Johnny Cash as an Air Force Radio Intercept Operator
in West Germany: 1951-1954

Plus the German Versions of Johnny Cash Recordings in the 1960s

Although Johnny Cash and Elvis Presley knew each other, and even performed together in the early days of their careers, they never became close friends. When they first met, Johnny was a few years older than Elvis. Cash was married, while Elvis was a single man who attracted a younger, largely female audience. Their lives and careers soon took their own different tracks. But in the 1950s they did have one thing in common: They were both stationed in West Germany while serving in the armed forces of the United States. Cash was unknown during his years in the U.S. Air Force in Bavaria, while Presley was already famous when he shipped off to his army post near Frankfurt.

Johnny Cash in Landsberg, Bavaria
Johnny Cash enlisted in the United States Air Force on July 7, 1950, less than a month after the Korean War began (June 1950 – July 1953). But the Cold War was also going strong by then. Cash would go to Europe rather than Asia. He completed his technical training in Texas and Mississippi before being assigned to the newly created 12th Radio Squadron (Mobile) of the U.S. Air Force Security Service (USAFSS) at Landsberg am Lech (pop. 14,000 in 1950; 28,000 today), about 65 km (40 miles) west of Munich. After Cash’s time at Landsberg, the 12th RMS was redesignated the 6912th Radio Squadron (Mobile) on 8 May 1955 and relocated to Bingen Air Base, West Germany. In 1959 the unit moved from Bingen to Tempelhof Central Airport in West Berlin.

As a radio intercept operator Cash would play an important role in helping the United States deal with the Soviet threat in post-war Europe during the Cold War. His listening post was ideally positioned to eavesdrop on communications from Soviet troops stationed in nearby East Germany, Hungary, Poland, and Austria at that time. (Austria remained divided into occupation zones, including the American and Soviet zones, until 1955.) The Berlin Airlift had recently ended in the Allies’ favor, leaving the Russians very perturbed. It was an extremely touchy period in the Cold War, and airman John R. Cash was going to be able to help his country with his newly gained skills as part of his elite 40-man radio squadron.

Cash Joins an Elite Unit
During his training at Keesler Air Force Base in Biloxi, Mississippi Cash had displayed exceptional skills in Morse code. He completed his training course weeks ahead of schedule. His fellow airmen at the time have commented on how smart Cash was. He was offered the opportunity to join a new elite unit that was part of the U.S. Air Force Security Service. Selected candidates had to excel in testing, and be more than just intelligent. They also had to demonstrate good character and emotional stability.

As part of his elite status Cash was offered two assignment locations: Adak, Alaska or Landsberg, West Germany. Since he had always wanted to visit Europe, he wisely chose Landsberg. His new job was so secret that he was not allowed to tell even his family about it. All he could reveal was that he was going to Landsberg. But before that he still had to complete four more weeks of advanced training at Brooks Air Base in San Antonio, Texas. It was in the Lone Star State that Cash would meet his future wife, Vivian Liberto. Her Catholic family had a long history in San Antonio. They met at a roller-skating rink and dated for only three weeks before Cash left for Europe. But Johnny was smitten. The two would exchange almost 10,000 pages of letters during his three-year hitch.

After his final weeks of training in Texas, Cash was sent to Camp Kilmer in New Jersey before sailing to Europe. He had a chance to visit New York City with a friend before shipping out. On September 20, 1951 Cash’s unit departed the Brooklyn Navy Yard aboard the USNS General W.G. Haan, a large 17,000 ton transport ship. After landing at Bremerhaven in northern Germany the unit still had a long rail journey from there to Landsberg in the south.

Cash Was Fast
Upon arriving at the listening station at Landsberg Air Force Base, Cash was assigned to intercept encoded messages from the Soviet Union’s military. Because Soviet Morse code operaters transmitted their code very rapidly, not every radio interceptor could keep up. Airman Cash was among the few operators who could consistently keep up with the speedy Russian coders.

