He was a legend, one of the last left of the good one's. It's unfortunate he had to go on his birthday, he left the world on the same day he came into it. I was a huge fan, and will dearly miss him, but his music will live on.
I didn't come to fully appreciate Merle Haggard (and country music generally) until I was well past 40 years old. I always found the hard driving Telecaster "Bakersfield" sound to be the most interesting of all the country music sub genres but didn't find much time for it in between Sonny Stitt and Hank Mobley records. I was a jazz snob for 25 years until the likes of Merle, Billy Joe Shaver and Marty Stuart opened my eyes- mostly through my wife who is a hardcore bluegrass Scruggs style banjo picker and county music fan.
Last April she and I drove up to Bakersfield to hear Merle in his hometown at the old Fox theatre and he put on a kick ass 2 hour show. I'm so glad we were able to hear him perform live, singing great and playing the shit out of that Telecaster at 78 years old.
RIP
Last Edited by PropMan on Apr 07, 2016 3:44 AM
RIP, Mr H. Thanks for the memories. I was fortunate to be able to spend a bit of conversational time with the gentleman. The luck of proximity. Haggard had a houseboat that he spent a great deal of time on on Lake Shasta up until about ten years ago when age slowed him up. His dentist is a guitar player in the next town over. Many visits had Mr Haggard patronizing the local eateries when he came to town. He was a really warm and easy going gentleman. But, you could certainly see it that there was some wild floating back in there and that the was some serious hell-raiser capacity from days gone by. Vaya con dios, sir.
---------- ~Buzadero Underwater Janitor, Patriot MBH poster since 11Nov2008
