WebBlue Sky Night Thunder is the fourth album by American singer-songwriter Michael Murphey and is considered one of the seminal albums of his career. During the late 1970s, he recorded four albums: Swans Against the Sun (1975), Flowing Free Forever (1976), Lone Wolf (1978), and Peaks, Valleys, Honky Tonks & Alleys (1979). In 1986 he founded WestFest, an annual music festival held at Copper Mountain, Colorado that celebrates western art and culture. The album included "Cosmic Cowboy, Pt. Cowboy Songswas so popular and highly regarded that Warner Bros. created an entire imprint called Warner Western. ", In 1971, producer Bob Johnston, whose resume included acclaimed work with Bob Dylan, Johnny Cash and Simon & Garfunkel, among others, saw Murph performing in Dallas and signed him to a recording contract with A&M Records. Story Behind the Song: 'Carolina in the Pines', Dave Paulson, USA TODAY NETWORK Tennessee, Your California Privacy Rights/Privacy Policy. Murphey wrote some additional songs for The Monkees, but he grew disillusioned with the poor financial rewards and the Southern California music scene. In an interview with the online magazine TheBluegrassSpecial.com, he reflected on the nature of material chosen for the project. He performed a number of times at the Armadillo World Headquarters, and his photo was even used for the original cover of Jan Reid's book, The Improbable Rise of Redneck Rock. Murphey is the narrator of the short film Spirit of the Cowgirl at the National Cowgirl Museum and Hall of Fame in Fort Worth, Texas. In 1971, Murphey returned to Texas and became part of the so-called Outlaw country movement, playing alongside other maverick performers such as Willie Nelson and Jerry Jeff Walker. In the end, when you go across, nobodys going to hold your hand. The young man came down from the mountains in 1970 and returned to Texas, to Austin, where he became one of the most popular artists in a burgeoning, fertile music scene that featured a raft of gifted singer-songwriter types working the Austin-San Antonio-Houston club circuit, including Willie Nelson, Jerry Jeff Walker, Guy Clark, the mercurial Townes Van Zandt, and bringing up the rear, a younger guard that included Houston-born Rodney Crowell, and Steve Earle. I really loved the music of the guys that raised me.. ", "The room was togged out gorgeous with mistletoe and shawls,And the candles flickered festious, around the airy walls.". I mean, I still get electrified. As early as 1985, Murphey performed with the New Mexico Symphony in a show called A Night in the American West, which led to many subsequent performances with American and Canadian symphonies, including the National Symphony Orchestra of Washington, D.C. Terry Tsotigh, a respected musician,played Native American flute, while the Celtic harp provided a contrasting sound. We realized that was what dad wanted to be doing; he just couldnt because of the job he had. Waddy Mitchell is the co-founder of the National Cowboy Poetry Gathering. 0:04. Includes Address(10) Phone(6) See Results. I thank you you have added to the richness of my human experience. The DVDs document his trail rides, cattle drives, and Cowboy Poetry gatherings. He followed this up in 2002 with Cowboy Classics: Playing Favorites II, which again included re-recorded versions of some of his best-loved cowboy songs. The end result, though, is what counts:Cowboy Songsyielded the unthinkablea hit single in Cowboy Logic, and ultimately a gold verging on platinum album (It takes Garth Brooks about fifteen minutes to go gold or platinum, Murph once mused. He has recorded So it wasnt so much about it becoming an interestit was just there. His wife, besides her Native American heritage, also is Irish. Termination right is at center of several copyright disputes. Hes introduced thousands of people to its natural beauty via trail rides, festivals and concerts. Ever a genre-busting artist, Murphey refocused his attention again in 2009 with his Grammy nominatedBuckaroo Blue Grass. MMM: You know, whenever I gothere, I don't tell any other stories. Through his music he tells the stories and romance of the Native Americans, cowboys, horsemen, ranchers, outlaws, and lawmen. Murphey met him at the Western Heritage Awards and they struck up a friendship. It was in another duo with Castleman, the Lewis & Clark Expedition, that Murphey began to find not only a distinctive voice as a songwriter, but a mission as well, that being to fuse country, folk and pop and add to the blend the lore and poetry of the old west, whose history had been one of the passions of his life, dating back to those childhood years on his grandfather's and uncle's ranches, where he had absorbed his family's tall tales about the cowboys, Native Americans and the notorious characters and great deeds in old west history. Her name was Caroline. All three records were produced by Murphey. 