Farewell to Dave Burgess, the guitarist of “Tequila”

He died at the age of 90 Dave Burgessguitarist of Champs. The news was confirmed by an obituary on the website of the Anglin Funeral Home in Dover, Tennessee, which reported the musician’s death on October 19. The obituary reports that Burgess and his wife Deon Adair Raabto whom he had been married for over 65 years, they had a son, David, and a daughter, Charmaine, and ran an art gallery in Montana.

Burgess was best known for the huge success of the instrumental single of the Champs from 1958, “Tequila”which reached number one in the US charts just three weeks after its release, knocking it off the top spot “Don’t” Of Elvis Presley.

THE
Champs
they took their name from Champion, the horse of the musician and owner of the record label Challenge Records,
Gene Autry
and were initially trained by studio executives to record a B-side for Burgess’ single
“Train to Nowhere”
. The B-side was
“Tequila”
and ended up becoming much more famous than its A-side, making the group the first to reach number one with an instrumental song, and it was also their first release.

“Tequila”
won the
Grammy Awards
for Best R&B Performance in 1959 and sold over a million copies, receiving a gold disc from the Recording Industry Association of America. After
“Tequila”
the band released other hits such as
“El Rancho
Rock”, “Midnighter”, “Chariot Rock”, “Too Much Tequila”, “Limbo Rock”
And
“Tequila Twist”
before finally disbanding in 1965.