Who else were playing professionally as children?

i played drums with the opening act for blood sweat and tears at the troubadour in 1967. i was 10.

 

Bee Gees.

 

Are you pulling our legs?

 

why would i do that? they were bobby columby's drums. i was like 3.5 feet tall. i could barely hit the pedals.

 

I believe Scott Walker’s first record came out when he was 14 and recording under his real name, Scott Engel.

 

The Carter Sisters, daughters of Mother Maybelle Carter. They continued to perform together for decades.

 

Sammy Davis, Jr.

 

LeAnn Rimes

LeAnn Rimes - Wikipedia

 

I don't know if they were actually playing professionally in 1933, but...

 

Janis Ian

 

I did. Been gigging at least twice a month since i was 12.

 

I did my 1st gig at 14, by 16 I would of done at least 100 I guess.

Still gigging, been on the road one way or another for decades.

 

The Osmond Brothers (and later sister)

 

and these guys... wait... what ?? Tracy didn't play that tambourine ? And Chris WASN'T the drummer on the tracks ?!!

 

Dave Davies was 14-15 when the Ray Davies Quartet were playing pubs and parties for pay.


I would actually think it was more the rule than the exception for future career musicians to have some amount of professional gigs in their early-to-mid teens, even nowadays.

 

In 1971, Yugoslav keys-player Lazar "Laza" Ristovski at his 14 recorded this "progressive" instrumental track with his early band Bezimeni (transl. "No Name").

 

Alex Chilton was 16 with a #1 hit

 

I wrote a song when I was 13
I recorded it when I was 14
I had a hit when I was 15
and I was a has-been at 16
-- attributed to Janis Ian





Sorry, didn't see it was already posted

 

And John Cowsill.



He was an accomplished drummer as a child too.

 

Ronnie Reno

 

Agnetha Faltskog had her first number hit in Sweden when she was 17, she wrote it herself.

 

"Almost from infancy Anita was singing. As she puts it, she was singing professionally from the age of 4, but did not start getting paid for it until she was 6. The professional singing began in earnest in Del Rio, Texas, where the Carter Family had both an early morning and an evening show six days a week on XERA, broadcast from across the border in Villa Acuna, Coahuila, Mexico. ... She recalls some mornings when she wanted to go along, she'd be awakened at 4:00 a.m. and "Mom just took me over, and I'd sleep in the guitar case in between songs and she'd wake me up and tell me to go to the microphone and sing and then I'd get back in the guitar case.""
(Otto Kitsinger in the booklet of Bear Family CD "Ring of fire" by Anita Carter)

 

Yeah, and later tried to fool us by calling her later album "Debut". Nice try.