Midnight Sun: Johnny Cash tribute artist

I had the pleasure of going to the 3:10 to Yuma event open house last Wednesday. Even though I think the effort to keep the Yuma Territorial Prison open is a great cause, I was there for one reason only - Johnny Cash - or at least the next best thing.

For that special day, Johnny Cash tribute artist Jimmie Ray Cantrell was in town to sing some of Cash's most famous songs. Cantrell's wife, Cyndi, even dressed up like June Carter and sang along with him during the show.

Now, if you have been keeping up with my columns you will know already that I am a Johnny Cash fan. I reference the man in black as much as I can and any local cover band who does a decent rendition of any Johnny Cash song becomes one of my favorites.

Needless to say I couldn't pass up the chance. I caught up with Cantrell before his warmup show. Here is what he said...

CM: “You are a Johnny Cash Impersona- tor?”

JC: “We don’t use that name very often. We are tribute artists. We are very proud to announce we won the Best Tribute Artist Award about a week ago. We model ourselves after the 1994 Johnny Tour, with the exception that we do some of the songs he did after ’94."

CM: "How long have you been doing this?"

JC: "He passed away in ’03 and we started this show in late ’06. We’ve been doing music for many years, but we decided to go in the direction of a Johnny Cash tribute band just out of the demand from the audience. People kept saying I had a similar stature and a similar voice."

CM: “Is this your full-time job?"

JC: "Yes it is. In fact, we just got done with Southern California and the week before that we were up in Vegas, which is our home."

CM: “Why do you do this?"

JC: “Well it started out... we had another band called Jimmie Ray and the Outbound. We did a lot of old tunes from Merle Haggard, Hank Williams, Patsy Cline and so on, but we got more requests to do Johnny Cash. We made a commitment and we are honored to do it. We love it and the audience has been just fabulous."

CM: "Why does the audience connect with the music?"

JC: "The people’s love of Johnny Cash. He just had an image for the common man and his songs were just nothing-magical music, except for the spirit of it, and that is what we want to project. Johnny can’t be here no more, so we want to be the next best thing."

CM: “Do you try to keep the songs as original as possible?"

JC: "We do. Sometimes we will do a medley... Johnny and June were in the music industry for six decades and did something like 12 hundred to 14 hundred songs, which they wrote and recorded. So if somebody says, ‘Play it all’ there is no way, we don't know them all."

CM: “How do you get into the spirit of the character?”

JC: “I just look at the audience and try to give them what they are asking for. Sometimes I’ll start off a show with, ‘Hello I’m Johnny Cash’ or  ‘Hello I’m not Johnny Cash,' it just depends. Our job is to take care of the audience. It is an honor being here, and we love history."

Soon afterwards, Cantrell got up on the stage with his wife and the band and opened up with "Folsom Prison." My spine tingled as my ears were greeted with live Johnny Cash. I love that song. They then followed up with a duet of "Jackson," which was fantastic.

Cash has been dead for seven years, but Cantrell is doing a good job of keeping his spirit alive. "Good job" to everybody involved with saving the prison - posterity will be pleased.

See you next week under the midnight sun...