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THE HIGHWAYMEN LET A FIFTH VOICE INTO THE STUDIO FOR EXACTLY ONE SONG. In 1985, Johnny Cash, Waylon Jennings, Willie Nelson and Kris Kristofferson recorded “Deportee (Plane Wreck at Los Gatos)” for the first Highwaymen album, and they brought in Johnny Rodriguez to sing the verses in Spanish. He is the only outside voice on any Highwaymen recording. The song was already thirty-seven years old, and it was about a fire over a California canyon. On January 28, 1948, a chartered DC-3 came apart above Los Gatos Canyon west of Coalinga. All 32 aboard died — four American crew and 28 Mexican nationals bound for the deportation center at El Centro, some of them braceros whose contracts had ended. The wire report named the crew. The rest were called deportees. They were buried together at Holy Cross Cemetery in Fresno under a marker with no names on it. Woody Guthrie read that coverage in New York and wrote a poem handing the dead invented names; Martin Hoffman set it to music a decade later. In 2009 a writer named Tim Z. Hernandez went looking for the real ones. By July 2013 he had all 28, several of them misspelled in old records. On Labor Day that year more than 600 people gathered at Holy Cross to unveil a granite memorial carrying every name, its border cut with 32 leaves. The names were read aloud, one by one. A second marker went up near the crash site in 2024: Forevermore We Will Call You By Name.

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The Highwaymen and the One Extra Voice That Changed “Deportee” Some songs carry more than melody. They carry memory. “Deportee…

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Marty Stuart was only 13 when Lester Flatt heard him play mandolin on the back of a tour bus. By the end of that weekend, one of bluegrass music’s biggest stars had offered the boy a job. It happened over Labor Day weekend in 1972. Stuart had come to Nashville after a friend in Flatt’s band invited him along for the weekend. His parents gave permission, and Lester Flatt agreed to let him ride with the band. Then Flatt heard the teenager play. He put Marty onstage that same weekend, the audience responded, and Flatt made the offer that changed his life. Soon Stuart was traveling with Lester Flatt and the Nashville Grass. At an early Grand Ole Opry appearance, Marty was so small that he later remembered having to stand on his tiptoes to reach the microphone. When the audience kept applauding after his mandolin solo, he thought he had done something wrong. Flatt looked at him and simply told him to do it again. Stuart stayed with Flatt through most of the 1970s, learning the music from one of the men who had helped define bluegrass. He would later play in Johnny Cash’s band before finally building a successful solo career of his own. But the remarkable part came first. Long before country audiences knew Marty Stuart’s name, Lester Flatt heard a 13-year-old boy play mandolin on the back of a bus — and trusted what he heard enough to put him onstage.

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Marty Stuart and the Weekend That Changed Everything Long before Marty Stuart became a celebrated name in country music, he…

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People remember Johnny Cash and June Carter as one of country music’s great love stories. Vivian Liberto remembered the marriage that had to break before that story could begin. Johnny and Vivian married in 1954 after exchanging thousands of pages of love letters while he was stationed overseas. Then “I Walk the Line” became a hit, the road opened up, and the husband who had once promised to stay faithful was suddenly gone for long stretches while Vivian stayed home raising their four daughters. Fame was only part of it. Cash’s amphetamine addiction grew worse, and Vivian also believed he had become involved with June Carter. But Vivian did not reduce the collapse of their marriage to another woman. According to her coauthor, she believed that without Johnny’s drugs, they might have remained married. Cash himself eventually accepted responsibility, saying no woman could live with a man “strung out on amphetamines.” Vivian filed for divorce in 1966 after twelve years of marriage. Johnny married June two years later. Yet behind the famous romance was another woman who had known him before the black clothes, the legend and the addiction — and had spent years waiting for the man in her love letters to come home.

