Kinky Friedman, the cigar-chomping, mustachioed Texan country singer and mystery novelist whose body of work often seemed like the un-kosher marriage of the Borscht Belt and the Bible Belt, died June 27 from complications of Parkinson’s disease. He was 79.
As frontman for the flamboyant 1970s country group Kinky Friedman and the Texas Jewboys, he was notorious for satirical songs such as “They Don’t Make Jews Like Jesus Anymore,” a raucous sendup of racism, and “Get Your Biscuits in the Oven and Your Buns in Bed,” which poked fun at feminism.
Advertisement
He could also turn serious, with songs dealing with social issues such as abortion and commercialism. His 1973 song “Ride ’em Jewboy” is a haunting elegy on the Holocaust, recorded by Willie Nelson and sung in concert by Bob Dylan. The lyrics transform cowboy cliches into a rumination on Hitler’s victims:
Now the smoke from camps a-rising
See the helpless creatures on their way
Advertisement
Hey, old pal, ain’t it surprising
How far you can go before you stay?
Texas Independent gubernatorial candidate Kinky Friedman addresses supporters during his election night party at Scholz Garten in Austin, Texas, November 7, 2006. (credit: REUTERS/Donald R. Winslow)
Advertisement
The Jewboys broke up in the mid-1970s and Friedman spent much of the next decade in a haze of drugs. In the mid-1980s he cleaned up and began writing a series of successful, raunchy, comic mystery novels whose main character is himself. He wrote more than 20 books, all on a manual typewriter.
https://youtu.be/uBewkqSdehQ
One reviewer, the actress and author Fannie Flagg, described his writing as “Raymond Chandler on drugs, if Chandler had possessed a tremendous sense of humor.”
Advertisement
In 2006 he ran for governor of Texas, looking to unseat incumbent Republican Rick Perry in a bid that went from joking to serious. His campaign material included a 13-inch talking action figure and bumper stickers that read, “My governor is a Jewish cowboy.” His official campaign slogan was “Why the hell not?” He considered himself tough on immigration, pro-choice, anti-capital punishment and a proponent of alternative fuels.
In time, his campaign gathered force as a serious quest to shake up Texas politics, break down traditional party machines and reach out to a dramatically disaffected electorate.
Advertisement
“In the last election for governor, only 29% of eligible voters went to the polls,” Friedman, known as “the Kinkster,” told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency that year. “Seventy-one percent didn’t vote — they didn’t like the choice between paper and plastic.”
In the end, Friedman placed fourth in the six-person race, receiving 12.6% of the vote.
The origins of Kinky Friedman
Born Richard Samet Friedman in Chicago in 1944, he moved with his parents to Texas as a baby and earned his nickname in college from his curly hair. His parents were educators who ran a summer camp for mainly Jewish children at Echo Hill Ranch, the 400-acre spread where Friedman would come to live in a small but rambling lodge.
Advertisement
“We had services every Friday night, and Kinky would play the guitar,” Ellen St. Clair, who spent four summers at Echo Hill, told JTA in 2006.
The property is also home to the Utopia Animal Rescue Ranch, a home and adoption center for abused and abandoned dogs that Friedman helped found.
Advertisement
He attended the University of Texas at Austin, where he majored in psychology. Friedman proudly recalled that during their time as members of the Jewish Tau Delta Phi fraternity he and a friend, Nathan “Chinga” Chavin, tried to admit African-American students, an effort that was ultimately thwarted.
After graduating in 1966, he served in the Peace Corps in Borneo. After returning from the Peace Corps, he formed Kinky Friedman and the Texas Jewboys, at a time when hybrid “country rock” bands — including The Band, the Eagles and Buffalo Springfield — were rising up the charts. The Jewboys drew a cult following — and occasional protests, as when the National Organization for Women awarded Friedman its “Male Chauvinist Pig Award” in 1973.
In early 1976, he joined Dylan on the second leg of the Rolling Thunder Revue tour. Friedman claimed to have been the first “full-blooded” Jew to take the stage at the Grand Ole Opry.
