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- [Alison Voiceover] On the season finale of The A List, we'll hear about life on the road from a man who's enjoyed a fascinating career in the music industry.

- Anyway, about five minutes later, the door opens here comes Teddy Gentry, the bass player for Alabama.

He said, "Bruce says you want a job."

He goes, "What do you do?"

I said, "I can work.

I can tech guitars and I know equipment.

I know PA equipment".

He goes, "Can you drive the truck?"

(laughs) I said, "Yeah, you better believe I can".

and he goes, "All right, you're driving the truck tonight, and we're gonna call you Dixie.

- Just like that.

- That's where it happened.

- [Alison Voiceover] Join me as I talk with the multi-talented Dixie Fuller, coming up next on The A List.

(upbeat music) - [Alison Voiceover] If you've ever been to Chattanooga's Riverbend Festival, then you've seen Dixie Fuller's talents on full display.

For 21 years, he served as production director, and was responsible for bringing in an eclectic array of acts for festival-goers from all walks of life to enjoy.

But his time at Riverbend just one of many jobs he's had in the music industry.

From guitar tech to tour manager, to drumming onstage with Alabama, Dixie has done it all.

And come away from it with some pretty incredible stories from the road.

But these days, he's devoting his time to running his family's historic restaurant, Zarzour's Café with his wife, Shannon.

- Well, Dixie, welcome to The A List.

- Thank you for having me.

I've been wonderin' about this thing.

And so, I got my invitation, I'm like, I'm not missing this.

- Oh, I mean, we are just kicking ourselves that we haven't done this sooner, but the good news is we're now at a point where you have even more stories to share with us.

- You betcha.

I've got them all saved up.

There's a lot of 'em that I probably can't tell, but a lot of them that I can.

- Well, anyone who may not know you may not realize what an extraordinary person you are, what a gift you are to Chattanooga, but also what an incredible stage, and I use that pun intended, but what an incredible stage you have set for you and your wife, for your entire family and this community and just the investment that you have made, not only in Chattanooga, but in the music industry and in bringing joy to all of our lives.

So thank you for that.

And I cannot wait to hear all of your stories.

- I've had a lot of fun entertaining Chattanooga and it wasn't always easy.

And there were so many things that I didn't get to do that I wanted to, but I really enjoyed my run at Riverbend was great.

And you know, and when I took over the buying the talent in 2020, when when Chip Baker took over and he wanted me to hang around and work part time and then all of a sudden I said, "You know this really isn't a part time job.

I probably need to..." So anyway, we worked somethin' out.

So I started buyin' the entertainment and it's a challenge.

It truly is when you don't have a great big budget and you got nine days to fill at that time.

And it was like, "Wow, this is a bear".

but it's always been a lot of fun and what was cool, a lot of times I would buy some things that I really wanted to see that I thought everybody else wanted to see too.

So that worked out real well.

- We're going to get to Riverbend.

'Cause I feel like we want to start at the beginning of this story, which starts with your family coming to Chattanooga and you have quite a eclectic family history.

- Yes we do.

And we of course own Zarzour's Cafe.

My name is Fuller, but my mother was a Zarzour.

She was Abe Zarzour's daughter.

And her grandfather came to Chattanooga in around 1915 and bought the location where Zarzour's is in 1918.

And after he had settled in and got things kind of organized and made a little bit of money and got it going he sent after my great-grandmother, who was still in Syria.

And so she came over, and as soon as she got here in 1918 she caught the Spanish flu and passed away.

So this whole epidemic thing has come full circle with us.

That particular flu didn't go after old folks, It went after young and healthy people, which is kind of strange but she must have been one heck of a person.

They raised five children in the back of Zarzour's.

That was actually a lot of times back in the old, you know in the early thirties and into the forties, a lot of people lived in their businesses.

And so that's, that's kinda how he did it.

He started out selling peanut brittle.

He had a little brass hammer, and I've still got it and a little set of scales, I still got those, and he'd sit out front of the store and he'd break.

