It’s one of the most historic music venues not only in the D.C. area but in all of America.

Now, the history, experience and legacy of The Birchmere in Alexandria, Virginia is chronicled in the brand new 502-page book 

“We started working on it right before the pandemic,” co-author Stephen Moore told Âé¶ččÙÍű. “When Gary had to close the place down, we worked on it all day together. The acts had more time to talk with us, so it really was kind of a hidden blessing in a way.”

Moore lovingly co-writes the book with Birchmere founder and operator Gary Oelze.

“He said, ‘Let’s do a Birchmere book,'” Oelze said. “I said, ‘I always wanted to do a picture book, I’ve got 1,000 unpublished pictures,’ and he said, ‘No, let’s do the history.’ So we combined it. Our book’s got 350 pictures and 150 great interviews did with different acts.”

You’ll hear classic stories and living histories from the artists who have played there.

“Ray Charles played his last date here,” Oelze said. “Little Richard got off the road after he played here. … In country, we’ve done Johnny Cash or Buck Owens; Joe Sample and Lalah Hathaway in R&B. … There will never be another Danny Gatton, Mike Auldridge or Tony Rice. If they don’t know who these people are … it’s a great gift to discover them.”

Others include Buddy Guy, Lyle Lovett, Mary Chapin Carpenter, Rosanne Cash, Arlo Guthrie, John Waters, Tom Paxton, Pete Seeger, Townes Van Zandt, Steve Earle, Shawn Colvin, Daryl Davis, Rodney Crowell, Isaac Hayes, Chaka Khan and The Neville Brothers.

“Mainly we started out doing bluegrass,” Oelze said. “There was a dozen clubs around town doing bluegrass, but they’d leave a TV on in the bar and have a pool table going. I would drop in and you couldn’t hear the music. … I said, ‘Bluegrass has got an audience,’ so I started enforcing a ‘quiet please’ [policy] and we put them all out of business.”

Over the years, The Birchmere has changed locations, starting as a 200-seat venue in Shirlington in 1966, then moving to a 350-seat space in Alexandria in 1981, then sliding up a few blocks on Mount Vernon Avenue to the current 500-seat space in 1997.

“It became the listening club,” Moore said. “All the acts that talked to us, they all told us it’s their favorite listening club in the world. I’m not kidding. … Gary was the original sound person. He always wanted The Birchmere to have great sound. He kept up with the technology. … There’s not a bad seat in the audience. The acts can actually see faces.”

Beyond the stage, the artists also enjoy the behind-the-scenes accommodations.

“People were coming in on the bus and had no washers or dryers,” Moore said. “Janis Ian told us [that] it was the first place she ever played that had a washer and dryer.”

“I put showers in also,” Oelze said. “These guys live on a bus and don’t have the comforts of a washer, dryer or shower. They’re so close to the audience [so smell matters].”

Arguably the biggest fan of The Birchmere is 22-time Grammy winner Vince Gill.

“When you’re a gypsy like me, you look forward to being around people who are like-minded,” Gill wrote. “The Birchmere has the feel of a family. I smile when I see this booking appear on my tour calendar. I love their open mind and willingness to present all genres of great music.”

You’ll also find a heartfelt afterword by former “Face the Nation” moderator Bob Schieffer.

“I’m so glad this book was done to summarize The Birchmere’s remarkable run and to honor the performers who ‘arrived’ by playing the legendary hall,” Schieffer wrote. “Again, I never did, and I regret it. If not on stage, my thanks for including me in the story.”

Schieffer isn’t the only Washington political figure to come through doors of The Birchmere, as the venue has hosted Supreme Court justices and U.S. presidents.

“Bill Clinton came here twice,” Oelze said. “Al Gore used to live up the street and was here all the time. One night he was leaving the White House. Clinton said, ‘Where you going?’ He said, ‘I’m going to The Birchmere to hear Jerry Jeff Walker.’ He said, ‘Hillary and I will go with you.’ The four of them showed up, then they came back to see Kim Richey.”

He’ll never forget having a conversation with President Clinton.

