Butch Crouch

...Click here to hear all 18 songs and see the CD song list and purchasing information... Butch grew up on the corner of Texas, Louisiana, and the Gulf Of Mexico (Pt. Arthur, Tex.). He considers himself lucky to have spent his formative years in a time and place that had big cars, cheap gasoline, young Rock and Roll, classic Country, timeless Cajun music, and rules. The area, and that time span, produced many musical giants: Janis Joplin, The Big Bopper (J.P. Richardson), George Jones and Johnny and Edgar Winter, just to name a few. Cutting his musical teeth playing with Johnny Preston and the Shades (“Running Bear”), Butch’s heart was never far from his music, even though he got a degree in Mechanical Engineering and pursued a corporate career. Over the years, no matter what his “day job” was, he kept his chops up by playing gigs and sitting in whenever and wherever he could. In the early seventies, he met and formed a lifelong musical partnership with Bax Taylor (formerly with the New Christie Minstrels and The Wayfarers). They have been arguing over who really wrote "The Pooh House" song ever since.In the late eighties Butch moved to beautiful Santa Fe, N. M. where for the last seventeen years he has entertained tourists and locals at El Farol, a nationally known tapas restaurant. He spends quite a bit of time wondering if this gig is a wonderful retirement program or an omen that his musical career isn’t going anywhere: either way, he considers it a blessing. Butch has been described as a troubadour in the tradition of Woody Guthrie, Cisco Houston, Hoyt Axton and Ramblin’ Jack Elliot, and his recent CD (produced by Bax Taylor) is available on the BaxTrax Music label, a company that Taylor founded. It contains songs that Butch wrote alone, songs that Bax wrote, songs they wrote together, a song by a “gone but not forgotten” friend, Jim Montgomery, and a song co-written by A. J. Masters, an old friend and legendary Nashville songwriter.