Willie Nelson, Kris Kristofferson and music publisher for Combine Music and founder of Monument Records, Fred Foster each received the Dale Franklin Award, an award honoring their unique leadership in country music during an invitation-only event on Sunday night (Aug. 29) in Nashville. On hand to perform were friends Rodney Crowell, Jamey Johnson, Lyle Lovett, Lorrie Morgan, Dolly Parton, Randy Travis, Lee Ann Womack and others. The award is named for the first executive director of Leadership Music, an industry networking organization that hosts the annual gala event.

During his introduction of Willie Nelson, Vince Gill said Nelson’s face belonged on Mount Rushmore. I couldn’t have said it better myself.

From CMT.com “As a music publisher for Combine Music and founder of Monument Records, Foster helped lay the career groundwork for artists like Kristofferson, Roy Orbison and Dolly Parton, as well as Larry Gatlin, Billy Grammer, Boots Randolph, Jeannie Seely, Billy Swan and Tony Joe White. His recent credits include producing Nelson’s 2006 album, You Don’t Know Me: The Songs of Cindy Walker, and a 2007 collaborative album with Merle Haggard, Nelson and Ray Price called Last of the Breed, which won a Grammy. Gill told the audience that Foster’s advice to aspiring producers was simply to “frame the picture,” thus allowing the artist to be the focus of attention, not the frame.”

Hank Cochran, one of country music’s most storied and prolific songwriters who wrote songs for Patsy Cline, Ray Price, Eddy Arnold, Merle Haggard, George Strait an many others passed away yesterday morning. His Wikipedia bio reads like a  Mother lode for source for country gold:

Born during the Great Depression in Isola, Mississippi, he contracted pneumonia, whooping cough, measles and mumps all about the same time at age 2. The doctor didn’t think that he would survive. His parents divorced when he was 9, he moved with his father to Memphis, Tennessee, but then went to an orphanage. He was sent to live with his grandparents, in Waynesboro, Mississippi, after he had run away from the orphanage twice. His uncle Otis Cochran taught him how to play the guitar as the pair hitchhiked  from Mississippi to southeastern New Mexico to work in the oilfields.

and my persoan favorite.

While working at publishing company Pamper Music, he used to spend nights playing at a Nashville bar called Tootsie’s Orchid Lounge. While there a new guy showed up and Cochran was amazed, he then encouraged management to sign the young songwriter, Willie Nelson, giving Nelson a raise that was coming to him at the time.

This from the press release:

Last night, Jamey Johnson, Billy Ray Cyrus and Buddy Cannon dropped by to sing songs with Hank, and this morning the legendary songwriter was surrounded by family and friends when he passed away at his Hendersonville, Tennessee home. A private, family memorial will be held in the near future, and a public service will follow. Details will be forthcoming.

The family asks that you respect their privacy at this time and, in lieu of flowers, request those wishing to honor Hank make donations to the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame Foundation.

Hank was inducted in to the Nashville Songwriters Association International Hall of Fame by unanimous vote in 1974, and was honored by B.M.I. in June 2009 for his six-decade long career of hits, that includes country classics: “I Fall To Pieces,” “Make The World Go Away,” “Ocean Front Property,” “The Chair” and “Don’t You Ever Get Tired Of Hurting Me.”

There appears to be a resurgence of sorts of the modern troubadour. the male singer/songwriter armed with only an acoustic guitar and the stories he weaves always teetering on the precipice between  emotional authenticity and cloying sentimentality. The balance becomes even more precarious when you have pop leanings as the term “pop” has been severed from it’s root “popular” into something fleeting and vapid.

A well-crafted song defies genre. Whether it’s Sinatra’s I did It My Way or Willie Nelson’s Blue Eyes Crying in the Rain, there’s a craftsmanship that transcends and a balanced symmetry of sound and word. These types of songs also used to fall under the moniker of pop because they were “popular” not because they were reminiscent of sugary confection.

New Jersey based Joe Whyte’s new (FREE!) release, When The Day Breaks, is a slice of pop-Americana that straddles territory settled in the 70′s by pioneers like Gordon Lightfoot and Stephen Stills and currently being reshaped by the likes of the  Avett Brothers, Darrell Scott and Brice Robinson.

Rambling is the asphalt-hearted theme that runs through this release. The jangly channeling of Gram Parsons in the opener Please Believe Me portrays a sunny tempo belying the narrators compulsion to hit the  road and not allow anyone to fence him. It’s a Shame with its Dobro yawn supplies  a precisely suited accompaniment to reflect the dark dysfunction of a man destined to leave a caring woman knowing full well its the wrong thing to do,

This City is Alive has the narrator sit still in the City that Never Sleeps (sounding like a lost track from Elton John’s Tumbleweed Connection) yet fights the urge to escape before it steals the person he’s finally discovered he is. Off to War is a different kind of leaving. A soldier being deployed wants more then anything to be home with his family and his solemn ache is the strongest testament against an unjust war.