2023 www.reporternews.com. As the band seemed to finish the night with "Goodnight, Ladies," Murphey told them to keep playing, jumped down from the stage and danced the last dance with the missus. Murphey performs these songs Murphey then moved to California, where he studied creative writing and majored in medieval history and literature at the University of California, Los Angeles. My dad was an accountant in downtown Dallas working for a mortgage banker, Murph related in a 2011 interview with TheBluegrassSpecial.com. His first marriage to Diana Vero resulted in a Grammy-nominated musician son named Ryan Murphey. His second marriage to Caroline Hogue inspired his hit song "Carolina in the Pines," and his third marriage to fashion model Mary Maciukas produced children named Laura Lynn and Brennan. His fourth marriage to Karen Rische began in 2003. "We're not breaking any rules.". Along the way Murph pays tribute to Guy Clark (L.A. 3 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart, as well as No. Murphey said, holding aloft afluted glass. You go up there and you check in to the most beautiful little log cabin you ever saw in your life. Cowboy Songs and its follow-up albums were so successful that they inspired the formation of Warner Western, a new subsidiary label of Warner Bros. Records devoted to western music and cowboy poetry. Here a listener could really hear, for example, the eerie invocation Wildfire really was when stripped of its pop production flourishes; here a listener could really hear songwriting as high, compelling art of a personal nature. He continued to top the country charts throughout the decade with hits like Whats Forever For, the Grammy nominated A Face In the Crowd, (with Holly Dunn), the number one A Long Line of Love, Im Gonna Miss You Girl, and many more. WebCelebrity Biographies. This song gives focus to the heritage of the American West, to the prairie and its songs, poems and literature." On the strength of his first album alone, proclaimedRolling StoneMagazine, Michael Murphey is the best new songwriter in the country. In1975 he topped the pop charts with his hit singles, Wildfire and Carolina In the Pines from the RIAA Certified Gold albumBlue Sky - Night Thunder. In 1973, Murphey followed up with the album Cosmic Cowboy Souvenir, which continued the urban cowboy theme of the first album. Termination right is at center of several copyright disputes. All rights reserved. That same month, Murphey organized and performed for John Wayne's 100th Birthday Celebration, with the approval of the John Wayne Family. 1:09. In the summer of 1975, "Wildfire" became a chart-topping hit, reaching No. Of course there were rings. What's "Carolina in the Pines" about? I think that was the first attempt that I everheard to incorporate jazz piano into a bluegrass song. By the early 1960s, Murphey was playing the clubs in Dallas, performing country music, folk music, and rock music. 1 Cowboy in 1980. During the early 1970s in Austin, TX along with artists like Jerry Jeff Walker and Gary P. Nunn, Murphey created the Cosmic Cowboy movement, which was pivotal in drawing artists like Willie Nelson to the scene and helped birth the Outlaw Country movement. At age 18 he had his own TV show in Dallas. Before his 24th appearance at the holidaydance last Saturday,Murphey and Tunewere married in a ceremony led jointly by a Methodist minister and Native American medicine man. I have lived that life all my life. Cowboy Songs III He signed a publishing contract with the Sparrow Music company, and soon he made a name for himself in the Los Angeles folk music scene. In 1990 he circled around to one of his first loves, cowboy music. Why yes, yes I did. But the transient nature of my career and the transient nature of my thinking and my life is very evident here, and I think theres a little boy who missed his dad being on the road a whole lot. Education: Attended University of California , Los Angeles . [15], In May 2011, Murphey gave a benefit concert at the Prairie Rose Chuckwagon Supper near Benton, Kansas to help save the cabin where Brewster Higley wrote the song "Home on the Range", Kansas' state song. Murphey asked then-ball association secretary SuAnn Holtman about this attractive womanand was told she lived out of town but had been to the dance a number of times. In 2006, he released "The Ballad of Kit Laney" in support of the New Mexico rancher's fight with the United States Forest Service over water rights.