He'd make this really fine peanut brittle and he'd sell it by the pound and a half pound.

And he sold sodas and, you know, and you know just anything he could do to, to make a little bit of money.

And he did really well.

And when my aunt Rose, which was the oldest daughter of his, when she got a little older, she talked him into, "You know, what we ought to, you know, maybe try to sell a hamburger or a hot dog or somethin'."

And so that's when all that began.

And so my aunt Rose, when he passed away and he passed away in about '55, I was born in '56 and he died the year before I was born, but he came here and originally went to Birmingham and then he traveled north towards Chattanooga.

And he stopped off in Hammondville, which is at the foot of the mountain at Mentone.

And this is in 1915, and he was a pack peddler for about eight months.

He went door to door selling, like a Fuller Brush guys; Combs, brushes, pencils.

And don't you know that was kind of strange, you know, this olive colored guy who spoke very broken English coming to the door of these very rural country farms and stuff, so.

But anyway, Zarzours is a really cool place.

The doors have never closed.

We're we're the oldest family owned restaurant in state of Tennessee.

We're 103 years old and the doors have never closed and the location's never changed.

So that puts us kind of a little bit in the historic book.

But it's a fun place.

A lot of history on the wall.

My great-grandfather's naturalization papers are actually on the wall.

And how it used to look.

And a lot of my family and my uncle George and of course my grandfather, Abe Zarzour, he was Mr.

Baseball in Chattanooga.

They called him the Mayor of Main Street.

He played for the Lookouts, played shortstop.

But he wasn't really big enough to go into the major leagues, so.

But anyway, my mom passed away in 2015.

My wife, Shannon, this is truly her passion.

She has been in the food industry.

She worked at Sunset Grill in Nashville for years and in fine dining.

And she always told me, She goes, "I'd love to have some place with like eight tables and, you know, just something simple and you know, no no alcohol."

And I'm agreeing, you know?

And so when we moved here and my mom got sick, we stayed with her until her passing and then, and so we bought it from the family.

And so now we've got it and we're real proud of it.

And I'm very proud in keeping that part of my family, that heritage alive.

And I think it's real important 'cause a lot of kids they just don't follow in their folks footsteps at all anymore.

It's kind of difficult, but it's, I find it to be an adventure and a challenge at the same time.

(country music) - [Alison Voiceover] There's no doubt that this family has made a big impact in Chattanooga.

And Dixie is certainly following in their footsteps.

But before he was running the restaurant, Dixie enjoyed a long and colorful career in the music industry.

Built on a passion he has nurtured since childhood.

- When did you first get an affinity and love for music?

- Believe it or not, when I went to elementary school.

I went to St. Jude's.

We're Catholic family and then we all went to St. Jude's Elementary School.

And I had a friend of mine that had a little band behind the house where he lived over Manchester parks and it was Bobby Todd.

And I used to run down there.

I'd hear him practicing, you know, and I know they got tired of me beating on the door but it was like-- Growing up in my house it was Ray Charles, there was Aretha Franklin, there was James Brown, it was Sam Cooke.

And then, you know, an occasional Dean Martin or the Ventures or somethin' but there was always music playin' in our house.

Some way somehow.

And so I think at a very young age I just had this passion about, I think that's what I wanna do.

I wanna, I would like to perform, number one but I just want to be involved.

I want to be around it somehow.

So, as I grew older and I got to know a few people in circles in Chattanooga, I started travelin' a little bit with Overland Express with Rick Williams and Randy Clark, Keith Sherman.

And those guys, Dennis Haskins, who was their manager.

And so I got a pretty good taste for it with those guys for about a year, year and a half.

And then I went to see a concert at the Memorial Auditorium And somebody said, "You need to go see these guys.

They're from Fort Payne.

They're just some band from Fort Payne, they're called Alabama".

And I said, well, "You know, whatever".

And so I went.

Kevin O'Keeffe and I went down there, bought a ticket and they were really good, however, they had guitars that were out of tune or the equipment, something was wrong you know, and you could see, they were just frustrated.