Blending a pop songwriters instinct for precision and hook with the warmth and authenticity in storytelling that are the trademarks of folk and country Whyte rescues the much maligned genre and gives it beauty and depth.

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If there was a country music Mount Rushmore two legendary (and appropriately weathered)  mugs sure to be immortalized in granite would be Willie Nelson and Merle Haggard.

Willie and The Haggard have left their indelible imprint on Country music by spearheading two spirited responses to the slick sound of 50s and 60s Nashville, Outlaw country and the Bakersfield sound respectively. Willie (77) and the Hag (73) show no signs of slowing down with ongoing touring and debuts on new labels ( and in Willie’s case a follow up) and both are back to buck mainstream Country trends by assuredly reasserting their mark on the future by mining tradition.

Country Music, the title of Willie’s Rounder Records debut, can be read as both a historical affirmation of the genre and a proclamation that the current pop variety overtaking the airwaves does not have a lock on the moniker  Never a slave to the genre Willie infuses these 14 classic covers (and one unearthed original) with his laid-back jazzy approach to make them fresh and compelling. Lack of collaboration is not a short-coming Willie embodies. He might collaborate with even a fence post if the mood struck him. But what I consider a perfect fellow Texan T Bone Burnett (Grammy winner for Robert Plant and Alison Krauss’ Raising Sand and Academy Award winner for the Crazy Heart soundtrack ) to handle production and brought some Nashville’s best talent – Buddy Miller,Jim Lauderdale,  mandolinist Ronnie McCoury, banjo player Riley Baugus as well as long-time Nelson harmonica maestro Mickey Raphale – and worked with Willie to choose the material, and steps back in the production and allows Willie and the material to shine.

The highlights include a sparse and elegant version of Merle Travis’ Appalachian coal miner lament Dark as a Dungeon which takes on a  topical context in light of the recent West Virginia and Russian tragedies,  the traditional Gospel number Satan, Your Kingdom Must Come Down which suits Willie’s sinewy voice backed by a instruments that emit a fitting Southern Gothic chill. The oft-covered Satisfied Mind is a solid study on appreciating what you have and is given authority in this delivery. The swinging Pistol Packin’ Mama, which was a number one single for Bing Crosby and The Andrews Sisters, throws off tons of playful cowboy cool.

I wonder if Haggard asked George Jones if he could borrow the title of his 1980 album I Am What I Am? Hag’s version made up of all originals and show him as feisty, poetic and occasionally solemn as ever. Recorded with his ace band the Strangers, as well as his son Ben on guitar, at his Northern California headquarters, the Shade Tree Manor studio, and produced by Haggard and longtime collaborator Lou Bradley, this album fits nicely into Haggard’s storied catalog.  The past fist-clenched defiance of Okie from Muskogee and The Fighting Side of Me has been replaced with a contemplation and mature restrain. But Haggard is still willing to say, not shout, what’s on his mind.

The bitetrsweet I’ve Seen It Go Away reminisces better times in a rear view mirror. Pretty When It’s New and The Road to My Heart shows that Willie is not the only one with a jazzy traditional pop bent. The spirit of Bob Wills inhabits the lively twin-fiddle fueled Live and Love Always, featuring a duet with his wife, Theresa, as Haggard gives arrangement instructions mid-song. Bad Actor is a great smooth country number about a man going through the motions in a dead-end relationship. Mexican Bands is a great mariachi-tinged waltz south of the border where haggard alludes to a pastime he might have picked up from Willie – “And early mañana smoke what I wanna, And listen to Mexican bands.”

Longtime fans know that both of there men are masters of the understated guitar, and throughout both releases there is testament to their subtle artistry. There are welcome reminders of the beauty and majesty possible when performers, young or old, are courageous enough to perform work from the heart.

Willie Nelson -  Country Music

Merle Haggard -  I Am What I Am

Kris Kristofferson’s latest is actually some of his earliest. Please Don’t Tell Me How the Story Ends: The Publishing Demos 1968-72 is a collection of raw demos made to shop his songs around to singers while sweeping floors at Columbia Studios in Nashville (where he later first met Johnny Cash.) I listened to 16 cuts from the album streaming over at NPR and it’s a beauty. The back and forth with Kristofferson and the recording engineer does not take away from the artistry from this master songwriter. There are classics like Me and Bobby McGee,made famous by a woman that dated Kristofferson for a time, Janis Joplin. There is also the title cut which was recorded by Bobby Bare and If You Don’t Like Hank Williams latter recorded by Hank Williams Jr. With Willie and Merle Haggard coming out with releases this month Please Don’t Tell Me How the Story Ends just makes this one of the best bumper crops in quite some time. The down-loadable version is on sale now at Amazon.

Kris Kristofferson reminisces about his days playing football. The days before he was pulled because of too many head injuries, that is.

CMT interviews the Texas Yoda, Willie Nelson about his new T Bone Burnett produced album, Country Music.

