Friends, fans lavish praise on Cash in tribute concert
Country music legend Johnny Cash performs during a tribute concert last
night. The show is scheduled to air on April 18. (AP)
By Jay Orr / Tennessean Staff Writer
NEW YORK -- For more than 40 years, Johnny Cash has sung about keeping
the ends of his heart out, ready for the tie that binds, and last night,
in song and spoken tribute, his friends, family and musical admirers
surrounded that heart with affection and respect.
An audience of more than 2,500, including R.E.M.'s Michael Stipe and film
director Peter Bogdanovich, filled the Hammerstein Ballroom, adjacent to
Madison Square Garden, to witness a concert honoring Cash as a rock 'n'
roll pioneer, a country music legend, a gospel music lover, a champion of
the "poor and beaten down" and a rowdy rebel who wrestled with the record
industry establishment and with his own demons.
Hosted by actor Jon Voight, An All-Star Tribute to Johnny Cash was taped
for broadcast April 18 on TNT. Cash's broad appeal was exemplified in
everything from an acoustic performance by Fugees' rapper Wyclef Jean of
Cash's lurid murder ballad, Delia's Gone (including a mid-song rap that
borrowed the "I shot a man in Reno, just to watch him die" line from
Folsom Prison Blues), to a house-shaking gospel number, Belshazzar,
performed by Nashville's Grammy-winning a cappella gospel specialists,
the Fairfield Four, led by Cash's former son-in-law, Marty Stuart.
June Carter Cash drew a standing ovation for her performance, with
autoharp, guitar and fiddle accompaniment, of Ring of Fire, the song she
wrote with Merle Kilgore.
The crowd's most passionate response, however, was reserved for Cash's
climactic appearance at the end of the three-hour event. Surrounded by
stagehands, Cash was hustled on stage while actor/director Tim Robbins
gave a dramatic reading of the notes Cash wrote for his landmark album,
Johnny Cash at Folsom Prison. With his guitar slung back over his
shoulder, Cash wheeled around as the spotlight hit him. Unbowed by his
battle with Shy-Drager Syndrome, a degenerative nerve disease, Cash
rumbled his trademark, "Hello, I'm Johnny Cash" as the house erupted in
whoops and applause.
Reunited with former members of his early bands, including bassist
Marshall Grant, drummer W.S. Holland, guitarist Bob Wootton and pianist
Earl Ball, and with his son, John Carter Cash, behind him, Cash appeared
to relish his first turn at center stage since being forced by his health
to give up touring in October 1997.
Looking robust, his guitar slung behind him or held at a jaunty angle,
Cash ambled confidently to the mike and launched into Folsom Prison
Blues, with all the tics, head gestures and enthusiastic growls that
characterized the performances of his prime.
He followed with I Walk the Line, a song about faithful love and the ties
that bind, as his wife, June Carter Cash, and members of the cast joined
him on stage.
For the balance of the concert, Cash watched the show from a monitor in
his dressing room.
"It feels good, it feels good, it feels good," he said from the stage.
A star-studded, black-clad cast, including Willie Nelson, Sheryl Crow,
Kris Kristofferson, Trisha Yearwood, Brooks & Dunn, Lyle Lovett, Emmylou
Harris, Mary Chapin Carpenter and Dave Matthews, provided the musical
complement to a roughly chronological script written by Rolling Stone
contributing editor Anthony DeCurtis designed to give a full picture of
Cash's historical and cultural legacy.
U2, Bob Dylan and Bruce Springsteen contributed pre-taped performances to
the production. Introducing his performance of Cash's Give My Love to
Rose, Springsteen said to Cash, "You took the social consciousness of
folk music, the gravity and humor of country music and the rebellion of
rock 'n' roll and told all us young guys that not only was it all right
to tear up all those lines and boundaries, but it was important."
