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Country Musician and Author Rosanne Cash

Cash is a singer/lyricist who in 1985 won a Grammy for "I Don't Know Why You Don't Want Me." She is the daughter of Johnny Cash. We talked to her after the release of her album, "Ten-Song Demo" (Capitol Records) and after publishing her first work of fiction: "Bodies of Water" (Hyperion) a collection of nine short stories. This was originally aired 3/26/96.

07:26

Other segments from the episode on August 31, 1998

Fresh Air with Terry Gross, August 31, 1998: Interview with Johnny Cash; Interview with Roseanne Cash; Interview with June Carter Cash; Interview with Carlene Carter.

Transcript

Show: FRESH AIR
Date: AUGUST 31, 1998
Time: 12:00
Tran: 083101np.217
Type: FEATURE
Head: Interview with Johnny Cash
Sect: Entertainment
Time: 12:06

TERRY GROSS, HOST: This is FRESH AIR. I'm Terry Gross.

During this final week of the summer season, it's country music week on FRESH AIR -- a week that we think you'll enjoy even if you don't consider yourself a country music fan.

We're going to start by featuring the members of what's been called country music's "first family:" Johnny Cash, June Carter Cash, Johnny's daughter singer-songwriter Rosanne Cash, and June's daughter Carlene Carter -- also a singer-songwriter.

Johnny Cash is the only musician to be inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame, the Country Music Hall of Fame, and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

Last fall, just after the publication of his autobiography, Cash cut short his tour -- announcing that he had a progressive disorder of the nervous system. He said very little about it publicly, but his book is about to come out in paperback with a new chapter about his condition. I spoke with him a couple of days before he revealed his condition.

Let's start with a song from one of his two recent CDs, which were produced by Rick Rubin, who usually works with rap and rock performers. These recordings gained a new young audience for Johnny Cash. This song is Nick Lowe's song "The Beast in Me."

(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP -- SINGER JOHNNY CASH PERFORMING "THE BEAST IN ME")

JOHNNY CASH, SINGER: (SINGING)

The beast in me is caged by frail and fragile bars.
Restless by day, and by night rants and rages at the stars.

God help the beast in me.

GROSS: Johnny Cash grew up during the Depression. I asked him how his father earned a living then.

CASH: My father was a cotton farmer first. And -- but he didn't have any land, or what land he had he lost it in the Depression. So, he worked as a woodsman and cut pulp wood for the paper mills. Rode the rails on -- in boxcars, going from one harvest to another to try to make a little money picking fruit or vegetables.

He did every kind of work imaginable, from painting to shoveling to herding cattle. And he's always been such an inspiration to me because of the varied kinds of things that he did and the kind of life he lived.

He inspired me so, that all the things he did, so far from being a soldier in World War I to being an old man on his patio, sitting on the porch watching the dogs, you know. I think about his life and it would inspire me to go my own other direction.

And I just like to explore minds and the desires of the people out there.

GROSS: You know, it's interesting that you say your father inspired you so much. I'm sure you wouldn't have wanted to lead his life, picking cotton.

CASH: I did. From -- until I was 18 years old, that is.

GROSS: Mmm-hmm.

CASH: Then I picked the guitar and I've been picking it since.

LAUGHTER

GROSS: Right.

Did you have a plan to get out? Did you very much want to get out of the town where you were brought up and get out of picking cotton?

CASH: Yes. I knew that when I left there at the age of 18 I wouldn't be back.

GROSS: Mmm-hm.

CASH: And it was kind of common knowledge among all the people there that when you graduate from high school here, you go to college or you go get a job or something, and do it on your own. And, having been familiar with hard work, it was no problem for me.

But first, I hitchhiked to Pontiac, Michigan, and got a job working in the Fisher Body, making those 1951 Pontiacs. I worked there three weeks, got really sick of it, went back home and joined the Air Force.

GROSS: You have such a wonderful, deep voice. Did you start singing before your voice changed?

CASH: Ah, yes. I've got no deep voice today; I've got a cold. But, when I was so young, I had a high tenor voice. I used to sing Bill Monroe songs. And I'd sing Dennis Day songs like ...

GROSS: Oh, no.

CASH: Yes. Songs that he'd sing on "The Jack Benny Show."

GROSS: Wow.

