Happy Birthday, Johnny Cash

by Jim Poulton

I can still remember when I first heard Johnny Cash’s Ring of Fire. My sister and I were riding in the back seat of our family’s Ford Fairlane. Ring of Fire came on the radio – we were listening to KNAK – and by the end of the song, all four of us were trying to sing along with the chorus. My dad had a barrel-chest kind of voice – a little like Cash’s – and he was the only one who could get the deep notes of ‘and it burns, burns, burns.’ It is one of those memories that just stay lodged in your brain.

Yesterday was Johnny Cash’s birthday. He would have been 79. Although he passed away in 2003, Cash has continued to be one of the most influential country singers in history. Ring of Fire, I Walk the Line, Folsom Prison Blues … it’s easy to see why.

Happy Birthday, Johnny Cash, wherever you are.