CHAPTER ONE
BRIGHT STARS IN A DARK SKY
HE IS STRONG
What am I gonna do
Too much is going on
Somebody help me please
Can’t make it on my own
Voices from my childhood call
My Momma sang a song
Jesus is calling ya’ll
Son when you’re weak, He is strong
Excerpted lyrics by Mylon Le Fevre
Angel Band Music/Dayspring Music
Used by permission
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One of my very first memories on planet earth is looking out the back window of my daddy’s 1947 Cadillac.
How could the sky be so dark and the stars be so bright at the same time? I used to wonder. It was just a
kid’s question. Nothing deep. I had no idea it captured the story of my future. As a little boy, rocking along
every night on those endless, lonely, two-lane roads, watching the white lines disappear under the red glow of
taillights, I never dreamed I was headed toward a darkness that would almost destroy me...and a light so bright
it would one day save my life.
I didn’t think about those things back then. I just took the days as they came. Growing up “on the road,” I
figured everybody’s parents were musicians; that it was normal to eat at a truck stop every night after the gig,
then travel to the next town to sing again. Touring with my family from concert to concert, and church to
church — from Memphis to Charlotte, Atlanta to Dallas, Tampa to Louisville — I spent most of my childhood
crisscrossing the Bible belt of the Old South. I don’t suppose there is a little country town with a high school
gym or singing hall where my family didn’t sing about Jesus.
While other kids’ parents bought station wagons, mine bought an old Greyhound bus, took out the seats
and replaced them with La-Z-Boy recliners that doubled as beds. Man, I thought that was cool — especially
considering our family’s rustic roots. In the 1920s, The Le Fevre Trio had traveled by horse and buggy. My
father, Urias, my Uncle Alphus, and my Aunt Maude landed their first big break after bouncing 60 miles
down a dusty dirt road to sing on the famous Grand Ole Opry radio show. When they finished singing, the
show’s sponsor, Purina Chow, paid them two live chickens and a 50-pound sack of Purina Chow!
From then on, by bus or by buggy, it seemed the Le Fevres were always going someplace to sing. That’s
actually how my parents met. My father saw my mother, Eva Mae, for the first time when he went with his
Bible school quartet to the North Chattanooga Church of God, in Tennessee. My grandfather, the Rev. H.L.
Whittington, was the pastor. Momma, a musical prodigy at 8 years old, had started playing the pump organ at
the church when she was so small she needed help to reach the foot pump. She was self-taught on the piano.
Daddy decided at this very first meeting, he had met his future wife. He told his brother, Alf, he would marry
her as soon as she came of age. Dad stayed true to his word and in 1934 Mom and Dad were married. While
they attended Lee Bible College, Mom took Aunt Maude’s place in The Le Fevre Trio and sang about heaven
until she moved there 75 years later.
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In their first years of marriage and music, my
parents’ future looked as bright as the stars.
Daddy saw my mother’s exceptional gift for
playing piano, singing, and especially for
speaking, so he appointed her MC of the
group which, at the time, was unheard of for a
woman. Dad kept playing and singing and
became the group manager. In 1940, they
gained some notoriety playing on WGST, a
local radio show in Atlanta sponsored by the
NuGrape soft drink company.
Then the shadow of World War II fell over the
nation and everything changed.
My mother, already busy raising three
children, became pregnant yet again with me.
Then my father was shipped off to duty in the
U.S. Navy. While my dad served our country
on a ship somewhere near the Philippines, my
mother delivered me at the U.S. Naval Base
Hospital on Oct. 6, 1944, in Gulfport,
Mississippi. At 26 years old, she managed to
raise four small children on her own until
Daddy finally came home from the war when I
was 2 years old.
At Right: The Le Fevre Trio
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ON THE ROAD AGAIN
With the nation at peace and our family back together again, The Le Fevre Trio expanded. The children—Pierce,
Meurice, Andrea, and eventually me—joined in and the group became simply The Le Fevres. Daddy insisted on it.
He made all his kids sing, whether they were talented or not. I don’t think he believed God would give him a child
who couldn’t sing. The first time I sang publicly at 5 years old, I was so little I had to stand on the piano bench to
reach the microphone!
Even with some of us singing on tiptoe, The Le Fevres’ music found an audience. In the 1950s, we began
appearing on local TV. Videotape hadn’t yet been invented so we broadcast every show live. After performing the
show in Atlanta, our family traveled each week to do shows in Augusta, Macon, Columbus, and Savannah,
Georgia. Friday and Saturday nights we sang concerts; then we started the whole process over again on Sunday.
When video was introduced, we began taping the broadcasts at Ted Turner’s