Cash did not know Russian, but he didn’t need to. He merely copied the characters in messages transmitted in International Morse Code, which were then passed on to an analyst/interpreter for decoding. The widely circulated story that Cash was the first person to intercept the news of Joseph Stalin’s death on March 5, 1953 may or may not be true, but he couldn’t have known what he actually had heard until the message was decoded and translated into English.

Elvis in Germany Elvis Presley was also stationed in West Germany after being drafted into the U.S. Army. He was stationed at Ray Barracks in Friedberg, West Germany from 1958 until 1960. Unlike Cash before him, a wealthy and famous Elvis could afford to live off-base in a house in nearby Bad Nauheim – with his father, grandmother, and friends. Learn more about Presley’s time in Hesse on this German Way page: Elvis Presley as a G.I. in West Germany.

The Landsberg Barbarians
While stationed at Landsberg, in his free time airman Johnny Cash polished his singing and musicianship with a cheap guitar he bought in Germany. He also bought a tape recorder. Cash wrote some poems and songs, and even founded a three-man band called the Landsberg Barbarians (a play on “Bavarians”). Cash and his Barbarians played at local bars and other venues, but after he left the Air Force and returned to the US in 1954, the band broke up and its members went their separate ways. Cash and his Landsberg bandmates Reid Cummins and B.J. (Bill) Carnahan would not see each other again until they were reunited 17 years later on the television show “This Is Your Life” in 1971. (See the video link below.)

Until late 2017, the base where Johnny Cash was stationed was a German Fliegerhorst known as Landsberg/Lech Air Base. The facility – actually located in the community of Penzing – was used by the Bundeswehr as an air transport and aircraft maintenance base (Lufttransportgeschwaders 61). Today the airfield is used by a local flying club. The German base was bombed by American B-17s during World War II, and taken over by the Americans on April 28, 1945 to become Airfield R-78. After 1949 the facility became a U.S. Air Force base and a listening post for Cold War communications. The base was located northeast of the town of Landsberg.

“Johnny Cash” is Not His Real Name! The man who would become famous as Johnny Cash was born in Kingsland, Arkansas on February 26, 1932. The name on his birth certificate was “J.R. Cash” because his parents couldn’t agree on a first name. He was “J.R. Cash” all the way through high school (as proved by his yearbook photos). When he went to enlist in the Air Force, he was told he had to have a real first name, not just initials. He decided on “John R. Cash” and that (or “Johnny”) was his name from then on. But when he introduced himself as Johnny Cash to Sam Phillips at Sun Records in Nashville, Phillips thought Johnny’s last name was made up! He thought it sounded like “Johnny Dollar” or “Johnny Guitar.” In fact, the Cash surname can be traced back to the 12th century in Scotland, to the ancient kingdom of Fife. Today there are farms and streets in Fife (in eastern Scotland) that still bear the Cash name. Johnny Cash traveled to Fife several times. In 1981 he recorded a Christmas special there for US television. His daughter Rosanne visited Fife after her father’s death in 2003.

Scenic Landsberg
Around 1135 a settlement named Phetine was located where Landsberg is today. Landsberg is a historic town on Germany’s Romantic Road (Romantische Straße) with a well-preserved picturesque old town center. Situated in the Lechrain region between Swabia and Bavaria, the town developed where a major historic salt road crossed over the Lech river. To protect the bridge there, Duke Henry the Lion (Herzog Heinrich der Löwe) expanded the fortress at Phetine and named it “Castrum Landespurch.” A town quickly grew around the new fortress.

By the 13th century the community was granted a town charter and took the name Landespurch, today’s Landsberg. The town was destroyed by a fire in 1315, but was soon rebuilt. A few years later Landsberg was granted the right to collect salt duties, bringing considerable wealth to the town. Since then the city has prospered despite some setbacks during the Thirty Years War. Today Landsberg is a popular scenic stop along the Romantic Road that stretches for 220 miles between Würzburg in the north and Füssen (near Neuschwanstein Castle) in southern Bavaria.

