Arkansas History Through Music part _3__ 6-16-10

• Johnny Cash was born in the small town of Kingsland, in the hill country of southern Arkansas. Life had always been difficult there, but when the Great Depression destroyed the fragile agricultural economy of the region, Johnny's parents, Ray and Carrie Cash, could barely earn enough to feed their seven children. In 1935, the New Deal administration of President Franklin D. Roosevelt encouraged marginal farmers from the hill country to resettle in the more fertile soil of northeastern Arkansas. The Cash family took the government up on this offer and made the move. Working together, they cleared 20 acres of land to grow cotton. Johnny worked side by side with his parents on the farm.

• When Cash graduated from high school in 1950 The Korean War was raging, and he enlisted in the United States Air Force. He was serving in Germany when he bought his very first guitar. With a few of his buddies, he started a band called the Barbarians to play in small night clubs and honky tonks around the air base. When his hitch in the service was over, Johnny Cash moved to Memphis, where he sold appliances door-to-door while trying to break into the music business.

• In 1954, he was signed to the Sun Records label owned by Sam Phillips. When Phillips wanted a ballad for the b-side of "Hey Porter," Cash wrote "Cry, Cry, Cry" overnight. The single sold over 100,000 copies.

With his second recording, "Folsom Prison Blues," Johnny Cash scored a national hit. In 1956, "I Walk the Line," was a top country hit for 44 weeks and sold over a million copies. By 1958 Johnny Cash had published 50 songs. He had sold over six million records for Sun. As the 1960s wore on, incessant touring took its toll on the singer. he had become dependent on tranquilizers and amphetamines. When his health recovered and he had freed himself from his chemical dependency, Johnny Cash married June Carter.

In 1987, Johnny Cash received three multi-platinum records for previous sales of over two million copies each of Folsom Prison, San Quentin, and his collection of Greatest Hits. Over the course of his career, he received 11 Grammy awards. He was inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, and the Songwriters' Hall of Fame. He received the Kennedy Center Honors, and the National Medal of the Arts.

His wife of 35 years, June Carter Cash, died from complications following heart surgery in May, 2003. Johnny Cash followed her in death four months later. succumbing to respiratory failure after a long struggle with diabetes. Two years after his passing, a motion picture based on his life, Walk the Line, enjoyed worldwide critical and popular success.

• In 1956 Sonny and the Pacers went to Sun Records and cut their debut single, "We Wanna Boogie." That song and "Red Headed Woman" were among the most raucous, energy-filled recordings released during the first flowering of rock and roll. Burgess' performances combined the country sounds of the white South with the R&B, blues and shout gospel sounds of the black community. This band combined the frenetic energies of black and white forms of jive-talking, duck-walking and climb-the-wall Southern music.

Maya Angelou is hailed as one of the great voices of contemporary literature and as a remarkable Renaissance woman. Being a poet, educator, historian, best-

selling author, actress, playwright, civil-rights activist, producer and director, Dr. Angelou continues to travel the world making appearances, spreading her

legendary wisdom. A mesmerizing vision of grace, swaying and stirring when she moves, Dr. Angelou

captivates her audiences lyrically with vigor, fire and perception. She has the unique ability to shatter the opaque prisms of race and class between reader and

subject throughout her books of poetry and her autobiographies. Dr. Angelou has authored twelve best-selling books including I Know Why the

Caged Bird Sings and her current best-seller A Song Flung Up to Heaven. In 1981, Dr. Angelou was appointed to a lifetime position as the first Reynolds

Professor of American Studies at Wake Forest University. In January 1993, she became only the second poet in U.S. History to have the

honor of writing and reciting original work at the Presidential Inauguration.

Maya Angelou inducted into theAcademy of Achievement,

Washington, D.C.

Reading “On the Pulse of the Morning, Clinton Presidential Inauguration, 1993

Schools were closed in 1958-59 so students took lessons via television.

• History, despite its wrenching pain,Cannot be unlived, and if faced with courage,

Need not be lived again.Lift up your eyes upon

The day breaking for you.Give birth againTo the dream.

Women, children, men,Take it into the palms of your hands.Mold it into the shape of your most

Private need. Sculpt it intoThe image of your most public self.

Lift up your hearts.Each new hour holds new chances

For new beginnings.

•Do not be wedded foreverTo fear, yoked eternally

To brutishness.The horizon leans forward,

Offering you space to place new steps of change.Here, on the pulse of this fine day

You may have the courageTo look up and out upon me,

The rock, the river, the tree, your country.No less to Midas than the mendicant.

No less to you now than the mastodon then.Here on the pulse of this new day

You may have the grace to look up and outAnd into your sister's eyes,

Into your brother's face, your countryAnd say simply

Very simplyWith hope

Good morning.

For a short time in the late '80s, K.T. Oslin was one of the most popular female country singers around. Her worldly, distinctly modern persona was quite unlike any of her

peers, and she matched it with utterly contemporary country-pop production, complete with synthesizers. Born Kay Toinette Oslin on May 15, 1942, in Crossett, AR, she soon

moved to Mobile, AL, and at age five settled in Houston after the death of her father. Oslin's mother had been an aspiring country singer before being forced to support her family, and she passed along her love of music to her daughter. Oslin studied drama at junior college and during the '60s performed in a folk trio with singer/songwriter Guy Clark and producer David Jones. She later went to Los Angeles to work on an album with Frank Davis, but the

sessions were never completed, and she returned to Houston and worked in musical theater. A part in the national touring company of Hello, Dolly! led to a trip to Manhattan and a spot in the chorus of the Broadway version. She remained in New York for a time,

appearing in shows, singing demos and commercial jingles, and working on her songwriting. In 1978, she sang harmony on a Guy Clark album and in 1981 released two

singles on Elektra as Kay T. Oslin. Neither "Clean Up Your Own Tables" nor "Younger Men (Are Startin' to Catch My Eye)" did well at country radio, which simply wasn't ready for

such a feisty, feminist-minded woman -- who was pushing 40 at that. However, Oslin's original compositions were becoming popular with other artists; her

songs were recorded by Gail Davis, Dottie West, and Judy Rodman, among others. She appeared on a live radio broadcast alongside more established musicians in 1984, and two

years later she staged her own showcase performance in Nashville. Alabama producer Harold Shedd was in attendance and helped her land a deal with RCA. Oslin debuted in

1987 with 80's Ladies, whose anthemic title track made the country Top Ten and won her a Grammy for Best Female Country Vocal.