Singer-songwriter from Riverside, California, who was singing by the age of four and playing the guitar at the age of eight. By this time, she was already good enough to play with her dad’s band on a cruise ship. At seventeen years of age, she started singing jingles for commercials such as Jeno’s Pizza, which exposed her voice to a national audience.
She attended college when she was eighteen years old and pursued a degree in music.
Sharing a room with her was Janie Fricke, who would go on to become a country and western singer in her own right. The two of them found work in Memphis, Tennessee, at The Tanner Agency, again recording commercial jingles. Judy also moonlighted with a local band named Phase II that played the Memphis hot spots.
In the 1970s, she graduated to background singing in the genres of country and western and soul music. She wed drummer and fisherman John Rodman and the two of them moved to Music City, U.S.A. in 1980. In Nashville, she continued to sing for commercials, but also had the opportunity to sing backing vocals for artists such as Johnny Cash, Ray Charles and Tammy Wynette.
She became the first artist to be signed by MTM Records, and the partnership proved profitable. In 1985, she cracked the Top 40 with her first record, “I’ve Been Had By Love Before”. The follow-up, “You’re Gonna Miss Me When I’m Gone”, reached #33. The Academy of Country Music named her its Top Female Vocalist for the year. “I Sure Need Your Lovin’”, Judy’s own composition, went to #30 in 1986.
More importantly, she recorded her eponymous debut album and it went to #23 and spawned a #1 hit in “Until I Met You”. It would be her only view from the top, although the second release from the album, “She Thinks That She’ll Marry” managed a respectable #9, and Billboard crowned her its Top New Country Female for the year.
In 1987, her sophomore effort, A Place Called Love, yielded a pair of hits: “Girls Ride Horses Too” went to #7; “I’ll Be Your Baby Tonight”, the old Bob Dylan song, went to #5. Her third album, Goin’ to Work, was never released, as MTM went belly up. Three of its would-be tracks, including the title song, enjoyed some chart success in 1988. “I Want a Love Like That” went to #18; “Goin’ to Work” worked its way to #43 and “I Can Love You” peaked at #48.
As country music reverted to a more traditional idiom, singers like Janie Fricke and Judy Rodman were shut out by fickle C&W execs. Undaunted, Judy pursued the power of the pen, and began making hits the old-fashioned way, by writing them. “One Way Ticket” was a #1 hit for Leann Rimes. “Girl Thang” was a party pleaser for Wynonna Judd and Tammy Wynette.
In 2006, she turned her attention to the stage, acting and directing the music in Daughters of Eve.
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