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Before June Carter, There Was Vivian Liberto: The First Wife in Johnny Cash’s Story People remember Johnny Cash and June…

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The last time Sonny Osborne played the banjo, he knew it was over before the song had even ended. It happened in Myrtle Beach in November 2003. The Osborne Brothers were performing “Ruby” when, about two-thirds of the way through, Sonny’s left shoulder suddenly gave way. His arm dropped to his side. He looked across the stage at his brother Bobby and said quietly, “I think I’m done.” They still finished “Ruby.” Then the group closed with a quick “Rocky Top.” Sonny would never play the banjo again. Doctors found that muscles and tendons connected to his rotator cuff had torn loose. Surgery could repair some of the damage, but not all of it. The injury ended Sonny’s life on the road and brought the Osborne Brothers’ half-century musical partnership to a close. For more than 50 years, that banjo had been beside Bobby’s voice. Then one night, in the middle of “Ruby,” Sonny’s hands were forced to say goodbye before he was ready.

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When Sonny Osborne Knew the Banjo Had Reached Its Last Song In November 2003, on a stage in Myrtle Beach,…

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DON GIBSON WROTE “OH LONESOME ME” AND “I CAN’T STOP LOVING YOU” ON THE SAME DAY. ONE BECAME HIS NO. 1 HIT. THE OTHER WAS PUT ON THE B-SIDE — AND GREW INTO ONE OF THE MOST RECORDED COUNTRY SONGS EVER WRITTEN. In 1957, Gibson was living in a trailer park north of Knoxville, Tennessee. Sitting down to write a lost-love ballad, he came across one line he had already written: “I can’t stop loving you.” He looked at it again and realized he had his title. That same day, he also wrote “Oh Lonesome Me.” On December 3, Gibson recorded both songs for RCA with producer Chet Atkins. “Oh Lonesome Me” became the A-side and reached No. 1 on the country chart. “I Can’t Stop Loving You” was placed on the other side of the record. But the B-side refused to stay there. Over the years, “I Can’t Stop Loving You” was recorded more than 700 times. In 1962, Ray Charles took it all the way to No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100. Don Gibson had written two classics in one day. The song placed second on the record may have traveled the farthest.

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The Day Don Gibson Wrote Two Country Classics In 1957, Don Gibson was living simply in a trailer park north…

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Gary Allan had gone more than eight years without a No. 1 country hit. Then a song called “Every Storm (Runs Out of Rain)” brought him back — and gave him something he had never achieved before. Allan’s previous chart-topper, “Nothing On but the Radio,” had reached No. 1 in December 2004. He continued recording and touring, but another No. 1 never came. Years passed while country radio changed around him. Then came “Every Storm,” written by Allan with Hillary Lindsey and Matt Warren. The message was simple: bad times do not last forever. In February 2013, the song reached No. 1 on Billboard’s Hot Country Songs chart, ending an eight-year, two-month gap between chart-toppers. It became the fourth No. 1 of Allan’s career. But the comeback was even bigger than one song. That same week, his album Set You Free reached No. 1 on the Billboard 200 — the first time Gary Allan had ever topped the all-genre album chart. After eight years waiting for country music to bring him back to No. 1, Gary Allan returned with a song whose title seemed to explain the entire journey.

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Gary Allan’s Long Wait Ended With “Every Storm (Runs Out of Rain)” For more than eight years, Gary Allan kept…

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David Lee Murphy had gone nearly 23 years without a No. 1 of his own. Then Kenny Chesney heard a song Murphy thought Chesney should record — and instead helped put Murphy back behind the microphone. Murphy had been one of country radio’s familiar voices in the 1990s. “Dust on the Bottle” reached No. 1 in 1995, followed by more hits, but eventually his recording career slowed. He never disappeared from Nashville. He simply moved behind the scenes, writing songs other artists took to the top, including Kenny Chesney’s “Living in Fast Forward” and Jason Aldean’s “Big Green Tractor.” Years later, Murphy brought Chesney “Everything’s Gonna Be Alright,” a song he had written with Chris Stevens and Jimmy Yeary. Murphy originally hoped Chesney might record it. Chesney had another idea: Murphy should make a new album himself. Chesney and Buddy Cannon helped produce No Zip Code, and Chesney joined Murphy on the song. In June 2018, “Everything’s Gonna Be Alright” reached No. 1 on Billboard Country Airplay — Murphy’s first chart-topper since “Dust on the Bottle,” nearly 23 years earlier. Five months later, Murphy and Chesney won CMA Musical Event of the Year. It was Murphy’s first CMA nomination — and his first CMA Award. For more than two decades, David Lee Murphy had helped other singers find hits. Then one of those singers helped make sure country music heard his voice again.