CASH: Every week he'd sing an old Irish folk song. And next day, in the fields, I'd be singing that song; if I was working in the fields. And I always loved those songs and with my high tenor, I thought I was pretty good, you know. Almost as good as Dennis Day (ph).

But, when I was 17, 16, my father and I cut wood all day long and I was swinging that cross-cut saw and hauling wood; and when I walked in the back door late that afternoon, I was singing: "Everybody gonna have religion and glory. Everybody gonna be singing a story."

I'd sing those old Gospel songs for my mother, and she said: "Is that you?" And I said, "Yes, ma'am." And she came over and put her arms around me and said: "God's got his hands on you."

I still think of that, you know.

GROSS: She realized you had a gift.

CASH: That's what she said, yeah. She called it "the gift."

GROSS: Well, how did you feel about your voice changing? It must have stunned you, if you were singing like Dennis O'Day (ph) and then suddenly you were singing like Johnny Cash...

LAUGHTER

CASH: Well...

GROSS: How did -- yeah.

LAUGHTER

CASH: I don't know. I guess, when I was a tenor I just -- and when it changed, I thought, well, it goes right along with these hormones. And everything's working out really good, you know. I felt like my voice was becoming a man's voice.

GROSS: Right. Right. So, did you start singing different songs as your voice got deeper?

CASH: Mm-hmm. "Lucky Old Sun." "Memories Are Made of This." "Sixteen Tons." I developed a pretty unusual style, I think. If I'm anything, I'm not a singer, but I'm a song stylist.

GROSS: What's the difference?

CASH: Well, I say I'm not a singer, so that means I can't sing. But -- doesn't it?

LAUGHTER

GROSS: Well, but, I mean, that's not true. I understand you're making a distinction, but you certainly can sing. Yeah. Go ahead.

CASH: Thank you.

Well, a song stylist is, like, to take an old folk song like "Delia's Gone" and do a modern, white man's version of it.

GROSS: Mmm-hm. Mmm-hm.

CASH: A lot of those I did that way, you know. I would take songs that I'd loved as a child and redo them in my mind for the new voice I had -- the low voice.

GROSS: I know that you briefly took singing lessons, and you say in your new book that your singing teacher told you, you know: "Don't let anybody change your voice. Don't even bother with the singing lessons." How did you end up taking lessons in the first place?

CASH: My mother did that. And she was determined that I was going to leave the farm and do well in life. And she thought, with the gift I might be able to do that.

So she took in washing. She got a washing machine in 1942, as soon as they got electricity, and she took in washing. She washed a school teacher's clothes and anybody she could. And sent me for singing lessons for $3 per lesson. And that's how she made the money to send me.

GROSS: What was your reaction when the teacher told you: "Don't let anybody change what you're doing. Don't, you know, I'm not going to teach you anymore?"

CASH: I was pretty happy about that. I didn't really want to change, you know. I felt good about my voice.

GROSS: You left home when you were about 18. And then, how old were you when you actually went to Memphis?

CASH: Well, I went to Memphis after I finished the Air Force in 1954. I lived on that farm until I went to the Air Force. I was in there four years. And when I came back, I got married and moved to Memphis. Got an apartment. Started trying to sell appliances at a place called Home Equipment Company. But I couldn't sell anything and didn't really want to.

All I wanted was the music. And if somebody in the house was playing music when I, when I would come, I would stop and sing with them. Like one time, Gus Cannon, the man who wrote "Walk Right In," which was a hit for the Rooftop Singers, and I sat on the front porch with him, day after day, when I found him, and sing those songs.

GROSS: When you got to Memphis, Elvis Presley had already recorded "That's All Right." Sam Phillips had produced him for his label Sun Records. You called Sam Phillips and asked for an audition. Did it take a lot of nerve to make that phone call?

CASH: No. It just took the right time. I was fully confident that I was going to see Sam Phillips and to record for him. When I called him, I thought, "I'm going to get on Sun Records." So, I called him and he turned me down flat.

Then two weeks later, I called. Turned down, turned down again. He told me over the phone that he couldn't sell gospel music. So -- because it was independent and not a lot of money, you know. So, I didn't press that issue.

But, one day I just decided that I'm ready to go. So, I went down with my guitar and sat on the front steps of his recording studio and met him when he came in. And I said: "I'm John Cash. I'm the one that's been calling. And if you'd listen to me, I believe you'll be glad you did." And he said: "Come on in."