Lonely Landsberg and the “Folsom Prison Blues”
As nice as Landsberg is, in the 1950s, with no internet, expensive international long-distance telephone calls, letters via airmail, and few opportunities to get away from the base, Johnny Cash often felt isolated and depressed. He missed his sweetheart Vivian, and dreaded getting a “Dear John” letter from her like many of his fellow airmen were getting. His loneliness is reflected in one particular song he wrote while stationed in Bavaria: “Folsom Prison Blues.” (Airman John R. Cash wrote or began writing several songs in Germany that Johnny Cash would later record professionally.) After viewing the Warner Bros. movie Inside the Walls of Folsom Prison (1951) at the base cinema, Cash could relate to the idea of living in prison. In his autobiography, Cash claims the 90-minute crime drama inspired him to write “Folsom Prison Blues.” More accurately, in the case of “Folsom Prison Blues,” Cash “borrowed” the words and music from a song by Gordon Jenkins entitled “Crescent City Blues.”

“Folsom Prison Blues” was released by Sun Records in December 1955 without any credit to Jenkins. (See the 45 rpm label on the right.) Although Cash would later pay Jenkins $75,000 to settle a plagiarism lawsuit in the 1970s, his lyrics are a major improvement over the original by Jenkins. The recorded version by Cash is also musically superior. Although some of the lines of the lyrics in the two songs are identical (“I hear the train a comin’, it’s rolling round the bend”), Cash added original lines such as “But I shot a man in Reno just to watch him die” – a true classic.* If you want to compare the two songs, see Folsom Prison Whose? at steelbrassnwood.livejournal.com.

*When asked how a person who shot and killed a man in Reno, Nevada could end up in Folsom, a California state prison, Cash replied: “That’s called poetic license.”

Before “Folsom” came out, Cash had released another train-themed song, his very first recording for Sun. The lyrics to “Hey, Porter” are about a man who is longing to get home to Tennessee, and keeps asking the porter where they are at different times. “Hey, Porter” also drew inspiration from Cash’s time at Landsberg, and his own desire to get back home. The song began as a poem Johnny wrote while he was stationed in West Germany. (See more about the poem below.) It was released in May 1955, about six months before “Folsom Prison Blues.”

Landsberg Prison
Ironically, Landsberg is home to a German prison that is infamous for being where Adolf Hitler was incarcerated in 1924, following the failed Beer Hall Putsch in Munich, and for housing Nazi war criminals during the Allied occupation of Germany after World War II. Built in 1908/1910, the prison on the western outskirts of Landsberg is still operated by the state of Bavaria as a progressive men’s correctional facility (Justizvollzugsanstalt Landsberg) that provides job training and medical help for up to 800 prisoners. Whether Cash was aware of that or not, it adds some poignancy to some of Cash’s song writing at that time and later.

Leaving Landsberg and the Air Force
The work of a radio intercept operator could be grueling. Operators like Cash usually worked 12-hour shifts, sometimes even longer. The concentration required could leave them exhausted at the end of a shift. When his enlistment period was over in 1954, Cash was promoted to the rank of staff sergeant and asked to reenlist, but he wanted out. Three years were more than enough. He was now 21 years old and ready for a change. Johnny had already proposed to Vivian from Germany. He had seen Munich, London, and Paris, but he was homesick for Arkansas. His characteristic wanderlust would return later, but now it was time to head home.

Some books and other sources claim that Cash wrote a poem entitled “Hey, Porter” on the train leaving Landsberg. But other sources claim that his poem was published in “the servicemen’s magazine Stars & Stripes.” (Note: Stars and Stripes is a newspaper, not a magazine.) A search in the online archives of Stars and Stripes for the period 1951-1954 did not reveal Cash’s poem, but the military newspaper did publish poetry in those years written by service members in a section called “Pup Tent Poets.”