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How Kenny Chesney Helped Bring David Lee Murphy Back to the Front of Country Music For a long stretch of…

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TWENTY YEARS AFTER JOHNNY CASH DIED, HIS GREATEST INHERITANCE WASN’T WRITTEN IN A WILL — IT WAS SITTING ON A SHELF, WAITING FOR HIS SON TO FIND IT. September 12, 2003. Complications from diabetes. Johnny Cash was gone at 71, less than four months after June Carter Cash. He left behind “Ring of Fire,” “Folsom Prison Blues,” multiple Hall of Fame inductions, and one of the most recognizable voices American music ever produced. But John Carter Cash would eventually inherit something the public had never heard. Back in 1993, Johnny had recorded an album’s worth of his own songs at LSI Studios in Nashville. Then he met Rick Rubin, began the American Recordings chapter of his career, and those tapes were shelved. Nearly three decades later, John Carter rediscovered them. He stripped the recordings back to his father’s voice and acoustic guitar, then brought musicians who had actually played with Johnny — including Marty Stuart and Dave Roe — into the Cash Cabin to finish the music with producer David “Fergie” Ferguson. On June 28, 2024, Songwriter arrived: 11 Johnny Cash songs, all written by him, released more than twenty years after his death. The awards were already on the shelf. The legend was already secure. But John Carter found something better — eleven chances to hear his father speak again.

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Twenty Years After Johnny Cash Died, His Greatest Inheritance Was Sitting on a Shelf When Johnny Cash died on September…

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THE OLD MAN IN “DESPERADOS WAITING FOR A TRAIN” WAS REAL. HIS NAME WAS JACK PRIGG, AND HE RENTED A ROOM IN GUY CLARK’S GRANDMOTHER’S HOTEL IN MONAHANS, TEXAS. Rossie Clark ran a thirteen-room shotgun hotel that took in oilmen, drifters and bomber pilots. Prigg was a wildcatter and oilfield worker, and he was Rossie’s boyfriend. With Guy’s father overseas during the war, Prigg became the male figure in the boy’s life — and he took him into oil fields and pool halls and the Green Frog Cafe, where old men sat over dominoes and told whatever version of their lives sounded best that night. Clark said Prigg let him drive the car home from Odessa years before he had a license. Then Clark watched him get old. He wrote the song after Prigg died and called it a eulogy, as true as he could make it. Jerry Jeff Walker cut it first on Viva Terlingua in 1973. Rita Coolidge, David Allan Coe and Tom Rush all recorded it in 1974, before Clark finally released his own version on Old No. 1 in 1975. Ten years after that, Willie Nelson, Johnny Cash, Waylon Jennings and Kris Kristofferson released it as the Highwaymen and carried it to No. 15 on the country chart. Four of the most famous voices in American music, on a stage in front of thousands, singing about an old oil driller from a West Texas town almost none of them had heard of — a man who had been dead for years, and who never once heard his own name in the song.

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The Real Old Man Behind “Desperados Waiting for a Train” Long before “Desperados Waiting for a Train” became one of…

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Ricky Skaggs and Sharon White did not light a unity candle when they married. They sang to each other instead. On August 4, 1981, the two country musicians stood together for their wedding ceremony when their pastor suggested something that fit them better than the traditional candle. Ricky could sing a verse to Sharon, Sharon could sing one back, and then they could join together. They chose Townes Van Zandt’s “If I Needed You.” It sounded simple, but Sharon later admitted it was difficult to get through because both of them were so emotional. The song became their own wedding symbol — two voices beginning separately, then meeting together. That moment lasted far beyond the ceremony. Ricky and Sharon continued making music together, raised a family, and decades later recorded “If I Needed You” again. More than forty years after that wedding, the song still carries the memory of the promise they made when their marriage was just beginning.