That was a good lesson for me, you know, to believe in myself.

GROSS: So, what did Phillips actually respond to most of the songs that you played him?

CASH: He responded most to a song of mine called "Hey, Porter," which was on the first record. But he asked me to go write a love song, or maybe a bitter weeper. So, I wrote a song called "Cry, Cry, Cry," went back in and recorded that for the other side of the record.

GROSS: You say in your book that you had to do 35 takes of "Cry, Cry, Cry."

CASH: Mmm-hm.

GROSS: Why did it take so many takes?

CASH: It was too simple.

LAUGHTER

We were trying to make something complicated out of it and it was the simplest song in the world, ever written. And, invariably, at some time during a take the guitar player would mess up or the bass player or I would mess up and we'd have to do it over. It's not unusual, though, to do a song 35 times.

GROSS: Were you nervous because it was your first recording?

CASH: No. Not at all. I had confidence that I was going to do it. I'd been singing in Germany in the Air Force. I'd been singing with my little group called the Lansburgh (ph) Barbarians. And we played in honky-tonks and guest houses (ph) and wherever we could, you know, when we weren't working.

GROSS: Well, why don't we hear "Cry, Cry, Cry," which was on the first single that Sun Records released by you.

CASH: OK.

(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP: SINGER-SONGWRITER JOHNNY CASH PERFORMING "CRY, CRY, CRY")

JOHNNY CASH, SINGER: (SINGING)

Everybody knows where you go when the sun goes down,
I think you only live to see the lights uptown,
I wasted my time when I would try, try, try,
'Cause when the lights have lost their glow, you'll cry, cry, cry.

Soon your sugar daddies will all be gone,
You'll wake up some cold day and find you're alone,
You'll call for me, but I'm gonna tell you, 'bye, 'bye, 'bye,
When I turn around and walk away, you'll cry, cry, cry.

You're gonna cry, cry, cry

GROSS: That's Johnny Cash's first single. We'll hear more of our interview after a break.

This is FRESH AIR.

BREAK

GROSS: We're featuring an interview recorded last fall with Johnny Cash. When we left off, we were talking about the beginning of his recording career.

What was it like when you started to go on tour? You know, after coming from the cotton fields. It's true, I mean, you'd been in the army and you'd been abroad, you know, with the army. But what was it like for you in the early days of getting recognized? You know, traveling around the country?

CASH: Well, when I started playing concerts, I went out from Memphis to Arkansas, Louisiana, and Tennessee. Played the little towns there. But I would go out myself in my car and set up the show -- get the show booked in those theaters.

And then along about three months later, Elvis Presley asked me to sing with him at the Overton Park Shell in Memphis. And I sang "Cry, Cry, Cry" and "Hey, Porter."

And from that time on, I was on my way, and I knew it. I felt it and I loved it. So Elvis asked me to go on tour with him, and I did. I worked with Elvis four or five tours in the next year or so.

And I -- I was always intrigued by his charisma. I just -- you can't be in the building without Elvis -- with Elvis, without looking at him, you know. And he inspired me so -- with his fire and energy -- that I guess that inspiration from him really got me to go.

GROSS: What were the temptations like for a young married man like yourself, on the road, you know, slowly becoming a star?

CASH: Hmmm. Fame was pretty hard to handle, actually. The country boy in me tried to break loose and take me back to the country, but the music was stronger -- the urge to go out and do the gift was a lot stronger.

And the temptations were women -- girls, which I loved -- and then amphetamines. Not very much later, running all night, you know, in our cars on tour, and the doctor's got these nice pills that give us energy and keep us awake. So, I started taking those and I liked them so much I got addicted to them.

And then, I started taking downers or sleeping pills to come down and rest after two or three days. So it became a cycle. I was taking the pills for a while and then the pills started taking me.

GROSS: I want to play what I think was your first big hit, "I Walk the Line."

CASH: Mmm-hmm. That was my third record.

GROSS: And, you wrote this song. Tell me the story of how you wrote it. What you were thinking about at the time.

CASH: In the Air Force, I had an old Wilcox-Kay (ph) recorder, and used to hear guitar runs on that recorder, going: "dhoun, dhoun, dhoun dhoun." Like the chords on "I Walk the Line." And I always wanted to write a love song using that theme, you know, that tune.