Since the poem “Hey, Porter” later became one of Cash’s first recorded singles for Sun Records, it is of some interest to know when and where Johnny Cash penned those lines. If his poem was indeed published in Stars and Stripes, it is unlikely that he wrote it on a train at the end of his time in West Germany. In any event, Cash said he was thinking of Arkansas when he penned the poem, but “Hey, Porter” only mentions Tennessee:

Hey, Porter
Please get my bags for me
I need nobody to tell me now
that we’re in Tennessee

Cash later apologized for having the song lyrics refer to Tennessee rather than his home-state of Arkansas. His only excuse was that he “…couldn’t think of enough words that rhymed with Arkansas.” But it was indeed Tennessee that was in his future.

Tennessee Bound
When Johnny Cash returned to his homeland, one of his first stops as a civilian was in Memphis, Tennessee. When he got off his American Airlines flight in Memphis on July 4, 1954, most of his family and his fiancée (“Viv”) were there to meet him. His brother Roy now lived in Memphis and had promised to help him find work there.

But first the entourage drove to Dyess for an Arkansas family reunion. Johnny was disappointed to discover that during his years in Germany most of his high school friends had left for greener pastures. His parents Carrie and Ray had sold the farm and now had a house in town. After showing Vivian around his old haunts, he borrowed his parents’ car for the 440-mile drive to San Antonio. Johnny had the old-fashioned notion to ask Vivian’s father for her hand in marriage. The couple visited the River Walk where he and Vivian had spent many pleasant hours years before, and found the cedar bench where he had carved “Johnny Loves Vivian” (now on display at the Witte Museum; the exact weatherworn words are in dispute). John got Vivian’s father’s approval to wed his daughter (in a Catholic church), but first he returned to Memphis on an effort to find gainful employment, while Vivian made wedding plans. Cash managed to line up a job at a local appliance store, starting after his wedding.

Baptist John R. Cash and Catholic Vivian Dorraine Liberto were wed in San Antonio on Sunday, August 7, 1954 at St. Ann Catholic Church. In charge of the vows was Father Vincent Liberto, Vivian’s uncle. Following the wedding and a hotel reception, the newly weds headed back to Memphis, with a stop in Palestine, Texas for a brief honeymoon.

Memphis and Sun Records
Before returning to the States, Johnny Cash and his former band members were not really very good guitar players. Now he and his future band members practiced and improved with time. Their slow, less than smooth playing style actually turned into a benefit. They had a unique “boom-chick-a-boom-chick-a-boom” sound that set them apart. Their first recording efforts at the Sun Records studio in Memphis in 1955 were not very promising, but Sam Phillips saw the potential. Within just a few years, Johnny Cash would be on his way to worldwide fame, starting from the very same tiny studio in Memphis where Elvis and other performers got their start.

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Concert Tours in Germany, Europe and Elsewhere

The Famous Prison Concerts
Although Folsom and San Quentin are the most famous of Cash’s prison concerts, neither was his first. Cash performed his first prison concert in 1957 at the Huntsville State Prison in Texas. (In 1958, a year after Cash’s Texas prison concert, Elvis began his military service in West Germany, where his manager forbid him to perform in public at all.) Cash’s concert (two performances) at Folsom State Prison took place on January 13, 1968. The San Quentin concert was recorded a little over a year later, on February 24, 1969. The prison concerts, particularly at Folsom and San Quentin in California, would become a Cash trademark – and the source of some very successful albums. Over the years Cash gave concerts at many other prisons in Arkansas, Nevada, Tennessee, and other states. He also became an advocate for prisoners’ rights. Many people assume that was in part because Cash had spent hard time himself, a myth that Johnny never seriously attempted to debunk. Although Cash did spend a few nights in jail for minor offenses, he was never a prison convict. Not content to offer free prison concerts only in the United States, Cash performed at Österåker Prison in Sweden in 1972, with the live album “På Österåker” (At Österåker) released in 1973.