“Clinton met me at the backdoor and said, ‘How long have you been open?’ I said, ‘Three months [at the second location].’ He said, ‘Let’s go inaugurate this place.’ It was a great night,” Oelze said. “Justice [Antonin] Scalia used to come every time Ricky Skaggs played. … It’s really sad not to see him here. … The Secret Service guys know us all now.”

These stories are just the tip of the iceberg of the book’s treasures.

“We’ve gotten some of the greatest reviews you’ve ever read,” Oelze said. “It’s very overwhelming to me. … It’s a lot of history. It’s a lot of fun to read. You’ll hear stars say things that have never been said in public or been published before.”

Listen to our full conversation here.

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Video for the demo of Bob Dylan singing with Johnny Cash on the latter’s hit song “Wanted Man” was released on YouTube on Monday.

Dylan wrote the song for Cash in 1969, and Cash recorded it on his live album, “At San Quentin,” that same year.

At the beginning of the recording, you can hear the country star’s wife and fellow singer, June Carter Cash, talking.

“Honey, I don’t want to interrupt your train of thought, but be sure that Bob puts the melody to that song, that ‘Wanted Man,'” she said. “You forgot the melody.”

If you listen closely, you can hear Cash flubbing exactly where the “Wanted Man” is wanted and chuckling at his mistakes.

, fellow singer-songwriter Carl Perkins can be heard playing guitar on the demo, which will be featured on the forthcoming box set “Bob Dylan (Featuring Johnny Cash) — Travelin’ Thru, 1967-1969: The Bootleg Series Vol. 15.”

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March Madness is officially here for college hoops fans, but it also brings a fun annual tradition on the Âé¶ččÙÍű entertainment page. In past years, you’ve voted for your favorite movies and TV shows, but this year we’re asking: Who are your favorite music artists?

We’re now in the Final Four with winners emerging from four genres — (1) Rock & Roll, (2) R&B/Hip Hop, (3) Pop/Standards, (4) Country/Folk. Yes, we realize there are many more subgenres, but this is the best we can do within the confines of a four-corner bracket.

Click through the gallery below to vote! Final Four voting closes at 8 p.m. Sunday.

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WASHINGTON — She’s been trying to cure your “Seven Year Ache” for over 40 years.

This weekend, country, roots and Americana music icon Roseanne Cash, the oldest daughter of Johnny Cash, presents her show  Friday night at Strathmore.

“It’s actually my second time at the Strathmore,” Cash told Âé¶ččÙÍű. “I really love that venue so I’m coming back with my band again. I called the show ‘She Remembers Everything’ because of the album, which came out Nov. 2. 
 Women my age still have lots to say but we have less time to say it. I keep saying this album is gothically feminine about a lot of subjects that are consuming me right now: mortality, rage, long-term relationships, loss, you know, journeys.”

In addition to selections from her new album, will she also perform any of her classic hits?

“Oh sure, I always pull things from my catalog,” Cash said. “It’s not about coming to see me as much as it’s about exchanging energy and all of us bringing feelings and inspiration to the surface. At this point, after 40 years, I think it’s a key moment in my life and I think we need it. I think we need art and music more than we ever have, so come out and let’s do it together!”

Born to Johnny Cash’s first-wife Vivian Liberto in Memphis, Tennessee, in 1955, Cash moved to California at age three, first to Los Angeles then Ventura. It’s here that she and her sisters grew up before her parents divorced in 1966 and her dad remarried June Carter Cash in 1968.

“Music was always around my house and I felt passionate about it,” Cash said. “When I started writing songs, he was as any good parent should be — encouraging, just like, ‘That’s great, keep going.’ It wasn’t professional advice he gave me then — and that’s exactly how it should have been — an encouraging, supportive dad.”

She made her studio recording debut on her father’s album “The Junkie and the Juicehead Minus Me” (1974), on which she sang lead vocals on Kris Kristofferson’s “Broken Freedom Song.” Two years later, her father recorded her original tune “Love Has Lost Again” on the album “One Piece at a Time” (1976), marking her first professional work as a composer.

