Retired Country Boy Becomes Country Singer

ELDORADO - Maybe Denny Halverson didn't win the karaoke contests at the Winneshiek and Allamakee county fairs and maybe his heart, backed up by an implanted defibrillator, will stop beating at any minute. But Denny, 66, knew he wasn't getting any younger and if he dreamed of becoming a singer he'd better do it sooner than later.

So this country boy at heart bought himself some karaoke equipment, recorded a 24-track album of old country songs (include two he wrote himself) and now tours taverns and care centers in northeast Iowa

"I wanted a guitar as a kid," Denny says, sitting in his house high on a hill just west of tiny, yet picturesque, Eldorado. "But my dad said, ‘We got your brother one and he never learned to play it. You wouldn't either.'"

So Denny went about life, walking to a one-room school, riding a bus to West Union to finish in 1964, marrying his sweetheart, Jean, in 1966.

He farmed with dad for a while then went to work at Edwin Mittelstadt's repair shop in Eldorado, buying it a few years later. When the farm economy went south, he closed up shop in 1985. He worked at a couple West Union garages before joining the Fayette County roads department for a 21-year career.

Retirement in 2009, on his March 14 birthday, prompted Denny to re-evaluate his life and plan his future.

He'd had a heart attack at 47 and triple bypass surgery. During a stress test in 1993 he passed out. Diagnosed with ventricular fibrillation, he had a pacemaker/defibrillator implanted. He's had it replaced three times.

In 2002 his first wife, Jean, died after she'd been diagnosed with lung cancer the year before.

Childless, he got an instant family in 2003 when he married Betty that's now four children, 11 grandchildren and two great-grandchildren.

Since Betty liked the way he sang - something he used to do only when nobody could hear - he hooked up a simple karaoke machine to the stereo.

"It didn't sound too bad," Denny admits, so he practiced with his favorites - Ray Price, Faron Young, George Jones, Charlie Pride - and hit the karaoke circuit.

"My God," he laughs. "I almost wet my pants. I had stage fright like you wouldn't believe."

"He's a country boy," laughs Betty, "stuck out here in the country."

Maybe it was the adrenaline, maybe it was the childhood dream to play guitar. Whatever, Denny was hooked. He bought dedicated karaoke equipment, a couple of guitars (he taught himself to play) and recorded a CR two years ago. He became a regular at care centers in Oelwein, Elkader, Fayette, Postville, Decorah, New Hampton and at Hooty's tavern down the road in Auburn.

"He was very critical of himself," Betty says. "But people say, the more they hear him sing, the smoother his voice is."

People asked when he'd make another CD. So, last year, he went into the Bird-On Fire Recording Studio in West Branch and cut "Together Yours and Mine," a 24-track CD that includes two songs he wrote, the haunting title track and the final cut, "Life Goes On."

In that last song, Denny sings to Betty: "When I first met you, my heart was broken. My first love had left and gone to heaven. And you saved me from a life of pain and sorrow. And showed me that life goes on."

For Denny Halverson, that's a new life as a country singer.

Comments: (319) 398-8323; dave.rasdal@sourcemedia.net

To order a copy of Denny's CD go to http://www.memorybrothers.com/ and click on the "this week" section.