The European Concert Tours
Unlike Elvis Presley, an international star who never performed a concert outside the US and Canada, Johnny Cash often performed overseas, frequently in Germany. During his many years as an entertainer, Cash traveled to Europe, Australia, Japan, Vietnam, and numerous other countries outside of North America for major concert tours. His first international concert tour took place in Australia and New Zealand in April 1959, early in his career. Cash performed in Melbourne, Sydney, Brisbane, and Auckland (NZ) from April 15 to 22.

In September 1959 Johnny Cash, now with three gold records to his name, returned to West Germany. His kid brother Tommy was then stationed at the 225th Station Hospital at Pirmasens, near Kaiserslautern. In an interview on the AFN radio network, Johnny revealed he was in Germany to arrange a December 1960 concert tour for American airmen. Five days later on September 25, he was in London for a live TV performance as part of an ITV rock music series called “Boy Meets Girl” that ran from 1959 to 1960. He sang “I Got Stripes” on September 25. (Other performers in that series included Eddie Cochran and Gene Vincent. Apparently only audio recordings exist of the 26 episodes.) But in addition to performing at concerts and on television all across the USA, Cash enjoyed playing concerts for his growing numbers of international fans.

Concert Tours in West Germany
In early December 1960 Cash was back in West Germany with his band for a special concert tour for US military personnel stationed at various bases. For 10 days (December 2-11) he traveled from base to base, starting in Frankfurt (Rhein-Main) and ending at Worms (NCO and EM Clubs), with two different concerts on some days. Although he would later return to Germany to perform concerts for much larger German/international audiences, the 1960 tour was Johnny’s way of bringing joy to Americans stationed far from home at Christmastime, something he had personally experienced as an airman less than a decade earlier. Like his free prison concerts, this tour was something personal and not about money.

In November 1961 Cash was off to Tokyo, Japan to give a concert at the Korakuen Auditorium. In 1963, 1966, and 1968 he had major concert tours in the United Kingdom and Ireland. His UK tours hit cities from London, Liverpool and Manchester to Edinburgh and Glasgow. In the fall of 1968, besides the UK, Cash added concert dates at Frankfurt’s Rhein-Main air base (October 29-31, 1968). In 1972 Cash again crossed the Atlantic to perform before German audiences in Frankfurt am Main, Düsseldorf, Munich, Saarbrücken, and Bremen in February and March of that year.

In March 1971 Cash again toured in Australia. Later that year (August/September) he was off to Europe again, with dates in Denmark and the UK. The next year he went back to Europe for concerts in the Netherlands (Amsterdam) and Germany (Frankfurt, Munich, Düsseldorf, Saarbrücken) in February and March.

In the years from 1973 to 1997, Johnny Cash continued to play at venues around the world, including on stages in Austria, Australia, Belgium, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, reunited Germany, Ireland, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Singapore, Sweden, Thailand, and the UK. His last overseas tour was in July 1997, when he toured in Sweden, Denmark, and four cities in Germany (Lorrach, Stuttgart, Hamburg, and Koblenz). In March 1987 he played for US servicemen stationed at the Guantanamo Bay naval base in Cuba. He played many concerts in Germany before and after the fall of the Berlin Wall.

Cash continued to play concerts in the USA from the late 1990s until his very last concert in July 2003 at Hiltons, Virginia – only a couple of months before his death on September 12, 2003 in Nashville.

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Johnny Cash Songs in German

Cash auf deutsch
The Beatles did it. Dionne Warwick did it. Chubby Checker did it. The Beach Boys did it. Even David Bowie did it. And so did Johnny Cash.