In 1978, she recorded a demo with Emmylou Harris’ frequent collaborator Rodney Crowell, which became her self-titled debut album on the German label Ariola Records. It was never released in the U.S., but it caught the ear of Columbia Records, which offered her a recording contract. The result was her American debut album “Right or Wrong” (1980) with three Top 25 singles: “No Memories Hangin’ Around,” “Couldn’t Do Nothing Right” and “Take Me, Take Me.”

She and Crowell married in 1979, got pregnant in 1980 and moved to Nashville in 1981, teeing up her breakthrough album “Seven Year Ache” (1981). It was a phenomenon off the strength of the title track, which topped the country charts and cracked the Top 30 on the pop charts. Today it’s voted one of the Top 100 Country Songs of All Time by Country Music Television.

“I was 24 years old and I was always writing (songs) about hookups and breakups, for the lack of a better term,” Cash said. “I was talking to my new boyfriend who became my husband on the street on Ventura Boulevard 
 and I thought there has never been a country song about being on the street, so it started as a long poem and it ended as ‘Seven Year Ache.'”

In 1985, “I Don’t Know Why You Don’t Want Me” won her a Grammy for Best Country Song.

“I was nominated for a Grammy in ’84 and lost, so I started writing these very tongue-in-cheek lyrics: ‘I got my new dress and I don’t know why you don’t want me,'” Cash said. “I finished the song with Rodney Crowell — and the next year it won a Grammy in the ultimate of ironies.”

After the successful country albums “Somewhere in the Stars” (1982), “Rhythm & Romance” (1985) and “King’s Record Shop” (1987), she shifted to introspective folk with “Interiors” (1990).

More country-folk albums followed with “The Wheel” (1993) and “10 Song Demo” (1996), during which time she was inducted into the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1995.

After “Rules of Travel” (2003), “Black Cadillac” (2006) and “The List” (2009), she delivered her most acclaimed album “The River and the Thread” (2014), winning three Grammys for Best Americana Album, Best Roots Song and Best Performance for “A Feather’s Not a Bird.”

Today, she’s touring her new album “She Remembers Everything” (2018) and working with her husband John Leventhal on a musical version of the Martin Ritt movie “Norma Rae” (1979), which earned Sally Field her first Oscar holding her famous protest sign reading, “UNION.”

“We’re almost finished writing it, five years into it, this woman’s transformation framed by union organizers,” Cash said. “Writing a musical is a whole different animal than writing an album, so it’s challenging, it’s fun, it’s an education and hopefully we’ll get it staged next year.”

Listen to our full conversation here.

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WASHINGTON — Lots of children dream of becoming doctors, teachers or firefighters when they grow up. But those fantasies never crossed mind.

From a young age, the Grammy-nominated artist knew her future would be filled with music — and it’s easy to understand why.

Carter, 63, is music royalty. Her grandmother — Maybelle Carter, of the Carter Family vocal group — was one of the first country music stars in the U.S.; her father, Carl Smith, had 30 Top 10 Billboard hits; and her mother, June Carter Cash, a well-known singer, songwriter and actress, was the wife of country legend Johnny Cash.

“I learned watching every single one of my family members — they’re great entertainers, and that’s all I wanted to be,” Carter said.

This year, Carter is celebrating 45 years of her musical career. Over the decades, she’s released chart-topping albums and has toured the country “with all the big hat acts of the 90s,” but now, her focus is more personal.

Carter recently moved to Nashville to concentrate on songwriting, even setting up residency at the famed Bluebird Cafe. And after a 2017 tour with John Mellencamp, she is playing smaller venues and sharing stories about her famous family between songs.

“And that’s the way I think music should always be 
 I’m going to talk to [the audience]; I’m going to know them and they’re going to know me by the time the night’s over,” Carter said.

She is also working on a new album, available in the spring of 2019, with her brother John Carter Cash, featuring old tunes from the Carter side of the family.

“There’s a new instrumental on there that [my grandmother, Maybelle Carter] wrote that we just found on a little tiny piece of tape on her autoharp and that ends the [album],” Carter said.

