I'll Call It Like I See It

by sheila morris

Tag: iconic gospel and country music

  • Chick Rebels in Words and Music: Molly Ivins and Linda Ronstadt


    I dearly love the state of Texas, but I consider that a harmless perversion on my part, and discuss it only with consenting adults. – Molly Ivins (1944 – 2007)
    Molly Ivins was a writer best known for her columns in more than 400 newspapers across the country which poked fun at her favorite targets: the corrupt Texas legislature, George Dubya Bush and Bill Clinton, her adopted state of Texas, bubbas in that state, herself, and the breast cancer that eventually killed her. A best selling author, humorist and speaker, she became one of the most famous female storytellers  ever to claim the state of Texas as her own – to run with that image as the tall Texan in her cowboy boots,  her pickup truck and  her dog named Shit as she mixed it up with the most powerful people in the state capital of Austin.  At her height of 6 feet she was easily spotted at the bars and cocktail parties where she drank with enthusiasm and was frequently overserved. Alcoholism was an addiction she considered necessary for her humor, but the laughs came with a steep price.
    I grew up in Arizona. I love it. I’m a part of the desert. I feel like, really I’m from the Sonoran Desert, which extends to both sides of the border. I’m really from that part of Mexico, also. And I hate that there’s a fence, you know running through it. Linda Ronstadt (1946 – )
    Linda Ronstadt was two years younger than Molly Ivins and came from a state farther west;  she told her stories with musical notes rather than simply relying on written words. A voice with a truly pure sound that defied labels, her eclectic genres included rock and roll, hard rock, soft rock, folk, art rock,  country, gospel, rhythm and blues, opera, standard American classics, Mexican mariachi, pop, five golden rings and a partridge in a pear tree. She became a female musical powerhouse in America during the 1960s and 70s when the profession was male and drug dominated – not necessarily in that order. Linda avoided heavy drugs but succumbed to an addiction for diet pills that plagued her at various times during her ten years on the road. In 2011 she retired due to the onset of Parkinson’s disease, a disease that also affected her maternal grandmother, a disease that has taken away her voice.
    This past weekend Pretty and I went to see two documentaries…Linda Ronstadt: The Sound of My Voice and Raise Hell: The Life and Times of Molly Ivins. I’m glad we saw them close together almost like an old double feature because I had an opportunity to reflect on the lives of two women who used their individual voices of celebrity and talent to challenge the politics and culture of the newspaper and entertainment industries at a time when women across the globe sought to make their own voices heard wherever they worked and lived. Post World War II women never again would fit nicely into their ticky tacky boxes that all looked just the same. The times they were, indeed, a changing for women – Molly Ivins and Linda Ronstadt were two of them.
    Stay tuned.

     

  • will the circle be unbroken?


    Will the circle be unbroken by and by, by and by.

    There’s a better home a waiting in the sky,  in the sky.

    I stood between my grandmother and granddaddy during the hymn singing and, although they each held a hymnal with the words and music, we all knew the songs by heart. I had to know them from memory since I was so young I couldn’t read yet, but my grandparents could have definitely read the words. They had sung the songs so many times during their lives, though, they didn’t need them. My granddaddy sang the melody, and my grandmother sang harmony or what I later learned was the alto part I tried to imitate for the rest of my life.

    …we sang the songs of childhood, hymns of faith that made us strong…

    My daddy was the song leader in the Richards Baptist Church in the 1950s. The Richards Baptist Church was a small congregation of 50 – 60 members that met on Sunday mornings for Sunday School and worship services, Sunday nights for Training Union and another worship service, and on Wednesday nights for prayer meetings plus a business meeting one Wednesday night a month.  My mother played either the black upright piano to the left of the small raised platform where the preacher and my daddy sat and stood up when they had something to say or she played the little pretend church organ to the right of the raised platform. I could barely see Mama even when I stood to sing from my seat with my grandmother and grandfather on one of the hard wooden pews toward the middle of the tiny sanctuary; I could always see and hear my daddy.

    My maternal grandmother had a particular place she sat every Sunday morning during the worship service – a place down closer to the front of the church, but she always sat alone. My mother’s two brothers sat in different places every Sunday, but my Uncle Marion sat on the back row since he was late coming in from standing outside smoking that final cigarette. My Uncle Toby also sat by himself closer to the front but on the opposite side of the church from his mother.

    One by one their seats were emptied, one by one they went away.

    Now the family is parted, will it be complete one day?

    My family members in  that little Baptist Church are, indeed, gone. But the circle of life and family is definitely not broken for me.  Hallelujah! There’s good news for the whole family when the circle is complete.

    Drew with his daughter Ella as his mother NanaPretty smiles at them both

    NanaSlow holds Ella as NanaPretty keeps smiling

    When Ada R. Habershon penned the lyrics in 1907 to the song Will the Circle be Unbroken, she had no way of knowing what an iconic gospel and country music song this would become. From remote churches like mine in the piney woods of East Texas to the center stage of the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville, Tennessee this song spoke to individuals and the masses. Her original lyrics changed through the years as different performers rewrote them, but the question remained the same.

    Will the circle be unbroken by and by? Regardless of time or place, the answer is yes.

    Stay tuned.