Hey Donnah --
We seem to like some of the same music. I'm just gettin' to know Gram, but I love him already.
So many of my favorites musicians are long gone:
Duane, Gram (and his Sneaky Pete) Nick Drake, Towns Van Zandt, Mombo John Traenor (from my little town of Seguin), Jerry Garcia, ... and plenty more of course.

One really great musician here in Austin now is Warren Hood, who's father was DesChamps Hood. Warren's an amazing fiddle player and singer-songwriter. One of his bands has been here in town lately each Sunday evening. Warren's like twenty four years old I think. He's not so crazy and into heavy drug use like some of my other favorite musicians ... maybe Warren will be around a while.

Went to a lady's house the other day who was a little girl when she first met Gram Parsons. I have met several people who knew him...etc. Of course, that isn't too unusual..I have lived in Winter Haven
since 74.

She was playing the piano at a talent show and she said he commented to her parents about her playing.

nice little story

csason: I'm one of those who met Gram Parsons (and his momma, too) when young and having grown up (too) in the Winter Haven/Haines City are. Several stories about that but the most specific I can be in summation of them all is that Gram Parsons was a truly beautiful young boy in his youth.

He along with his earliest bands used to play at some of our summer weekend dances and I remember several of his performances well.

Thanks for these links, Donnah. I watched several of the videos at YouTube after seeing this one here and enjoyed nearly all of them.

I also remember the Altamont happenings later, while by that time I was working in CA and in the entertainment industry (too), so it came as a real shock to nearly everyone on the day after the news of Altamont circled around the media.

Stories I could tell...

Winter Haven/Haines City AREA. (^^).

I was hoping to hear from you, S. I imagine as a young girl you found the sight of him quite inspirational.

That is awesome video, great airborne Burrito Bros. -- thanks a million Donnah. There's nothing like waking up to a boy-eatin lizard story and then a little Cosmic American Music to make it all better.

Wail On "Southern Woman on the 'Net".

Gram was a tragic figure. The unauthorized biography by Ben Fong-Torres "Hickory Wind" describes how a really nice, talented and wealthy kid (Snively Citrus), born in Waycross, GA-- became a druggie, Rolling Stones hanger on and wasted his talent. The story of his stepfather's attempt to snake the inheritance from the dead Gram, under Louisiana law, and the bizarre stealing of Gram's body from LA airport is really unbelievable yet true. Gram and Emmylou Harris did so much for great Southern country and bluegrass songs being revived- songs like "Cash on the Barrelhead" a Louvin Brothers tune- truly outstanding. Thanks for the video Donnah, and always the Skydog memories. Pleasant remembering seeing Duane and ABB in Atlanta at the Great Speckled Bird-- and the opening act- Little Feat with Lowell George!
Keep it coming!
An old Gator.
An old Gator here

Far from tragic, Gram Parsons is one of a small legion of visionary musicians who are now in a Better Place. EmmyLou Harris and Sam Bush are both living testaments to what Mr. Parsons saw way before any one else: Cosmic American Music.

Gram was born in Winter Haven, Florida, Drew.

Drew: I know Ben Fong-Torres (reasonably well) and will be speaking with him tomorrow or sometime this week, but, as to his book, from the essential passages I've read as to Gram's youth, Ben got the culture and influences wrong.

I told him so and am going to discuss this with him when we speak -- I've been ruminating writing a book about the area where I and Gram and a few others who went on to musical/creative accomplishments grew up (primarily, Florida and the talent that's originated from there or been influenced after life there during the same years as I spent in Central Florida).

But, as much as I enjoyed what Ben wrote, he did, in fact, not capture nor present the area and culture (and influences) accurately.

I know that Gram Parson's Christian faith was sincere and it was noticably so during his youth, and that, as with many people, his family suffered substance abuse problems and emotional distress that so often results. But about Gram, I think that there's another perspective as to his youth and influences and he wasn't so much "troubled" as the times were troubled during which he had to grow up (later).

I know MANY people who grew up in our shared generational times and MOST of us had to contend with the same radical, complex and even troubling times and confusing influences that resulted by our late teen and twenties' years. I tend to think that Gram Parsons like many of us got lost in bad company. I know I did, too. It happens often when trusting "Southern kids" from proper times and homes appear in big cities and are not prepared for the certain affronts and disparities that are then encountered.

