence her talent came. "I sing loud, I stay on pitch, and I smile a lot," she told me during our 2000 interview. "I never got in this for the awards and glory. I've tried to keep focused on what this is all about, and that's what has sustained me all these years."
Her biography reads like a sad country song. She had an abusive father who worked in a prison. He wasn't pleased when his guitar-playing daughter had a Christian born-again experience at a Pentecostal revival at age 12.
Give up Christian music or leave, he ordered. That ultimatum didn't sit right with Dottie, now on fire for the Lord.
"He didn't want any Holy Roller in the house," Rambo told me. "He was so mad, he went outside and destroyed a whole acre of corn. Just pulled it up by the roots!"
Her Mama Knows Best
Her mother was a Christian and knew her daughter had immense talent. Seems like the time had come to let Dottie leave the nest.
So Mother helped pack daughter's belongings, walked her seven miles from the family farm in Morganfield, Ky., to the nearest bus station and sent her on her way to make a new life. She wasn't even 13.
Dottie never questioned her mama's decision. "She put me in God's hands," she said. "I took my guitar, and churches around the country put me up for singing."
Her first stop was Indianapolis. She never looked back. She sang at camp meetings, tent revivals and Sunday church picnics. She joined The Gospel Echoes and they produced their first album on a $600 budget. They paid off the debt when they sold out their first run - 1,000 copies - from the trunk of their car.
She married Buck Rambo at age 16. Baby daughter Reba came 18 months later. Eventually, the threesome became The Singing Rambos, with the prolific Dottie churning out gospel songs at a remarkable pace. Television introduced her to an ever-expanding audience. For six years in the 1980s, her "Dottie Rambo Magazine" vaulted to one of the top-rated programs on TBN.
Then came the ruptured disc, the paralysis in her left leg, 10 surgeries and immeasurable pain. Her husband left her. Her personal and ministry finances took a dive. For most, the chain of bad luck might have been the end. But not for Dottie. When I met her, she was plotting her comeback.
Not a word of self-pity from her lips. Dottie was nearly giddy with girlish excitement. She liked to laugh and poke fun at herself. Her faith was her armor, and she wore it well.
"Oh, honey, I feel like I'm 15 and I'm just starting over," she gushed. "I've had a bad run of it these last 12 years, with back pain and all, but things are turning around."
And thankfully, they did.
By the time that bus struck a guard rail and hit an embankment, Dottie was a player again. She was performing about 150 concerts a year and gearing up for another album. Manager Larry Ferguson, whose wife and two children also are recovering from injuries from the accident, wrote a book in 2006 about life on the road with the singer, "Driving Ms. Dottie." She's even got a limited-edition collector's doll in her likeness.
"I've had broken hearts, broken homes and broken health," she told me in our interview, "but never a broken spirit. And I'll keep writing songs that reflect that for as long as the good Lord allows."
And she kept that promise to the end.
For more on Dottie Rambo, including photos, video clips, go to www.DottieRambo.net. Michelle Bearden can be reached at mbearden@tampatrib.com or (813) 259-7613.
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