CMT Blog: Statler Brothers

We started out in one of my favorite places this weekend — Denton, N.C. — at Doyle Lawson & Quicksilver’s bluegrass festival. This was like going home for me, seeing and visiting with old friends, along with Doyle and the boys. The promoter said it was the biggest Thursday they have ever had since the festival started many years ago. We did two 45-minute sets. It was packed when we got on stage; the crowd was incredibly receptive and we had fun together. In the middle of our second set, the clouds opened up and it started hailing hard! I MEAN REALLY HARD! Luckily the show was held under a pavilion, so we stopped the show, and Darrin and I went over and sat on the edge of the stage. We took pictures with folks until the storm passed and then finished our show. The crowd was wonderful and brought us back for two encores, plus we sold out all of our merchandise. WOW! What a night!

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Aside from my several visits to the Stoli Fountain of Youth, the best part of the Sony BMG boat show during last weeks’ Country Radio Seminar was watching video clips of Kellie Pickler interviewing football players for Jay Leno. Can that girl talk! Her approach is simple: Say the first thing that comes to mind — and then ride the waves. Flirtatious, impulsive and fearless, she reminds me of Dolly Parton, even though she’s yet to match Parton’s skewering wit.

Country music has had lots of great talkers, people who are smart, skilled and self-confident enough to turn a routine interview or press conferences into pure theater. Of these, Parton is the most entertaining. Her mind is so quick and her view of life so droll that all you have to do is give her a mic and surrender. I never met Roger Miller, but those who knew him agree he was country’s undisputed master of one-liners. Legend has it that during his first flush of success, he walked into a room filled with cronies and asked, “Is it hot in here, or is it just me?”

Marty Stuart brings a poet’s sensibility and a historian’s eye for detail to his enchanting stories about the country stars he’s known and the surreal worlds they inhabited. He couldn’t be boring if you put a gun to his head. Kathy Mattea is an elegant, thoughtful conversationalist whose subdued sense of humor is more likely to elicit grins than guffaws. You don’t leave an encounter with her without feeling somewhat improved by it. Vince Gill, as we’ve seen, could have a second career as a standup comic and perhaps a third as an essayist on the human condition, which, he would readily point out, is a study in the ridiculous. He has integrated his patrician background so seamlessly with country music’s blue-collar leanings that he can poke fun at the follies of both — and regularly does.

Tom T. Hall (when he’s in the mood), Harold and Don Reid of The Statler Brothers, the eternally feisty Jerry Reed; ribald Maxine Brown of The Browns; and sly Brad Paisley are all first-rate talkers who rivet audiences with their observations, memories and verbal vamps. So as we rejoice in their music, let us never forget their life-enhancing gift of gab. That’s show biz too.

I am delighted to learn this morning that Emmylou Harris will be inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame this year. She is one of the shining lights in my music collection, and I admire her so much for her contributions to the city of Nashville. Back then they were thinking about tearing down the Ryman Auditorium – which astounds me that anybody would ever consider that – she staged a concert in there, and people realized just what they’d be missing. That was the first Emmylou album I ever bought, when I was a teenager. She’s also an advocate for dogs, so much so that she built a shelter in her backyard.

Just last week, I was on the Cayamo songwriters cruise with Emmylou, and her performance closed out the series of late-night concerts. She didn’t breathe a word of this induction, but I know the place would have gone nuts if she had. People who love music can’t get enough of her. I think she deserves a lot of credit for being a good ambassador for country music abroad. On several occasions, I met Europeans on the cruise who came specifically to hear her. I can’t tell you exactly how many times I’ve seen her perform - probably nine or ten - but each and every time, I have felt grateful for the experience. She connects with songs, and the world falls away for me when she’s the one singing them.

I’m a fan of her more recent work too, but I never tire of her early catalog, like “Boulder to Birmingham,” “Together Again,” “One of These Days,” “Easy From Now On,” “Beneath Still Waters” and, of course, “Pancho & Lefty.” Someday I hope Gram Parsons will join her in the Hall of Fame, too. But who can argue with an induction class that includes Tom T. Hall, the Statler Brothers and Ernest “Pop” Stoneman?

Johnny Cash liked an audience. That’s a conclusion easily derived from the first two Johnny Cash Christmas Specials, released on DVD this month by Shout! Factory and the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum. The second CBS special, drawn primarily from a concert at the Grand Ole Opry House, aired 30 years ago (Nov. 30, 1977). It was markedly better than the 1976 effort, shot privately at Cash’s homes in Bon Aqua and Hendersonville, Tenn.

The earlier special is marred by problems both technical and conceptual. Billy Graham is too preachy; Tony Orlando dashes off some stereotypical (and not funny) city boy-visits-the-country jokes; Roy Clark sings “The Christmas Song” with a banjo on his knee, although no banjo notes are heard; and at the close of Barbara Mandrell’s “Steel Guitar Rag,” the clapping in the room is inaudible for a couple seconds, a sign that the performance was taped. Cash frequently seems wooden and uneasy.

The 1977 show demonstrates great progress. With people to play to, Cash is engaged, smiles often and makes a natural connection with his guests and the Opry House audience. At the time, Cash hadn’t yet been remade as a mythic figure. Standing on three-inch heels, he has a command that makes him a bit taller physically, and figuratively, than his fellow performers: Clark, Carl Perkins, Roy Orbison, Jerry Lee Lewis, the Statler Brothers, the Carter Sisters and Jan Howard. There’s also a moment of irony. Just 12 years prior, a chemically-altered Cash dragged the mic stand across the footlights at the Ryman Auditorium during an Opry performance, destroying each of the bulbs. In the 1977 special, a shot from the base of the stage presents Cash with the Opry House footlights commanding the foreground.

Cash shot at least 10 Christmas specials, so it’s possible that more DVDs may appear in coming years. Quality-wise, they’re likely much closer to the 1977 show, which is far superior to the inaugural installment. But that ’76 edition has one small charm: Cash’s former home burned to the ground this year, but this show captures a view of its quiet majesty from Old Hickory Lake and a peek at the living room, with its stone walls and wagon wheel beams. The structure underscored the solid and earthy nature of the Man in Black, who came alive most when he had people, and not just a camera, to entertain.

On my way home from Chattanooga this weekend, I was switching out CDs and I suddenly heard one of those classic George Strait songs on the radio, something from the 80s. Of course my friend and I had to listen to it. She had borrowed the car while I was doing a triathlon earlier that day and had discovered the station, 98.1 FM. You know, it’s almost impossible to hear anything from the 1980s on country radio anymore, unless it’s “Forever and Ever Amen.” We listened till the signal ran out, enjoying the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band’s “Modern Day Romance,” Gene Watson’s “Love in the Hot Afternoon,” Paul Overstreet and Tanya Tucker’s “I Won’t Take Less Than Your Love,” Roger Miller’s “Dang Me” (what a crazy irresistible song!), the Statler Brothers’ “I’ll Go to My Grave Loving You” and Reba McEntire’s “The Last One to Know.” They were about to play an Eddie Rabbitt song but by then all we heard was a lot of crackling.

After a little research, I learned that 98.1 switched to the classic country format last month and that it’s owned by Clear Channel. I never would have guessed it since this station’s playlist seems to be exceptionally broad. Hopefully they’ll hang onto it. We are driving to Atlanta in a few weeks for a Wynonna concert and I’d love to listen in for an hour. Maybe they’ll play “Mama He’s Crazy” as we’re passing through.

I’m a big fan of country music from the 1980s and I have numerous friends who just love the stuff. Occasionally it comes up when I’m interviewing a singer – Terri Clark and Blake Shelton are equally enthusiastic about it. I do wish I knew more songs from that era. If I lived in Chattanooga, I’d listen to this station around the clock. There’s another terrific country station out of Lebanon, Tenn., at 98.9 FM, that I can usually pick up in the mornings. They play a lot of Willie Nelson, which is OK by me. I need to scan the dial more often on road trips because these smaller country stations across America still play the music from the 1970s and 1980s that I can’t get enough of.