Dwight Yoakam & Merle Haggard will perform together June 18 & 19 at Oregon’s Chinook Winds Casino Resort.

Speaking of Brother Hag, the LA Times Pop & Hiss get’s on the bus with the Merle while in town for the Stagecoach Festival.

In a case that will go down in Country Music Outlaw history, a Waco, Texas jury has acquitted 70-year-old Texas Country Music Hall of Fame member Billy Joe Shaver of aggravated assault in the shooting of a man outside a Lorena, Texas bar in 2007. the incident came after Shaver had played a show.Willie Nelson and actor Robert Duvall had been at the trial to show their friend moral support.

My favorite parts of  the released testimony were: during cross examination by the prosecuting attorney Shaver was asked if he might have pulled a gun on Billy Coker in the bar’s parking lot because  Coker (who had first allegedly pulled a knife to which Shaver pulled a gun from his truck and famously asked him “Where do you want it?” ) was talking to talking to Shaver’s wife, Wanda, Shaver said “I get more women than a passenger train can haul. I’m not jealous.”  When asked why he didn’t leave the bar without his wife after realizing his argument with Coker was escalating. Shaver replied, “Ma’am, I’m from Texas. If I were chickenshit, I would have left, but I’m not.” Classic.

Texas singer/songwriter wrote a song entitled “Where do you want it?” shortly after the incident.

• The will of the late singer/songwriter Stephen Bruton, is being contested by his possibly estranged widow. Bruton provided the inspiration for the Crazy Heart character Bad Blake played by Jeff Bridges and worked with T. Bone Burnett on the movie’s soundtrack in his days of fighting cancer.

• And for more in Crazy Heart news, the good folks at the 9513.com have a great interview with Ryan Bingham. Bingham. reflects on his Golden Globe winning and Academy Award nominated song The Weary Kind.

• PopMatters debuts a new monthly country music column, Kickin’ Up Dust. First up? Willie Nelson!

• The CMT blog has a nice run down of early 2010 Americana releases. Looks to be another bumper year!

• The Levon Helm documentary Ain’t In It For My Health: A Film About Levon Helm will make its world premiere at this year’s SXSW Festival. (Country Standard Time)

• Speaking of great 2010 releases, seminal 80′s cowpunk band, and the 2008 Americana Music Association’s Lifetime Achievement Award recipient, Jason and the Scorchers will release their first album in 14 years. Halcyon Times will be released in February 2010 and was co-produced by Scorcher member Warner E. Hodges and Brad Jones, and features guest contributions from Dan Baird and Tommy Womack.

• Merle Haggard has penned a deal with independent label Vanguard Records- home pf Levon Helm – ans will release hos label debut I Am What I Am, his first album on April 20. The project, featuring 12 new songs he has written, was co-produced by Haggard and Lou Bradley.

• Six members of Willie Nelson’s band and crew were cited for misdemeanor possession offenses after of marijuana wafting from the window of a The Texas Yoda’s tour bus led to six members of the country singer’s entourage getting busted in Duplin County for possession of marijuana and three-fourths of a quart of moonshine. Nelson later that day canceled a North Carolina concert due to a hand that was husrting him – what may be a result from carpal tunnel surgery in 2004 – according to a posting on his Web site.

• Justin Townes Earle dapper throw-back hillbilly duds has garnered him a spot on GQ’s 25 Most Styish Men in the World list.

• The mighty Drive By Truckers have announced tour dates to suppert their upcoming release The Big To-Do (March 16, 2010 – ATO Records) DBT and ATO Records are also offering up the first single, “This Fucking Job”, from The Big To-Do for free: Drive By Truckers – This Fucking Job

• WillieNelson.com posted that The Texas Yoda has wrapped up his newest, as-yet-untitled album,  recorded live in Nashville in four days and produced by prestigious Americana producer T-Bone Burnett. From the post “Some folks have mistakenly called it bluegrass,” says Burnett. “It’s actually pre-bluegrass. It’s some of the songs Willie’s been singing his whole life.” The material ranges from 1920s to 1960s.” The album features a string section, Buddy Miller on guitar and Mickey Raphael on harmonica, includes “The Man With the Blues,” which Burnett says is the first song Willie ever wrote. Other tracks include covers of “Dark As a Dungeon” by Merle Travis and “You Done Me Wrong” by Ray Price. No release date has been set.

• Recording and visual artist Ronnie McDowell showed up at at George Jone’s home on home in Franklin, TN on Christmas day bearing the gift of a portrait — commissioned by Jones’ wife, Nancy — depicting Jone’s celebrated DUI arrest while operating a riding lawn mower.

• Roseanne Cash has announced a short tour to support her latest release, The List. (No Depression)

• The 11th annual San Francisco Bluegrass & Old-Time Festival is coming up February 12-21. The nine-day festival will feature many great bands at various locations around the Bay Area.

• The 11th Annual Musicfest at Steamboat concludes today at the Steamboat Colorado ski resort. Seriously, people, next year someone at the event needs to hook a blogger UP!