The look of frustration on their face.

So I thought this is the guys.

I mean, they're from right down the street and I'd love to be on the road with somebody that's, and take it to the next level.

And so Steve Chappell, good friend of mine was a disc jockey over at WDOD.

And that's when they were still over at Baylor school, it was a little, it was smaller than this table.

And I called him and I said, "Man, do you know anything about this Alabama bunch?"

And he goes, "Yeah!"

He goes, "Yeah I do!"

He goes, "Those are some pretty cool cats."

He goes, "You know they're gettin' ready to win Vocal Group of the Year".

And I went, "Well, I wanna, I wanna get in touch with 'em.

I want to go to work for 'em."

And he said, "Okay?"

And so he got Randy's number.

Of course, I called Randy Owen out of the middle of nowhere.

And I'm sure he went, you know, "Who the heck is this guy?"

But anyway, I found out that they were gonna be in Cumming, Georgia, a little bitty outdoor music park called Lanier Land.

And I told my mother, I said, "I'm gonna go get a job with these guys".

- Okay, hold on.

So how old are you at this point?

- I am, I was probably 20.

- You're, 20 years old, - I was 20 years old.

- And you decide, "I'm gonna be a stagehand for Alabama."

- Yes that's right.

- Because they need me.

- I could tell they needed somebody.

They needed guitars, and I could play.

I took lessons from Norman Blake when I was a young person.

So not a great player, but I know guitars.

And so, I told mom, I said, "Mom, I need $20.

I need a Trailways ticket to Cartersville Georgia."

And so she goes, "Are you out of your mind?

I went, "Probably.

Yes ma'am.

I am".

So anyway, she bought me a bus ticket and gave me $20 and said, you know, "I'm not gonna hold you back."

So I got a bus ticket to Cartersville Georgia and the bus station there was like a gas station that they pulled in and just dropped a few people off and ran.

And Bob Stagner a good friend of mine here in Chattanooga is, Shakin' Ray Levi Society guy.

And he was a musician that I knew.

He was livin' in Atlanta, and he came up here and picked me up.

And he's like, "Do you know what you're doin'?"

You know, same thing my mother asked me.

And I was like, "I don't know."

But anyway, said, "I'm gonna take you to Cumming, to this place.

Do you know these people?"

And I said, "No, I don't".

I'd handwritten a resume on a piece of notebook paper with a pencil and I'm like, "Just take me there".

So he took me there and he goes, "Man," he goes, "all right then.

I'm going to drop you off."

So he dropped me and left, and here I am.

I'm standin' outside the bus and the road manager, big, tall burly gray haired guy that they'd brought out of the bars with 'em from Myrtle Beach named Bruce Burnett.

He says, you know, he looked at me like, "What are you..." You know?

I said, "Hey", I said, "I'm Dixie, Joe Fuller.

I said, my name's Joe Fuller".

I'm from Chattanooga, Tennessee.

And I said, "I saw the guys a couple of weeks ago at the Auditorium".

And said, "Looked like they need some help with the equipment on stage."

And I said, "I'd love to, you know apply to maybe mix or whatever you guys need."

He goes, "Wait a minute."

He goes, "Can you drive that truck?"

And it was a box truck, a little 24 foot box truck.

I said, "I certainly can."

Never been in one in my life.

I said, "You bet I can."

(Alison laughs) So anyway, he got on the bus and the guys were in there, and they'd bought this old beat up bus from Marshall Tucker band.

They probably had a million miles on her.

It was just terrible shape.

Anyway, about five minutes later, door opens, and here comes Teddy Gentry out, the bass player for Alabama.

He said, "Bruce says, you want a job."

He goes, "What do you do?"

I said, Well I can work.

I can tech guitars and I know equipment.

I, you know, I know PA equipment."

He goes, "Can you drive the truck?"

I said, (laughter) "Yeah!

You better believe I can!"

He goes, "All right.

