FINAL NOTES
Charlie Daniels Oct. 28, 1936 – July 6, 2020
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ountry rock pioneer Charlie Daniels, 83, died July 6. He was noted for his genrecrossing singles including “The Devil Went Down to Georgia,” “Uneasy Rider,” and “Long Haired Country Boy,” his hugely successful and long-running musical event the Volunteer Jam, and his decades of charitable endeavors. He was a multi-instrumentalist and life member of the Nashville Musicians Association who joined the local Dec. 14, 1967. Daniels was born Oct. 28, 1936 in Wilmington, North Carolina, to the late William Carlton and LaRue Daniels. He was raised listening to a wide variety of music, including bluegrass, gospel, and country, and learned to play guitar and fiddle as a teenager. He and some friends formed his first band — the Misty Mountain Boys — and he wrote his first song while a member. After he graduated from Goldston High School in 1955, Daniels moved and the band dissolved. In 1959 he formed a rock & roll band called the Jaguars, and in 1964 had his first important success, when he cowrote a song with Joy Byers — a non-deplume for songwriter and producer Bob Johnston at the time — called “It Hurts Me,” which became a Top 30 pop hit for Elvis Presley. Daniels moved to Nashville from California with his wife and 2-year-old son in 1967 to become a session player at the urging of Johnston, who introduced him to Bob Dylan. Dylan used the multi-instrumentalist on his album Nashville Skyline, in which Daniels played electric guitar, bass, and acoustic guitar. In an interview with The Nashville Musician in 2015, Daniels talked about what it was like to be one of the Nashville Cats during the ‘70s. “The producers would turn it loose and let it go here in Nashville,” Daniels said. “There were so many great musicians who worked well together. I never felt a lot of ego. Everyone did their parts and played what was there. Leonard
26 THE NASHVILLE MUSICIAN