Advertisement
Friedman would cite Mark Twain and the humorist Will Rogers as his heroes, and the inevitable comparisons were not far off.
“These days,” he once said, “there are many people around the world who listen to the songs that made me infamous and read the books that made me respectable.”
East Texas native Kacey Musgraves on Wednesday announced a May 1 release date for her seventh studio album, Middle of Nowhere. And the country-pop singer released the album’s first single, “Dry Spell,” along with an accompanying video.
The saucy track bemoans a 335-day dry spell since her last romantic encounter, with double entendres aplenty. Musgraves and Hannah Lux Davis co-directed the song’s cheeky video, which is set in a grocery store and is ripe with fruit-touching and wistful stares.
Kacey Musgraves’ new album, “Middle of Nowhere,” is due out May 1.
Lost Highway Records
Advertisement
News Roundups
Catch up on the day’s news you need to know.
By signing up, you agree to our Terms of Service and Privacy Policy.
Musgraves was born in Sulphur Springs and raised in Golden, about 80 miles east of Dallas. She moved to Nashville in 2008.
The eight-time Grammy Award-winner had some help on Middle of Nowhere, which features guest appearances by Willie Nelson, Miranda Lambert, Billy Strings and Gregory Alan Isakov.
Advertisement
Musgraves, who wrapped up her global “Deeper Well World Tour” in December, has emerged as one of the biggest stars in country music over the last decade-plus. Her debut album, 2013’s Same Trailer Different Park, won the Grammy for best country album, and she has topped the country charts multiple times since while earning critical acclaim.
Guitarist praised by ZZ Top’s Billy Gibbons bringing blues show to Oak Cliff
Anson Funderburgh will join Shawn Pittman and Mike Morgan at the March 21 concert at The Kessler.
‘Dallas Blues Society Lost Recordings’ features long-forgotten gems
Recorded in 1989, the treasure trove of mostly Dallas musicians has finally been released.
HOUSTON – A North Texas man faced execution on Wednesday for fatally stabbing his girlfriend and her 8-year-old son nearly 13 years ago.
Cedric Ricks was sentenced to death for the May 2013 killings of 30-year-old Roxann Sanchez and her son Anthony Figueroa at their apartment in Bedford, a suburb in the Dallas-Fort Worth area. Sanchez’s 12-year-old son, Marcus Figueroa, was injured during the attack.
Ricks, 51, was scheduled to receive a lethal injection after 6 p.m. CDT at the state penitentiary in Huntsville, about 70 miles (113 kilometers) north of Houston.
His attorneys have asked the U.S. Supreme Court to stay his execution, arguing that prosecutors violated Ricks’ constitutional rights by eliminating potential jurors on the basis of race. Previous appeals by Ricks that alleged ineffective counsel and called for the suppression of evidence in the case have been denied.
Advertisement
In a 1986 ruling known as Batson v. Kentucky, the Supreme Court determined that excluding jurors because of their race violated the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment.
“At trial, Ricks already suspected that the State had singled out minority jurors to exclude them from his jury,” Ricks’ attorneys said in their petition to the Supreme Court.
Ricks’ lawyers said that notes prosecutors kept during the jury selection process and which were not obtained until 2021 show that prosecutors singled out minority jurors.
The Texas Attorney General’s Office said court records show the prosecution’s decisions in jury selection were “race neutral” and lower courts have already concluded that prosecutors’ actions were not discriminatory.
Ricks “viciously stabbed his girlfriend Roxann and her eight-year-old son Anthony to death,” the attorney general’s office said. “The public has a strong interest in enforcement of Ricks’ sentence.”
Advertisement
The Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles on Monday denied Ricks’ request for a 90-day reprieve or to commute his death sentence.
Prosecutors said Ricks and Sanchez were arguing in their apartment when Sanchez’ two sons from a previous marriage — Anthony and Marcus Figueroa — tried to break up the fight.
