|
Johnny Cash (February 26, 1932–September 12, 2003), born J. R. Cash, was an American singer-songwriter and one of the most influential musicians of the 20th century. Primarily a country music artist, his songs and sound spanned many other genres including rockabilly and rock and roll (especially early in his career), as well as blues, folk, and gospel.
Cash was known for his deep, distinctive bass-baritone voice, the "chicka-boom" freight train sound of his Tennessee Three backing band, his demeanor, and his dark clothing, which earned him the nickname "The Man in Black". He traditionally started his concerts with the introduction "Hello, I'm Johnny Cash".
Much of Cash's music, especially that of his later career, echoed themes of sorrow, moral tribulation and redemption. His signature songs include "I Walk the Line", "Folsom Prison Blues", "Ring of Fire", "Get Rhythm" and "Man in Black". He also recorded humorous songs, such as "One Piece at a Time" and "A Boy Named Sue", a duet with June Carter called "Jackson", as well as railroad songs such as "Hey Porter" and "Rock Island Line."
LifeHeritageCash was of Scottish royal descent but he learned this only upon researching his ancestry.[Millar, Anna. 4 June, 2006.. Scotland on Sunday. Scottsman.com. Retrieved on 2008-12-24.] After a chance meeting with former Falkland laird, Major Michael Crichton-Stuart, he traced the Cash family tree to 11th century Fife, Scotland.[ first=Stephen ] Scotland's Cash Loch bears the name of his family.
He had believed in his younger days that he was mainly Irish and partially Native American
. Even after learning he was not Native American, Cash's empathy and compassion for Native Americans was unabated. These feelings were expressed in several of his songs, including "Apache Tears" and "The Ballad of Ira Hayes", and on his album, Bitter Tears.
Early lifeJohnny Cash was born J. R. Cash in Kingsland, Arkansas, to Ray (1897-1985) and Carrie (née Rivers) Cash (1904-1991), and raised in Dyess, Arkansas.Citation needed
Cash was given the name "J.R." because his parents could not agree on a name, only on initials. When he enlisted in the United States Air Force, the military would not accept initials as his name, so he adopted John R. Cash as his legal name. In 1955, when signing with Sun Records, he took Johnny Cash as his stage name. His friends and in-laws generally called him John, while his blood relatives usually continued to call him J.R.Citation needed
Cash was one of seven children: Jack, Joanne Cash Yates, Louise Garrett, Reba Hancock, Roy, and Tommy. His younger brother, Tommy Cash, also became a successful country artist.
By the age of five, J.R. was working in the cotton fields, singing along with his family as they worked. The family farm was flooded on at least one occasion, which later inspired him to write the song "Five Feet High and Rising".[Cash, Johnny. Cash: The Autobiography.] His family's economic and personal struggles during the Depression inspired many of his songs, especially those about other people facing similar difficulties.
Cash was very close to his brother Jack, who was two years older. In 1944, Jack was pulled into a whirling table saw in the mill where he worked, and cut almost in two. He suffered for over a week before he died.
Cash's early memories were dominated by gospel music and radio. Taught by his mother and a childhood friend, Cash began playing guitar and writing songs as a young boy. In high school he sang on a local radio station; decades later he released an album of traditional gospel songs, called ''My Mother's Hymn Book. He was also significantly influenced by traditional Irish music that he heard performed weekly by Dennis Day on the Jack Benny radio program.[Gross, Terry. ]All I Did Was Ask: Conversations with Writers, Actors, Musicians, and Artists.
Cash enlisted in the United States Air Force. After basic training at Lackland Air Force Base and technical training at Brooks Air Force Base, both in San Antonio, Texas, Cash was assigned to a U.S. Air Force Security Service unit, assigned as a morse code intercept operator for Russian Army transmissions, at Landsberg, Germany. On July 3, 1954, he was honorably discharged as a sergeant. Then, he returned to Texas.[first=Kenny ]
Vivian LibertoOn July 18, 1951, while in Air Force training, Cash met 17 year-old Vivian Liberto (April 23, 1934, San Antonio, Texas—May 24, 2005, Ventura, California) at a roller skating rink in her native San Antonio. They dated for three weeks, until Cash was deployed to Germany for a three year tour. During that time, the couple exchanged hundreds of pages of love letters.Citation needed
On August 7, 1954, one month after his discharge, they were married at St. Anne's Catholic church in San Antonio. They had four daughters: Rosanne (born May 24, 1955), Kathy (born April 16, 1956), Cindy (born July 29, 1958) and Tara (born August 24, 1961). Cash's drug and alcohol abuse, constant touring, and affairs with other women (including future wife June Carter) led Liberto to file for divorce in 1966.Citation needed
June CarterIn 1968, 12 years after they first met backstage at the Grand Ole Opry, Cash proposed to June Carter, an established country singer, during a live performance in London, Ontario, marrying on March 1, 1968 in Franklin, Kentucky. He had proposed numerous times, but she had always refused. They had one child together, John Carter Cash (born March 3, 1970).
They continued to work together and tour for thirty-five years, until June Carter died in 2003. Cash died just four months after. Carter co-wrote one of his biggest hits, "Ring of Fire," and they won two Grammy awards for their duets.
Vivian Liberto claims a different version of the origins of "Ring of Fire" in I Walked the Line: My Life with Johnny, stating that Cash gave Carter the credit for monetary reasons.
