Steve Hill grew up in Longview, Texas with his brother Mark in a small house on the south side of town. After graduating from high school there he went to college at Stephen F. Austin in Nacogdoches and received a BBA from there on a music scholarship . He played his music all over Texas to get him through college and remembers some of the moments:
“I guess one of my highlights in college was rooming with Rodney Crowell. He turned me on to song writing and country music. ‘Goose Creek Symphony’ was the first album Rodney played for me and I loved it. We lived in a converted chicken shack. It had the toilet in the closet and the bathtub in the kitchen. Rodney got me all caught up in country and I traded a wonderful trumpet for a Suzuki violin. I just really wanted to make those country sounds. I was playing at the Holiday Inn there and a Nashville guitar player sat in one night and I realized that I had a lot of work to do to play country guitar too. I just resigned myself to practice. I kind of became a hermit and practiced all the time. I loved it. Country music is my first music love even today”
Steve left Nacogdoches to live in Arkansas in a commune where the whole gang would sit around most of the day and play there instruments. He found a job in Texarkana managing a music store for about a year and started a band named “Govinda” (after a Herman Hesse book). They played all over Texas, Louisiana, and Arkansas.
Steve moved to Tyler, Texas where he met up with Tom Russell and started a band named “Stonehill Flattop Band” and were signed to Shelter Records (with Leon Russell) and did 3 albums.
“There were a lot of great artists signed with Shelter at the time. Tom Petty, Phoebe Snow, J. J. Cale, The Gap Band, and of course Leon just to name a few. It was a great time in my life”
“Stonehill Flattop Band” went from a duo to a 5 piece band that played all over Texas.
Steve started working in recording studios in Texas. Playing guitar, fiddle, and singing in he honed his studio chops.
“I was a staff musician at a studio in Tyler that was affiliated with Ktel records. We did a cover album every week. I had to play the part just like the original so I learned to play like all the big guys. I really learnd a lot.”
Steve received a phone call from Al Petty, who’s album he had played on, to go on the road in the Midwest. The timing was right and Steve found himself in South Dakota playing 6 nights a week and doing a radio show and a TV show every week.
“Al called a day off a day when I didn’t have to work until 3. It was a grind but dang he sure taught me a lot. Al Petty had been Al Perkins steel guitar teacher and when I met Al Perkins later it proved to be a real stepping stone to what was to come for me.”
Steve wanted to do something with his degree and started teaching at a small college in Tyler (Tyler Commercial College) where he met his wife Marla. They bought an old Winnebago and off to California they went.
In California Steve started a band called “The Slingshot Band” and later teamed with Steve Woods and got a record deal with Polygram and released one album that they had recorded in Nashville. They were playing at the Palomino club and needed a steel player one night and hired Al Perkins to play. Steve and Al became immediate friends.
Al was producing some gospel albums for Maranatha Records and asked Steve to play on them. On the sessions also was Chris Hillman.
“I don’t know. Chris and I just hit it off. We had had very similar lives up to that point even though he grew up in the San Diego area and I grew up in Texas.”
Steve recorded “God Loves Country Music’ 1, 2, 3, and 4 and also a “Down Home Praise” with Maranatha.
Steve and Chris started writing together while Steve had opened his own studio in Ventura where Chris lived. Chris formed the “Desert Rose Band” and started recording his and Steve’s songs which netted many hit songs for the songwriting team and they became closer friends. They have written hundreds of songs and have a multitude of cuts that have been played on the radio and bought by music lovers everywhere (refer to discography on the about us page)
Steve signed a record deal with Sweetlake Records out of Holland and recording 4 albums for them. He toured Europe many times playing for as many as 35,000.
Steve Hill has done very well in Europe and this ‘ol Texas boy now is trying to get things going for him and his band right here in the US of A/