Ricks grabbed a knife from the kitchen and began to stab Sanchez multiple times, according to court records.
Marcus Figueroa ran to his bedroom closet and tried to call police. After killing Anthony Figuerora, Ricks resumed stabbing Marcus Figueroa, who survived the attack by playing dead. Ricks did not injure his then 9-month-old son, Isaiah, according to court records.
Ricks fled and was later arrested in Oklahoma.
Advertisement
During his trial, Ricks testified that he had anger issues and had been defending himself against the two boys after they had come to their mother’s defense.
“Explaining my rage, I was upset. Things happen. I don’t know. I don’t know. I don’t know. I wish I could bring them back, like, right now,” said Ricks, who also apologized for the killings.
A day before the stabbings, Ricks had appeared in court after having been charged with assaulting Sanchez during a previous incident.
If the execution is carried out, Ricks would be the second person put to death this year in Texas and the sixth person in the country. Texas has historically held more executions than any other state.
Charles “Sonny” Burton, a 75-year-old inmate in Alabama, had been scheduled to be executed on Thursday. But Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey on Tuesday commuted his death sentence, reducing it to life in prison without the possibility of parole. Burton had been sentenced to death for a fatal shooting during a 1991 robbery even though he didn’t pull the trigger.
Advertisement
___
Follow Juan A. Lozano: https://x.com/juanlozano70
Copyright 2026 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.
The deadline for Texas families to apply for Texas Education Freedom Accounts (TEFA), also known as school vouchers, is on March 17.
TEFA is the $1 billion program that provides families with taxpayer money to help pay for private school. A longtime priority of Gov. Greg Abbott, Texas Republicans were able to pass it through the Legislature in a special session in 2025 after years of opposition from a coalition of Democrats and some Republicans worried about it negatively impacting public schools.
In the period from when applications opened on Feb. 4 through March 8, more than 160,000 Texas families have applied for the vouchers. Acting Texas Comptroller Kelly Hancock expects the program to reach capacity in its first year.
Texas school voucher application data by income
According to data from the Comptroller’s Office, 79% of the applicants for TEFA are already in private school. Lawmakers who advocated for the program said it was designed to give public school and homeschooled students an opportunity to switch to a private education.
Advertisement
After applications close, the Comptroller’s Office will allocate funding to eligible families through a lottery that prioritizes students with disabilities first. Eleven percent of all applicants, about 18,000, are students with disabilities from families at or below 500% of the Federal Poverty Level.
Next on the priority list is students from low- and middle-income families. Just 35% of applicants are from households that earn 200% or less of the Federal Poverty Level:
200% or less of the Federal Poverty Level ($66,000 or less for a family of 4): 35%
Between 200% and 500% of the Federal Poverty Level ($66,001-$164,999 for a family of 4): 36%
500% or more of the Federal Poverty Level: ($165,000 or more for a family of 4): 29%
The Comptroller’s Office will report the waitlist to the Texas Legislature to determine funding for future years.
Texas school voucher application data by grade
The highest share of applications are for students who will be entering pre-K in the fall. Nearly 21,000 applications, about 12.8%, are in that cohort. The number of applicants per grade level declines as the students get older:
Pre-K: 20,975
Kindergarten: 15,777
First grade: 13,654
Second grade: 13,035
Third grade: 12,922
Fourth grade: 12,449
Fifth grade: 12,273
Sixth grade: 12,262
Seventh grade: 10,953
Eighth grade: 9,600
Ninth grade: 9,464
Tenth grade: 7.921
Eleventh grade: 6,731
Twelfth grade: 5,347
Texas school voucher applications by school district
The Comptroller’s Office also released a list that broke down the number of applications submitted in each school district across the state.
How much money public school districts will miss out on will depend on how many enrolled or prospective students they lose to private school because of TEFA, since state funds follow the student. But since 79% of applicants are already in private school, the extent of the impact on public school funding may be limited.
Here are the North Texas school districts with the most TEFA applications from within their boundaries:
