Skip to main content

Big River

     Hey, everyone. As I've mentioned before, I am a bit of an entertainment glutton. I read a lot, play a lot of I-Pad games, watch movies and television etc. Tonight I was scrounging through the satellite channels and ran across an old video I enjoyed. It was from the 1994 Montreux Jazz Festival. In my ignorance, I assumed that it was from Montreal , but I found that this festival is held in Switzerland every year, during July, and is the second biggest such gathering in the world behind one held in Montreal, Canada.
    Anyway, this particular video was of Johnny Cash and it was obviously in the latter stage of his life. I got a big kick out of it, because I love the "Man in Black". He had enough wind left to do a good job, even played harmonica a bit. It was nice to see his son, John Carter Cash, on stage with him, picking a guitar. Gee, wonder who taught him to play? June Carter Cash came out and did a few songs as well. Jackson, of course. When she sang Will the Circle Be Unbroken? with her husband and son, it gave me cold chills, knowing that she and Johnny had since went to join that great circle of family members who have gone to a better place.
      I liked hearing that big guitar in Ghost Riders In the Sky, the favorite of pickers everywhere. I am playing it on keyboard the last few weeks, wishing I could play it on guitar. Sigh...
     Johnny actually did several songs I had not heard, which freaked me out a bit. Oh, yeah, about the title of this post. Cash did his song, Big River, which I really like. I like the music a lot. It is about a guy with one of those wild, free-spirited women and their travels on an old time riverboat.
    As I sat and watched the elderly singer, I thought back to the time in the 1980's when Carley and I saw Johnny at the Kansas State Fair. I prefer to think of him the way I remember him from that day. His voice was so deep and strong. He was tall, dark and ruggedly handsome in that black suit, black shirt, and picking way up on the neck of that big, black guitar. Absolutely at home with all the Kansas folks because he was just like them; just country. It was a great place to see his show. We were sitting on an old wooden grandstand. It felt like maybe there had been horse-races there at one time, I don't know. Cash was very close to us. He seemed to linger and play, just because he liked it. Folks behind the stands were having dinner on the ground and I suspect he would have liked a piece of that fried chicken.
     I thought about this guy a bit. I thought about Lennon and McCartney digging his music and people like Elvis and Dylan who took some of their rebel vibes from his deck of cards. I remember how the critics tore at him, calling him One-note Johnny Cash and all that. He played concerts in prison. He wrote songs that resonated with common people, which is a cardinal sin in any artistic endeavor. My goodness, we forget what a songwriter he was!
    Not long ago, we went to Nashville and toured the Grand Ole Opry. Mr. Cash was one of the people that crossed my mind when I stood on that stage. I had to chuckle a few months ago when I was reading about how one of the Rolling Stones loved to play Johnny's tunes on guitar. Heck, most of the modern country music sounds like Rock from the 1960's. Whatever. Music is similar to books for me. As long as it's good, I don't care what label you hang on it.
     It was sad to see big John so old-looking. Unfortunately, time is like that Big River and it just keeps rolling.
    I'm CE Wills. 

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Shadowgun: Crushing The Driller On Level 4

      Hey, everyone. Let's talk about the game called Shadowgun, the I-Pad game with which I have a love-hate relationship. Most of you who made it past the evil Cyber Lobster are doubtless locked in a death struggle with the Driller at the end of level 4. At this point you have been in the cave for a long time. The Driller breaks through the rock wall and chases you through the tunnel as you try to shoot out the green lights which slows the Driller down. If you are slick enough to shoot out all the lights and emerge from the cave, a rolling door crashes on the Driller and crushes his aggravating carcass. I have tried and failed to beat the Driller at least 250 times. I hate the Driller to the heights and depths my soul can reach. I hate it like a plague. I hate it with intensity of feeling. I hate it like a rich man hates taxes. Excuse me, I got carried away.       We had a big dinner here at the green retreat and my friend Trevor was ...

Faerie In a Glass Jar

    Hey, everyone. Sometimes gaming can be high-pressure. Take tonight, for instance. I was playing the excellent puzzle game titled 4 Elements #2. I have already done a review of it so I won't attempt to do so again. You have to match symbols and use 'power-ups' to get molten lava to flow around a board and bring life back to a faerie world. Cool. That's what I do. I'm into it. There are also a variety of mini-puzzles such as hidden objects and even putting together a jigsaw puzzle. Hey, when I get in trouble I call Carley.     Anyway, tonight, Carley wasn't around when a crisis struck. I was confronted with a faerie in a glass jar. She was crying for help. She said that she was running out of air. Every minute or two she would rattle the jar. In order to free her, I had to find all these objects and use them. Like there were some missing books. Then there was the pieces of a torch. When I found them I could light all the candles. I found the pieces of ...

You're Aiming the Missile Where?

    Hey, everyone, out there in game-land. The number 1 game on the friendly neighborhood app store is Call of Duty: Strike Team . No wonder, because it is a terrific game. The farther I play, the cooler it gets. But before I get to that, what are all these numbers indicating on my gun? Has to be some sort of ammo indicator for the clips, I guess. either that or some of my compadres has trouble doing his math homework. Whatever.     Hey. Check out the picture of me hitching a ride on an enemy truck so that my team can infiltrate a missile silo. Do you like the face mask? I bought it at a store called Fashions by Bane. Ha, ha. (Batman Reference) On this mission, my team was assisted by a Russian Spetsnaz squad. How's that for detente, comrade? These Spetsnaz guys make everything fun. What I mean is this. We shoot bunches of enemies and get into the bowels of the silo. We get to the gantry where the missile is (Pictured above) and we see that the rad...