CareerEarly careerIn 1954, Cash and Vivian moved to Memphis, Tennessee, where he sold appliances while studying to be a radio announcer. At night he played with guitarist Luther Perkins and bassist Marshall Grant. Perkins and Grant were known as the Tennessee Two. Cash worked up the courage to visit the Sun Records studio, hoping to get a recording contract. After auditioning for Sam Phillips, singing mostly gospel songs, Phillips told him that gospel was unmarketable. It was once rumored that Phillips told Cash to "go home and sin, then come back with a song I can sell," though Cash refuted that Phillips made any such comment in a 2002 interview. Cash eventually won over the producer with new songs delivered in his early frenetic style. His first recordings at Sun, "Hey Porter" and "Cry Cry Cry", were released in 1955 and met with reasonable success on the country hit parade.
Cash's next record, "Folsom Prison Blues", made the country Top 5, and "I Walk the Line" became No. 1 on the country charts and entered the pop charts Top 20. Following "I Walk the Line" was "Home of the Blues", recorded in July 1957. That same year Cash became the first Sun artist to release a long-playing album. Although he was Sun's most consistently best-selling and prolific artist at that time, Cash felt constrained by his contract with the small label. Elvis Presley had already left Sun, and Phillips was focusing most of his attention and promotion on Jerry Lee Lewis. The following year Cash left the label to sign a lucrative offer with Columbia Records, where his single "Don't Take Your Guns to Town" became one of his biggest hits.
In the early 1960s, Cash toured with the Carter Family, which by this time regularly included Mother Maybelle's daughters, Anita, June and Helen. June, whom Cash would eventually marry, later recalled admiring him from afar during these tours.
He also acted in a 1961 film entitled Five Minutes to Live, later re-released as Door-to-door Maniac.
Outlaw imageAs his career was taking off in the early 1960s, Cash started drinking heavily and became addicted to amphetamines and barbiturates. For a brief time, he shared an apartment in Nashville with Waylon Jennings, who was heavily addicted to amphetamines. Cash used the uppers to stay awake during tours. Friends joked about his "nervousness" and erratic behavior, many ignoring the warning signs of his worsening drug addiction. In a behind-the-scenes look at The Johnny Cash Show, Cash claims to have "tried every drug there was to try."
Although in many ways spiraling out of control, Cash's frenetic creativity was still delivering hits. His rendition of "Ring of Fire" was a crossover hit, reaching No. 1 on the country charts and entering the Top 20 on the pop charts. The song was written by June Carter and Merle Kilgore. The song was originally performed by Carter's sister, but the signature mariachi-style horn arrangement was provided by Cash, who said that it had come to him in a dream.
In June 1965, his truck caught fire due to an overheated wheel bearing, triggering a forest fire that burned several hundred acres in Los Padres National Forest in California. When the judge asked Cash why he did it, Cash said, "I didn't do it, my truck did, and it's dead, so you can't question it."
DEFAULTSORT:Cash, Johnny
Category:1932 births
Category:2003 deaths
Category:Actors from Arkansas
Category:American autobiographers
Category:American composers
Category:American country guitarists
Category:American country singers
Category:American country songwriters
Category:American folk guitarists
Category:American folk singers
Category:American male singers
Category:Americana Music Award winners
Category:American performers of Christian music
Category:American Protestants
Category:Burials in Tennessee
Category:Charly Records artists
Category:Columbia Records artists
Category:Country Music Hall of Fame inductees
Category:Deaths from diabetes
Category:Grammy Award winners
Category:Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award winners
Category:Grand Ole Opry members
Category:Kennedy Center honorees
Category:Musicians from Arkansas
Category:Musicians who have served in the military
Category:People from Cleveland County, Arkansas
Category:People from Sumner County, Tennessee
Category:People with Parkinson's disease
Category:Rockabilly Hall of Fame inductees
Category:Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductees
Category:Scottish-American musicians
Category:Sun Records artists
Category:United States Air Force airmen
Category:United States National Medal of Arts recipients
Link FA ka
ar:???? ???
bar:Johnny Cash
bs:Johnny Cash
bg:????? ???
ca:Johnny Cash
cs:Johnny Cash
da:Johnny Cash
de:Johnny Cash
et:Johnny Cash
el:????? ?a?
es:Johnny Cash
eo:Johnny Cash
fa:???? ??
fo:Johnny Cash
fr:Johnny Cash
fy:Johnny Cash
ga:Johnny Cash
gl:Johnny Cash
hi:???? ???
hr:Johnny Cash
id:Johnny Cash
is:Johnny Cash
it:Johnny Cash
he:?'??? ???
ka:???? ????
sw:Johnny Cash
la:Ioannes Cash
lmo:Johnny Cash
hu:Johnny Cash
mr:???? ???
nl:Johnny Cash
ja:????·?????
no:Johnny Cash
oc:Johnny Cash
nds:Johnny Cash
pl:Johnny Cash
pt:Johnny Cash
ro:Johnny Cash
ru:???, ??????
sco:Johnny Cash
sq:Johnny Cash
simple:Johnny Cash
sk:Johnny Cash
sl:Johnny Cash
fi:Johnny Cash
sv:Johnny Cash
th:??????? ???
tr:Johnny Cash
uk:?????? ???
vi:Johnny Cash
zh:???·??
Copyright Citations
This article is licensed under the GNU License
Click here for original article: Johnny Cash
|
|
Photo by: www.ananova.com
|