And so, I started to write the song. And I was in Gladewater, Texas one night, with Carl Perkins and I said: "I've got a good idea for a song." And I sang him the first verse that I had written. And I said, "It's called, 'Because You're Mine'." And he said: "'I Walk the Line''s a better title."

So I changed it to "I Walk the Line."

GROSS: Now, were you thinking of your own life when you wrote this?

CASH: Mmm-hmm. Mmm-hmm. It was kind of a prodding to myself to play it straight, Johnny.

GROSS: And was this -- I think I read that this was supposed to be a ballad. I mean, it was supposed to be slow, when you first wrote it.

CASH: Mmm-hmm. That's the way I sang it, yeah, at first. But Sam wanted it up, you know, up tempo. And I put paper in the strings of my guitar to get that "oonch-ch, oonch-ch, oonch-ch" sound, and with a bass and a lead guitar, there it was. Bare and stark, that song was, when it was released. And I heard it on the radio and I really didn't like it. And I called Sam Phillips and asked him to please not send out any more records of that song.

GROSS: Why?

CASH: But he laughed at me. I just didn't like the way it sounded to me. I didn't know I sounded that way. And I didn't like it. I don't know.

But he said: "Let's give it a chance." And it was just a few days until -- that's all it took to take off.

GROSS: That's funny. I mean, you'd heard your voice before, hadn't you?

CASH: Mmm-hmm.

GROSS: But -- so it was something in your own singing, you weren't liking when you heard it?

CASH: Well, the music and my voice together. I just felt like it was really weird. And -- but I got used to it very quickly. I don't know that I didn't -- I didn't hate it, but I just didn't like it. I thought I could do better.

GROSS: Well, let's hear "I Walk the Line." This is a great record. It was great then and it still is. This is Johnny Cash.

(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP: SINGER JOHNNY CASH PERFORMING "I WALK THE LINE")

JOHNNY CASH, SINGER: (SINGING)

I keep a close watch on this heart of mine,
I keep my eyes wide open all the time,
I keep the ends out for the tie that binds,
Because you're mine, I walk the line.

I find it very very easy to be true
I find myself alone when each day's through
Yes I'll admit that I'm a fool for you
Because you're mine, I walk the line

GROSS: I think it was in the late 1950s that you started doing prison concerts, which you eventually became very famous for.

CASH: Mmm-hm.

GROSS: What got you started performing in prison?

CASH: Well, I had a song called "Folsom Prison Blues" that was a hit just before "I Walk the Line," and people in Texas heard about it at the state prison and got to writing me letters asking me to come down there. So, I responded, and then the warden called me and asked if I would come down and do a show for the prisoners in Texas.

And so, we went down, and there's a rodeo at all these shows that the prisoners have there. And in between the rodeo things, they asked me to set up and do two or three songs.

So, that was what I did. I did "Folsom Prison Blues," which they thought was their song, you know, and "I Walk the Line," "Hey, Porter," "Cry, Cry, Cry."

And then the word got around on the grapevine that Johnny Cash was all right and that you ought to see him. So the requests started coming in from other prisons all over the United States. And then the word got around.

So, I always wanted to record that, you know, to record a show, because of the reaction I got. It was far and above anything I had ever had in my life -- the complete explosion of noise and reaction that they gave me with every song.

So, then, I came back the next year and played the prison again -- a New Year's Day show. Came back again a third year and did the show.

And then I kept talking to my producers at Columbia about recording one of those shows. "It's so exciting," I said, "that the people out there ought to share that, you know, and feel that excitement, too."

So, a preacher friend of mine named Floyd Gressett (ph) set it up for us, and Lew Robin (ph) and a lot of other people involved at Folsom Prison.

So we went into Folsom on February 11, 1968 and recorded a show live.

GROSS: Well, why don't we hear "Folsom Prison Blues" from your "Live at Folsom Prison" record. This is Johnny Cash.

(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP: SINGER JOHNNY CASH PERFORMING "FOLSOM PRISON BLUES")

JOHNNY CASH, SINGER: (SINGING)

Hello. I'm Johnny Cash.

SOUNDBITE OF APPLAUSE AND CHEERING

I hear the train a-coming,
It's rolling 'round the bend,
And I ain't seen the sunshine
since I don't know when.

