Saturday, February 23, 2008

Commence the hillbilly music

Today we have the first family of country music, the Carter family. The gal sitting bottom left with the smile that's bright enough to power a small city is June Carter. She'd go on to become June Carter Cash, wife of Johnny Cash, a few years later. The Carter family is from around where I live now and they still own a performance space in a little town about 30 miles from me, it's called the Carter Fold.

6 comments:

Jess Wundrun said...

PBS did a great special on the Carters. They said that the grandpa travelled around the south knocking on doors and asking families for their old songs.

He did it to get new material to record but they said that if he hadn't, many old folksongs would've been lost forever.

FWIW, though I like Reese Witherspoon, I thought her portrayal of June Carter was a bit too sweet. I also thought that Joaquin Phoenix made Johnny Cash seem less like a good old boy and more like a psycho freak than he deserved to.

Thanks for the video.

Anonymous said...

This was one of the first songs I learned to play on the guitar.

Dale said...

When did Jimmy join the group? :-) I love the old tyme country.

Blueberry said...

My mother used to play the Wildwood Flower on the guitar and sing it to me for a lullaby. It may have been one of the only songs she could play.

Alyson said...

you know they have the carter family fold weekend music festival every summer?? never been there but heard it's awesome!!

for the record i LOVED the june & johnny portrayls by witherspoon & phoenix :-)

Missy said...

Oh I saw that PBS special. I love a collection of their stuff I downloaded. My fave is "Bury me under the weeping willow."