Although it seems odd today, in the 1960s and ’70s it was common for famous English-speaking recording artists to release foreign language versions of their American or British hit songs. Besides several German-language songs, Johnny Cash also recorded a Spanish version of “Ring of Fire”. (Johnny’s German sounds much better than his Spanish, and the Spanish title is misspelled on the record label as “Fuego d’amor” rather than “Fuego de amor.”) Few if any of the foreign-language versions ever did well on the hit charts in Germany, Spain, Japan, France, or anywhere else. That may help explain why the practice died out, and these non-English recordings are today only a curiosity. (Continued below…)

Cash’s German Single Releases: These three Cash 45rpm singles (with A and B sides) were released in Germany by Columbia/CBS. The first two records came out in 1966, with only one original Johnny Cash title: “Wer kennt den Weg” (“I Walk the Line”) out of four songs. The third was released in 1968 with German versions of “Five Feet High and Rising” and “I Got Stripes.” That last record was re-released in 1978, still in monophonic sound (not stereo). A | “In Virginia” (Words: Peter Kaegbein / Music: Karl Götz) Original German song B | “Wer kennt den Weg” (German lyrics: Peter Anton) German version of “I Walk the Line” Release Date: 1 Jan. 1966 Label: Columbia • Catalog: CBS-2114 A | “Kleine Rosmarie” (Words: Günter Loose / Music: Karl Götz) Original German song B | “Besser so Jenny Joe” (Words: Kurt Hertha / Music: Burgner) Original German song Release Date: 1 Jan. 1966 Label: Columbia • Catalog: CBS-2115 A | “Wo ist Zuhause Mama” (German lyrics: Joachim Relin) German version of “Five Feet High and Rising” B | “Viel zu spät” (German lyrics: Günter Loose) German version of “I Got Stripes” Release Date: 1 Jan. 1968 (Re-released in 1978) Label: CBS • Catalog: CBS-6271

Even the Beatles had more success in Germany with English rather than their songs in German. “I Wanna Hold Your Hand” did far better in Germany than the German version: “Komm gib mir deine Hand.” But at least the Beatles’ German versions tried to keep the original meaning of the English. Not so for Johnny Cash. Not one of his German renditions even tries to retain the original meaning of the English lyrics. A prime example is “Wer kennt den Weg,” supposedly the German version of “I Walk the Line.” Although Cash does a reasonably good job of pronouncing the German lyrics (learned phonetically, like the Beatles and others), the words have no connection to the song’s English lyrics. While “I Walk the Line” is an expression of how the singer will remain true to his sweetheart/wife, the German lyrics (by Peter Anton) ask “Who knows the way?” and ramble on about a man who feels regret.

Compare the second verses, first in English, then in German:

ENGLISH (second verse, J. Cash):

I find it very, very easy to be true.
I find myself alone when each day’s through.
Yes, I’ll admit that I’m a fool for you.
Because you’re mine, I walk the line.

GERMAN (second verse, Peter Anton):

Sie schenkte mir die Liebe und ihr Herz.
Doch ich bracht’ ihr nur Tränen, Leid und Schmerz.
Und ich verließ sie und damit mein Glück.
Wer kennt den Weg, den Weg zurück.
She gave me love and her heart.
But I brought her only tears, suffering, and pain.
And I left her, along with my happiness.
Who knows the way, the way back.

Who Wrote the Best German Lyrics for Cash? The words to two of Cash’s German songs were written by the Berlin-born lyricist Günter Loose (Rudolf-Günter Loose, 1927-2013). His lyrics for the German version of “I Got Stripes” (“Viel zu spät”) were the closest to the original than any of the others. Loose (LOH-suh) also wrote the German words for “Kleine Rosmarie,” an original German song for Cash. Loose was also known for writing many hit songs (Schlager) from the 1950s into the 1980s for German artists, and he wrote the German lyrics for the 1960 hit song “Der Itsy Bitsy Teenie Weenie Honolulu-Strand-Bikini” (English: “…Yellow Polka Dot Bikini”), which reached the top spot on the German hit charts that year.

