As its title implies,
Encore is a collection of late
Bob Wills recordings, made after his primary work was done. In 1960,
Wills reunited with singer
Tommy Duncan, who had left his band in 1948, for the Liberty Records LPs
Together Again (1960) and Living Legend (1961). Naturally, the two recorded many early
Wills favorites, such as "Take Me Back To Tulsa" and "San Antonio Rose," but also included was "Heart To Heart Talk," which became
Wills's first country Top Ten hit in a decade, and his last. In 1963, Liberty recorded a "solo"
Wills album, Bob Wills Sings And Plays, on which the bandleader, while still accompanied by a group, was prominently featured both on fiddle and vocals. Ten years later, United Artists Records recorded what turned out to be the final
Bob Wills album,
For the Last Time, when
Wills suffered a stroke following the first session. This three-CD set, which, with a running time of two hours and 35 minutes, might have just fit onto two discs, draws from all these recordings as well as some live radio transcriptions from 1963-64 for a comprehensive portrait of
Wills's last two decades. The box, which features a cover photograph of
Wills in his prime and gives no indication of when the tracks were recorded, could be deceiving, and the lavish 40-page booklet, containing an extensive essay by
Wills biographer Charles R. Townsend, tends to suggest that these recordings have more importance than they actually do in
Wills's discography. As Townsend writes, the set contains "fifty-seven of the best recordings
Wills made in his later years, " but, while entertaining and constituting a coda to his greatest work that is of historical interest, these recordings are not among
Wills's best overall. ~ William Ruhlmann