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Ricky Skaggs and Sharon White Chose a Song Instead of a Unity Candle On August 4, 1981, Ricky Skaggs and…

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Ray Price helped create one of country music’s most copied sounds — then some of the same fans who loved him turned away when he refused to keep making it. In the 1950s, songs like “Crazy Arms” helped establish the driving 4/4 shuffle that became known as the “Ray Price Beat.” Fiddles, steel guitar and hard-country rhythm had made him a star. But Ray did not want to spend the rest of his life repeating himself. By 1967, he recorded “Danny Boy” with a full orchestra. Strings replaced much of the honky-tonk sound people expected from him. Many longtime fans hated the change. Some believed Ray was abandoning the music that had made him famous. He kept going anyway. Three years later, Ray recorded Kris Kristofferson’s “For the Good Times” with the smoother style he had fought to pursue. It reached No. 1 on the country chart, crossed over to No. 11 on the pop chart, and earned Ray a Grammy for Best Country Vocal Performance, Male. The sound that once made some of his old fans walk away had become part of one of the biggest records of his life. Ray Price had already changed country music once. He simply refused to ask permission before changing himself again.

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Ray Price was dying of pancreatic cancer when he recorded the album he wanted his wife to listen to after he was gone. Ray and Janie Price had been married since 1970. Janie later said Ray was never a “mushy” man. He loved her, but he was not the kind of husband who constantly said it. By 2013, cancer and chemotherapy were wearing him down. Still, Ray traveled to Nashville to work with producer Fred Foster on one final collection of love songs. Janie usually went everywhere with him, especially during his illness. This time, Ray asked to make the sessions without her. She eventually learned why. The album, Beauty Is… The Final Sessions, was for her. Among its songs was Willie Nelson’s “It Always Will Be,” surrounded by songs about lasting love, memory and two people growing old together. Ray told Janie, “I want you to have it to listen to when I’m not here.” He finished his studio work in October 2013. Ray Price died on December 16. He was 87. The album came out four months later. For a man who had never been comfortable saying “I love you,” his final record said it twelve different ways.

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Marty Robbins did not have to chase a record executive through Nashville for his first big break. One walked onto his little television show in Phoenix and heard enough to change his life. By 1951, Robbins was singing on local radio and hosting his own TV program in Arizona. He was still far from the Grand Ole Opry and years away from songs like “El Paso.” Then Little Jimmy Dickens appeared as a guest on the show. Dickens was already an established Columbia recording artist and Opry star. After hearing Robbins sing, he was impressed enough to tell Columbia that the young Arizona singer deserved a contract. The company listened. Robbins signed with Columbia Records that same year. In 1953, he joined the Grand Ole Opry and moved to Nashville. Over the years that followed, he became one of country music’s most versatile stars, recording everything from western ballads to country-pop and rockabilly. But the door opened in a much smaller room. Before the Grammys, the Opry and “El Paso,” Marty Robbins was simply a local television singer — until Little Jimmy Dickens heard one performance and decided Nashville needed to hear him too.

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Before Shirley Collie became Willie Nelson’s second wife, she was already beside him on one of his first Top 10 records. Years later, a hospital bill would help bring their marriage to an end. Willie and Shirley recorded “Willingly” together in 1962, and the duet reached the country Top 10. They married in 1963, while Willie was still struggling to turn his songwriting reputation into success as a singer. But in 1969, a hospital bill arrived at their home. It showed that a baby girl had been born to a woman listed as “Mrs. Connie Nelson.” Shirley had not known Willie was having an affair with Connie Koepke. She confronted him. Willie later admitted there was no explanation that could make the situation look innocent. He and Shirley divorced in 1971, and he married Connie that same year. Decades later, Willie did not try to rewrite what happened. He said he regretted the pain he had caused Shirley and his other wives, admitting that when it came to love, he had always had a gift for making things complicated. The marriage ended badly. But before it did, Shirley had already become part of Willie Nelson’s story — not only as his wife, but as one of the first voices the world heard singing beside him.