The CBS/Columbia German versions of “I Got Stripes” (“Viel zu spät”) and “Five Feet High and Rising” (“Wo ist Zuhause, Mama?”) are little better. “Five Feet…” is a song inspired by flooding that Johnny experienced during his childhood in Arkansas. The German version has the same melody, but asks “where is home, mama?” and never even mentions flooding. “I Got Stripes” is about a prisoner who’s wearing a striped uniform and being dragged down by his chains. “Viel zu spät” (“much too late”) doesn’t even mention stripes or chains. But it does at least have a prison theme and refers to “der Sheriff” (German for “the sheriff”). It also mentions the prisoner’s mother (meine Mutter) and days of the week, thus coming closer to the original than any of the other Cash song imitations. Compare these verses:

ENGLISH (first verse, J. Cash):

On a Monday, I was arrested (uh huh)
On a Tuesday, they locked me in the jail (oh boy)
On a Wednesday, my trial was attested
On a Thursday, they said guilty and the judge’s gavel fell

GERMAN (second verse; like English first verse, Günter Loose):

Montag Morgen schnappte mich der Sheriff
Montag Mittag sperrte er mich ein (poor boy!)
Montag Abend sprachen sie mich schuldig
Und am Dienstag Abend soll für mich die letzte Stunde sein
Monday morning the sheriff caught me
Monday noon they locked me up (poor boy!)
Monday evening they declared me guilty
And Tuesday evening should be my last hour

But it’s easy to solve this lyrics problem with original songs in German that have no equivalents in English! Three other German songs recorded by Cash aren’t even based on Johnny Cash songs! “In Virginia” (1966, Karl Götz, Heinz Peter Kaegbein) was the B-side of the “Wer kennt den Weg” 45rpm single. “Besser so, Jenny Joe” (Burgner, Kurt Hertha) and “Kleine Rosmarie” (Karl Götz, Günter Loose) were the A and B sides of a single released in January 1966 (Catalog No. CBS-2115). None of the three songs had anything to do with any original Johnny Cash song.

COMING SOON: Lyrics and more video for Cash’s German songs. See the video links below.

Next | Featured Biographies

Related Pages

AT THE GERMAN WAY

• Elvis Presley in Germany – About G.I. Elvis in West Germany
• Featured Biographies – More detailed bios of notable people from the German-speaking world
• Notable Women from Austria, Germany, Switzerland
• Famous Graves in Germany – Where are they buried?

ON THE WEB – VIDEO: TV APPEARANCES

• Johnny Cash – ‘This Is Your Life’ (1971) – Video of Cash on the TV show “This Is Your Life” – a reunion with his Air Force buddies from the Landsberg Barbarians
• Johnny Cash on German TV (1983) – Video of “Country Time” with Freddy Quinn, from Hannover. Johnny sings in English (“Ring of Fire,” “Folsom Prison Blues,” “Hey Porter,” “Jackson” [with wife June Carter], “Columbus, Georgia”) and speaks in halting German.
• Johnny Cash on “Wetten, dass…?” (1983) – Video of Cash performing on the German TV show “Wetten, dass…?” from Augsburg. Songs: “Ring of Fire” and “Ghost Riders in the Sky” (10:33)

ON THE WEB – VIDEO: SONGS IN GERMAN

• “Viel zu spät” (“I Got Stripes”) – Johnny sings in German
• “Wer kennt den Weg” (“I Walk the Line”) – Johnny sings in German
• Five Songs in German – Johnny Cash sings in German: “Besser so, Jenny Jo,” “Kleine Rosmarie,” “In Virginia,” “Wo ist Zuhause, Mama,” “Wer kennt den Weg” (10:14)

ON THE WEB – CASH-RELATED SITES

• Bear Family Records – This German website has Johnny Cash CDs, LPs, etc. from the 1960s and later.
• Johnnny Cash Singles – CBS Germany – A listing of Johnny Cash recordings (English and German) released in Germany

Next | Featured Biographies

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