Big Tommy Moran: The Fiddler from Lakeshore

Shared History - April 2019

This local musician's talents are woven into the fabric of our American musical heritage.  
​
- story by Edward Gibson, photos courtesy the Moran family

The Moran Family

I asked Tommy Moran for whom he had played fiddle. He told me, “mostly a bunch of unknowns.” He told me that he never wanted to get too far from home. That’s where I found him at his Lakeshore home, his recliner kicked back, in his stocking feet, watching basketball. 

​Born on the family’s forty acres in Lakeshore in 1934, Thomas Joseph was the second of nine children. The Morans ran cattle and cut timber. There was music in the home.

​Both his grandfathers played fiddle. Tommy said his father loved music but did not play. Tommy took to the guitar at around ten, mastered it and moved on to teach himself the fiddle. He started playing around the community with his brothers Ola Gene and Doug. 

Shared History 
is sponsored by

---

Click here and scroll down for archived Shared History columns

​At twenty years old, he joined a band led by Werly Fairburn. Fairburn, the “singing barber,” is a lost legend of rockabilly, one of the few that successfully transitioned from country to the “new” music. This was in 1953, before Werly turned away from country.

​“Werly was a good songwriter and a good singer. He was serious about it,” said Tommy.

Tommy Moran (with fiddle) with the Werly Fairburn group. Fairburn is kneeling in front with guitar.

​Tommy moved to New Orleans, and along with his brother, Ola Gene, backed Fairburn. They recorded Werly’s music and played live fifteen minutes every day on WDSU.

The group earned extra money playing dances and barrooms. Soon, Fairburn and Moran landed a gig on the Louisiana Hayride. There, they shared the bill with Johnny Horton and Elvis Presley. From there, they went to the Grand Ole Opry, playing alongside the royalty of country music, most notably, the great Webb Pierce.

​But music is always changing, and country was giving way to rock 'n' roll. Tommy played a bill at Pontchartrain Beach with Presley. Tommy said, “They wanted to tear his clothes off of him. That always baffled me.” 
​

Tommy Moran (far right) with brothers and Bill Monroe (second from right)

---

The Dixie Revelers, Tommy Moran, 4th from left

---

The Dixie Revelers with Tommy Moran, second from left.

---

The Dixie Revelers, Tommy Moran, second from left, back row.

By the late fifties the Bakersfield sound was catching on, and Fairburn wanted to move to move west and cash in.

“I wouldn’t go,” Tommy said. “I figured I had never lost anything in Bakersfield, and so I didn’t have to go out there to find it.” Besides, it was the old-timey music Tommy loved, “Fire on the Mountain” and “Billy in the Low Ground.”

For the next ten years, Tommy also became a popular session musician. He recorded in Nashville and at the Studio in the Woods in Bogalusa. Along with the many unknowns, he recorded with Loretta Lynn and Don Price. He played with Dolly Parton and George “Possum” Jones.

Both Tommy Morans during an appearance on the classic show, Louisiana Hayride, around 1955.

---

Big Tommy Moran sits in with the band, Catahoula, with son Tommy Moran, Danny Perniciaro, Sid Rutter, David Adams, Mike Keel and Pat Murphy (far right).

---

L to R. Gene Moran, Thomas Allen Moran ("Little Tommy") and his father, Thomas Joseph Moran, ("Big Tommy.")

But the recording artist has enjoyed performing as well.  Early on, Tommy formed the Moran Family band with two brothers and two sisters (listen to one of their recordings at the end of this story).  Along with his talented son, "Little" Tommy Moran, he toured with Moe Bandy. And he took home numerous top prizes from fiddling competitions through the years.    

But mostly, he cut timber. He worked oxen long after the mechanization of the timber business. Tommy said he cut less timber, but he could make more without the cost of skidders and tractors. He could feed an ox for a dollar a day. They never broke down, and I think he liked the quiet of the woods and the company of the animals. 
​

We talked about the players he liked, consummate session and side men like Don Rich, Roy Clark, Jerry Reed and Glen Campbell. A good player, he said, isn’t out front. He is there in a way that you hardly notice, but if he wasn’t there, the song would be missing something.

Two of his sons, Tommy and Gene, are carrying on the family tradition, currently playing together in "Monsters at Large"  (catch them at 100 Men Hall, June 21, 2019).

Years ago, I had an opportunity to play at church with Tommy Moran and his wife Annette. He came out day or two before. We ran through the number I picked, Doc Watson’s “I am a Pilgrim.” I asked him if he wanted to run through it again.

"That’s all right,” Tommy said, “I got it.”

​Yes, he did. 

---

In the recording below, Tommy Moran's brother, Doug Moran (now deceased) sings lead. 

---

Tommy Moran plays in this 2012 video by BSL singer-songwriter Rochelle Harper

---

Special thanks to Tommy Moran's daughter Michele Seal for photo/video assist for this story!