I'm stuck in Folsom Prison.
And time keeps draggin' on.
But that train keeps a-rollin',
On down to San Antone.

When I was just a baby,
My mama told me, "Son,
Always be a good boy.
Don't ever play with guns."

But I shot a man in Reno
just to watch him die.
When I hear that whistle blowin',
I hang my head and cry.

GROSS: That's Johnny Cash "Live at Folsom Prison."

Our interview was recorded last fall just a couple of days before he announced that he had a progressive disorder of the nervous system. We'll hear more from Johnny Cash, as well as interviews with other members of his family in the second half of the show.

I'm Terry Gross and this is FRESH AIR.

BREAK

GROSS: This is FRESH AIR. I'm Terry Gross.

It's country music week on FRESH AIR and today we're hearing from the Carter-Cash family. Johnny Cash and June Carter Cash have been performing together since 1962 and have been married since '68. Here's their 1967 recording, "Jackson."

(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP -- SINGERS JOHNNY CASH AND JUNE CARTER CASH PERFORMING "JACKSON")

JOHNNY CASH AND JUNE CARTER CASH, SINGERS: (SINGING)

We got married in a fever
Hotter than a pepper sprout
We've been talking about Jackson
Ever since the fire went out.

I'm going to Jackson
I'm gonna mess around

GROSS: June was performing long before she met Johnny. She was born into what many people consider the first family of country music. Her mother was Mabel Carter of the original Carter family, whose performances and records spread the sound of Appalachian ballads and gospel music.

I asked Johnny Cash how he first met June.

You married your second wife -- your wife, June Carter, now June Carter Cash, in 1968. How did you first meet the members of the Carter family, the kind of first family of country music?

CASH: I met June at the backstage at the Grand Ol' Opry, when I did my first appearance as a guest artist. And that was five years again -- five years more 'til I saw her again.

And we started working together, touring beginning in Des Moines on -- in January 1962. And we've been together ever since.

I met her family on about my second tour that we had June on, 'cause I asked them to all come and be a part of the show. So, I kind of got into those people and became one of their family. And it felt good to go out with them.

GROSS: What was it like, traveling with a family instead of being on your own? Being on your own, leaving the family behind?

CASH: Hmmm. I really don't like to do an appearance without June Carter. And what it would be like, being alone? It would be awfully lonely to me. I'm very comfortable with, you know, how we do it, with my wife and my son on the show, and a daughter or two. And it feels so good. I would hate to think that I had to do it all alone.

GROSS: Did it change your life to have a family that really understood the performing life because it was their life, too?

CASH: Very much so. Yeah. Right.

GROSS: What was the difference? I mean, why was that so important?

CASH: Well, there's something about families singing together that is just better than any other groups you can pick up or make, you know. If it's family, if it's blood-on-blood, then it's gonna be, it's gonna be better. The voices, singing their parts, are going to be tighter and they're going to be more on pitch. Because it's, as I said, it's blood line on blood line.

GROSS: Johnny Cash, recorded last fall.

This is a rush transcript. This copy may not
be in its final form and may be updated.

TO PURCHASE AN AUDIOTAPE OF THIS PIECE, PLEASE CALL 888-NPR-NEWS

Dateline: Terry Gross
Guest: Johnny Cash
High: Music legend JOHNNY CASH. CASH has been recording albums and performing since the 1950s. Representing CASH's varied musical styles, he has been inducted into the Songwriters, Country Music, and Rock and Roll Halls of Fame. Last year, he released an autobiography called "CASH" (Harper). The book tour for the memoir was canceled due to complications with CASH's Parkinson's disease.
Spec: Entertainment; Music Industry; Art
Please note, this is not the final feed of record
Copy: Content and programming copyright 1998 WHYY, Inc. All rights reserved. Transcribed by FDCH, Inc. under license from WHYY, Inc. Formatting copyright 1998 FDCH, Inc. All rights reserved. No quotes from the materials contained herein may be used in any media without attribution to WHYY, Inc. This transcript may not be reproduced in whole or in part without prior written permission.
End-Story: Interview with Johnny Cash
Transcripts are created on a rush deadline, and accuracy and availability may vary. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Please be aware that the authoritative record of Fresh Air interviews and reviews are the audio recordings of each segment.

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