I think there's room there for a book, is my point, that shares what it was really like to grow up amid water skiis, orange groves, nature in the raw beside topiaries and all that music and shared talk. It just was a unique time and place and it raised some unique and timely folks...Gram certainly was a fellow of the place, no doubt about it, but what place has yet to be presented rightly.

Please write the book; I'll syndicate the chapters in their entirety on my music blog, http://goldcoastbluenote.blogspot.com/

aka Gold Coast Bluenote (Paco Malo aka Jim - Tampa native, 50)

Paco Malo: O.K., will do! Ben's said he'll send me an autographed copy of HICKORY WIND and what I want to do is capture that essential place that Ben didn't (though I enjoyed his book, it's written to and from a foreign perspective and not in relationship with the effects that the "Heart of Central Florida" provided.

About this that Drew wrote (^^):
"The unauthorized biography by Ben Fong-Torres 'Hickory Wind' describes how a really nice, talented and wealthy kid (Snively Citrus), born in Waycross, GA-- became a druggie, Rolling Stones hanger on and wasted his talent..."

Just isn't accurate. Parsons certainly wasn't a "hanger on" to the Rolling Stones (if anything, they, with the exception of Mick Jagger, hung onto Gram) and I don't think that Gram Parsons "wasted (his) talent," not at all: take a look over the songs he wrote and the groups he created and at what ages and in what limited time and no one could realistically, ever, say he "wasted" his "talent."

We're all still talking about him, no waste there. Many and I do mean, MANY successful and talented Country&Western and Rock musicians accredit their very inspiration to get started and keep going to the work ("talent") of Gram Parsons.

What DID do him in was the motorcycle accident. He was gravely injured in that and I have best-guessed that his turn into morphine and more alcohol (what eventually caused his death) was that situation and the difficult and not complete recovery from the very near fatal bustup (driving around with John Phillips, notorious heroin user by that time so take a look at the influences on Gram's life by that time) (and, John Phillips, despite his narcotic use, was considered among the epitome at that time of "talented" and influential in music...years older than Gram, Gram still impressionable...there's reasons there, is my point, as to what happened to Parsons later.

I can see a huge difference in him in his photos from before the wreck and after and up to his passing away. He just wasn't the same person after that or, rather, was a changed person by the near-fatal damage he'd experienced and certainly was using morphine to help with that process (but not responsibly, obviously, later).

I'm not one to rationalize drug use but I do have some reliable insights into situations such as these. All I can say is that I understand...mostly that it was Gram's time to leave and he left. He didn't leave "wasted" in the talented/achievement sense, however.

He was a beautiful boy when we were young. I think he passed away a beautiful boy, grown up and tired.

Not sure how you can dub someone as wasting a talent that produced "Sweetheart of the Rodeo", "Gilded Palace of Sin" and "Grievous Angel." Most go their whole lives trying to make a perfect record and Gram made three. All are essential (and listed on RS magazines 500 greatest albums.) I wore through the vinyl playing those records when I was a kid, and they were some of the first CD's I bought when I got my first CD player.

Tell it on the mountain, David.

Whoops, stand corrected on Winter Haven. Waycross, GA was where they moved was formative. When I say "wasted" I mean that in the sense that he did not live long enough, and what a terrible loss of his creative genius, thanks to the dope and the times. Keith Richards, before meeting Ry Cooder, who taught him how to play rhythm guitar- a complete H waste of time. The stones needed Gram. Piles of dope on the table meant no need to do much of anything- so you're right, they parasite off Gram to try to distill the "high lonesome" no english copycats will ever get, and the drugs kept everyone right where they were. I've never bought into the need to generate self destruction to be creative- that is a marketable rationalization of music biographers. Lots wrong with Fong-Torres bio, which was unauthorized, but essential elements of his family, drunk mom, ostracized dad, snotty mom's family, the Jax private school and the south Georgia influence on his music are good observations. I just miss his music, and praise what he was able to do, just like I miss the Louvin and Delmore brothers or Merle Travis, or Duane or Lowell. That's all, and thanks for the correction. And thanks, Donnah for the great memory of Gram!