Gamble Rogers

James Gamble Rogers IV (January 31, 1937 – October 10, 1991) was an American folk artist musician and storyteller known for the recurring theme in his songs and stories about characters and places in a fictional Florida county.

As a young man, he chose to become a musician—while on his way to interview for a job at an architecture firm, he attended a Serendipity Singers audition in New York City,[2] borrowed a guitar, tried out, and was admitted to the group.

He appeared in James Szalapski's 1976 country music documentary film Heartworn Highways, performing an onstage comic monologue followed by "Black Label Blues."

In their tribute to him, "Song for Gamble," Steve Gillette and his wife Cindy Mangsen describe him: "He had the gift of innocence, and a fondness for the key of 'E'."

Through years of onstage apprenticeship, Rogers refined and polished his one-man show into a single story line – a continuum he entitled, Oklawaha County Laissez-Faire.