You're drivin' the truck tonight.

And we're gonna call you Dixie."

- Just like that.

- That's where it happened.

"You're driving the truck tonight."

I said, "I'll work the first two weeks for free.

If you don't like me, I'll go back home."

He goes, "Okay, you're drivin' the truck tonight."

And next thing I know I'm headed to Munster, Texas drivin' a truck.

I mean... and here we go.

And that was it.

And that's how I got the name Dixie.

What it is, when I left, Rick Williams and I were livin' in a house on Mount Creek Road and I stole a hat from him.

They had a little Rebel flag on the front of it.

And that's all I have is this Rebel, this hat.

And I didn't, I had a day bag with like just a couple of things in it.

And so like three weeks go by and I'm just having the time of my life.

We're already out in the Midwest doing all these tiny county fairs and we're winning awards and crowds are gettin' bigger and the albums are selling and I'm going, "Man, this is it".

And so, I got on the bus one afternoon and the guys were in there and I'm walkin' through the front lounge.

And Randy looked at Teddy and goes, "Are we paying Dixie yet?

Have we paid him anything yet?

(laughter) I went, "No but you know, whatever".

And so isn't that funny?

And that's how the all that began.

And it was so surreal to me to, you know come back into Fort Payne and this little bitty town and see these guys who were just plain simple country guys.

They were gettin' ready to be these huge superstars.

And I could just feel it.

I could just, I went, "Man this is all headed in the right direction."

And next thing you know, you know it's Vocal Group of the Year, Instrumental Group of the Year, Entertainer of the Year.

And, and I was just, wow, it was just incredible.

And so then about, I don't know maybe two years into this thing, the guys come in we, what we would do is, every member of the crew could play some sort of instrument.

So we'd rushed to get this huge PA system set up so we could get up there and play like ZZ Top or somethin' and have some fun.

Well, the guys came in early for sound check and we're up there, we're jammin'.

We're doing some Loverboy song or somethin'.

And they come in and they're like at the back of the room and they're goin', "Man, what a bunch of sandbaggers.

I can't believe you guys can play.

What's up with that?

And so anyway, they said, "Well, why don't you all open tonight?

And we were like, "No, no, no.

- No!

- So anyway, so we didn't, we didn't.

They were like, "We oughta just let them come out and", you know, and, but we didn't.

But anyway, Randy, Teddy said, and I was helpin' while I was doing some drum thing.

I wasn't even playing guitar at that point.

And Teddy said, "Man, we got all kinds of neat percussion parts on this next album we're doin'.

You wanna maybe try and do some stage work and play?"

And I said, "I'd love it."

And so we rehearsed the whole 40 Hour Week album.

And I mean, next thing you know, I played on the "Live" album, I played on "40 Hour Week" and I played on "The Closer You Get".

And those were great albums.

And all of a sudden here I am from ridin' the bus to Cumming.

I'm actually getting on stage with them.

- [Alison Voiceover] Dixie continued to travel the world with Alabama until 1986 - Entertainer of the Year, Alabama!

- And witnessed their ascent to become one of the biggest country music bands of all time.

And as I'm sure you can imagine, he met some pretty colorful characters along the way.

Well, as small as the Alabama crew was, I imagine that the number of artists that you met was extraordinary.

- Oh, it was huge.

I just posted a thing the other day.

One of the several people that I met in my travels with Alabama that were a lot of fun.

We were at the American Music Awards in the backstage at the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles.

This of course was a Dick Clark Production.

It was really neat.

And it was early.

It was in its baby years, but anyway, they didn't have enough dressing rooms, so they took this huge assembly hall that was attached to the Shrine Auditorium and they put a bunch of travel trailers in there like you'd go camping with, for temporary dressing rooms.

So I had about an hour break one afternoon, we'd done a rehearsal and Bob Martin and I were walkin' and we walked by this trailer and there's Liberace.

And I thought, "Oh my God!

This is great man.

I wonder if he's actually in there.

Let's just..." because we, you know, as a kid I'd seen him on the Ed Sullivan show or Lawrence Welk, I mean, you always saw Liberace was everywhere, Johnny Carson, you know?

And so we've beat on his door and one of his aides came out to the door that was with him and he said, "Can I help you?"

And I said, "Yeah", said, "I'm, I'm Dixie Fuller.

I'm from, with the group Alabama.

We'd like to say hello to Liberace."

And he was in there and all of a sudden I heard him say, "Well, I thought you'd never ask!"

(both laugh) So he came out.

We signed autographs and took pictures.

Had my picture with 'em.

But he was in full, you know, Porter Wagner didn't have anything on Liberace in his rhinestones.

So, but he was so sweet and kind, he couldn't have been nicer.

You just, you meet people along the way that really, oh man... - I understand you also shared a dressing room with some pretty amazing characters.

- Yeah, we shared a dressing room with Siegfried and Roy, which was cool and they had tigers with 'em.

They had baby Bengal tigers, and I'm like, we had all of our guitars set up and here's these things runnin' wild.

And I mean, these are lovable, big cats.

Now I'm talking about 180 pound cat that just wants you to, you know, And it was great.

And they were really neat guys.

But yeah, we have shared some dressing rooms with some pretty cool folks.

Award shows are great.

They're a lot of fun.

I remember each and then the last two Entertainer of the Year awards that we got, I went up on stage with the guys.

And so I got, mine's at Zarzour's.

It's up on the, I got two of 'em up there and I'm really proud of those.

But, you know, Alabama was a lot of fun.

You know, but I got an offer to go out and do a thing with Clint Black and he had just released the Killin' Time album and they needed a road manager.

And so they hired me to go out and I went out and did Clint Black and then came back in.

And then what was cool is when I saw your Sun, your Sun Studio, after I got back in from Clint, I went to work for Billy Burnett and Billy Burnett was the guitar player for Fleetwood Mac.

He, entered the band when Lindsey Buckingham left temporarily and we did the Behind the Mask tour together, I did with Billy.

But his dad was Dorsey Burnett, and he's one of the rockabilly guys that did the Carl Perkins work at Sun Studios.

So that's how I know all that stuff.

But that was fun.

The Oak Ridge boys was a lot of fun.

I did have one little thing that I did for Angela Bofill.

She was a jazz player from San Francisco.

Black and wonderful and just really cool.

And, had an all girl band.

They were all very good musicians.

Terri Lyne Carrington was the, Arsenio Hall's drummer.

I mean great stuff, but, but that wasn't that was road managing a whole lot of women was a whole brand new thing for me.

They'd never been on a bus before.

And so, you know, we're going down the road in the bus and they're trying to hold themselves up and stuff going to and from the front to the back.

But that was a lot of fun, now, what happened was towards the tail end of all this stuff, I was working for a company part-time called Bandit Lights out of Knoxville.

And they were the lighting vendor for Riverbend, for Chattanooga's Riverbend Festival.

And so I was overseeing all the lighting on four different stages.

And Richard came up to me, Richard Brewer who was over, executive director.

He said, "Would you consider coming back next year and managing a stage, maybe the Coke stage?"

And I'll look at that big old thing and I went, "Oh, me?

Okay.

Why not?"

So I did.

I started that and I would always take the first two weeks of June and I would, and anybody that I'd work for I'd say, "Look, you can have me all year long but the first two weeks of June I'm goin' home, 'cause I gotta go do the Festival.

- [Alison Voiceover] What started out as a side gig, quickly turned into a new kind of challenge and adventure for Dixie.

In 2000, he made the jump to the role of production director, where he was in charge of everything from booking talent, to lighting, to catering.

And over the course of his time with the festival, Dixie had the opportunity to bring some big names and new sounds to his hometown.

- What was your most proud moment of an act that you were able to secure?

- Probably the Allman Brothers Band for closing night.

That was my dream.

That was one of my favorite things as a kid was the Allman Brothers Live with the Fillmore East album and everybody had a copy of it and I loved 'em and I couldn't go see him at UTC.

They were Maclellan Gym and I was too young.

And, and man, I loved 'em.

It was like, God, what a great guitar work is just incredible.

And I booked 'em for Riverbend and also Joe Cocker was the other one that I really went, "Man.

Golly".

And then he died next year.

Have a lot of artists that passed away the year, you know, Leon Russell, Merle Haggard, God bless 'em.

But man, they put on great shows and you know and they were on the tail end of their lives and I mean, that's all they knew, you know?

And Willie Nelson, you know?

God, I don't know how in the world he's doing it but he's still doing shows, you know?

But... - Who do you still need to see?

Who's still on your list?

- Steve Winwood.

And, and every year I made an offer for Steve Winwood and I made an offer for John Fogarty from Credence Clearwater, and they never bit the hook.

It took me five years just to get ZZ Top on the Coke stage.

And I kept throwin' stupid money at 'em.

And they're like, "We're just not gonna be in the area", or "we're not touring" or, you know, "Frank's daughter's graduating college" or something.

Always some little thing.

And Bill Ham, their manager, was my boss on Clint Black.

He was Clint Black's manager too.

So I got, I knew the guys and they knew me and they knew eventually they were going to come down here and do this thing.

But that was a cool show.

ZZ Top's just fun, man.

It's just fun.

There're all kinds of little stage props and really cool things going on up there.

- But any young kid, I have to imagine, any young person watching this right now is thinking to themselves one thing.

"I want to be Dixie Fuller", right?

Anybody who wants to be in the music industry but when you listen to your path, right?

And you think about you gettin' on that bus with $20 in your pocket and no fear and nobody telling you it can't happen, how does, what advice do you give to that young person who wants to do what you did?

- I, and this was I, and I tell everybody this and I do.

I teach a class up at McCallie school every year music on music, just, you know, follow your dream, do it.

I mean, you know, if it's a crazy idea but you know that the end result, if you're focused on what's at the end, you know, the end result is somethin' that you really want to do in life.

And I loved it.

I mean, I couldn't wait to get on stage and play and I couldn't wait to get on the bus and go to the next town.

And it was magic.

It was just magic.

It was, you know, and I was blessed that way.

Thank goodness you know, that I wanted to do that and that happened for me.

And I tell anybody that you know that if you want to be a doctor, man follow your dream and stay with it.

It's hard.

It's gotta be very difficult.

You know, if you want to be a road person follow it, you know, you'll learn and don't ever think, you know everything.

There's every day you're going to have some young kid come up and go, "Well I got a better way you can..." you know?

Listen to it.

There's always a better idea.

Always.

But I loved it.

I mean, you know, it's been my passion and I wouldn't do anything differently.

- Well Dixie, when I think about Chattanooga, I can't imagine a city that would have benefited more from anyone else.

Between sustaining us with food and giving us the sustenance we needed with entertainment.

You are, you are certainly the champion of both.

- Thank you so very much, Alison.

I appreciate that.

But I mean, I love Chattanooga.

I love this town and, I've had a really good life.

It ain't over with, by a long shot, but thank you for having me.

- Well thank you for being here.

And on that note, what should be your theme song as we roll to credits?

- Oh, let me see.

Steve Winwood's "Higher Love".

- There we go.

- Steve Winwood's "Higher Love".

- We'll try to make that happen.

- That would be great.

- Thank you Dixie.

- Thank you for having me my love.

Thank you.

(Steve Winwood's Higher Love plays) - [Male Narrator] Get on demand access to even more of the shows you love with WTCI Passport on the PBS Video app.

Download it today.

- Funding for this program was provided by: Chattanooga Funeral Home Crematory and Florist, dedicated to helping you celebrate your life or the life of a loved one for over 85 years.

Chattanooga Funeral Home believes that each funeral should be as unique and memorable as the life being honored.

- [Female Narrator] This program is also made possible by support from viewers like you.

Thank you.