Âé¶ččÙÍű recently caught up with Carter before her show at D.C.’s to find out more about what it was like growing up in the Carter-Cash household, and to hear her thoughts on the future of country music.

Songs and stories

With 13 albums under her belt, Carter has no shortage of material to play on stage. And having grown up in a famous family, she isn’t short on stories to share, either.

“My stories are about things that people didn’t get to ask,” said Carter, who lost her mother, stepfather and sister all in the same year (2003).

“[The audience] wants to know things that only I know, and the other people I am talking about have passed away.”

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Carter said she also discusses her “hiccups in life” and tries to “add levity to some hard times.”

“I try to be really open and honest about everything,” she said.

On pursuing music

Carter’s first dream was to become a Broadway star. She took the stage for a year in a London-based musical in the 1980s, but found more success in songwriting.

“My mom gave me the advice to write songs, and that has been my bread and butter most of the time,” Carter said.

“I’ve been very fortunate and blessed that I’ve been able to stick around because, you know, it’s one thing to be related to all these very talented people, but you don’t get to hang around for 45 years like I have if you don’t have a little something else to offer.”

Having parents out on tour

Growing up with a father, mother and stepfather in the music industry (not to mention all of the extended family), Carter said time on the road and in the spotlight “was just the way of life for us.”

“I always used to fantasize about what it must be like to have your mom and dad come home from work and have dinner at the same time every day,” Carter said.

That said, those nontraditional careers had an upside. Carter said her mom would often be home for two weeks at a time, each month, between performances.

“And who else’s mom would come to school and play her banjo for your class? And I was completely cringing the whole time, but it was always interesting. There was never a dull moment,” Carter said.

The future of country music

These days, country music has many branches — there’s pop-country, Americana and folk, to name a few. But Carter is confident the traditional country her family has played for generations will always anchor the genre.

“It always comes back to traditional country, eventually. At some point, it will come back to embracing that,” Carter said.

“Really, what the whole thing is about is the song. It’s not about your pyrotechnics on stage 
 I think it’s all down to a person sitting down and singing a song to someone and meaning it and connecting with the audience. That is what I do it for.”

The taxing side of touring

Life on the road can take its toll on musicians, and Carter admits that touring is different now than it was in her 20s and 30s. The equipment is heavier and the hotels she stays in are nicer. (She prefers soft beds and soaking tubs.)

But still, nothing makes her happier than playing and sharing her music.

“Everything I’ve dreamed of has pretty much happened to me. The thing I dream of most now is that I just get to keep doing it,” Carter said.

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WASHINGTON — He wasn’t a “Boy Named Sue;” he was their beloved son.

— the only son of Johnny Cash and June Carter Cash — just published his father’s personal poems in the new book ” Published by Blue Rider Press, the book is available just in time for the holiday season in hardback and e-book at $25.

“My father was a prolific writer and had [scribblings] on pieces of paper tucked away,” Cash told Âé¶ččÙÍű. “When he passed away, we went through his office and there were all these different writings, perhaps over 200. … I realized there were some beautiful words here. There was a story told in a way that had never been stated before. It struck me as something beautiful. … I believe that it was something that dad would’ve liked to have seen released if it was put together in the right way.”

So, Cash compiled the poems into 41 chapters, including images of the handwritten documents.

“In the world we live today, everybody types,” Cash said. “My father hand-wrote things, a lot of great writers did. There’s probably something lost now. There’s much to be seen in the actual handwritten document, the person’s character, who they were. … My dad’s handwriting over the years changed.”

These handwritten poems range from the comedic to the profound.

“I love ‘Don’t Make a Movie About Me,’ tongue-in-cheek,” Cash said with a laugh. “I also love ‘I Heard It On the News,’ which is a profound insight. ‘I heard on the news that there was a lull in the fighting in Vietnam.’ It talks about how they shut down the war on both sides to go plant the rice crops. In the end, he says, ‘What kind of animal is man that he would pause in his killing to go about his business of preparing for the living, knowing that he will ultimately return to the business of killing?'”

Such masterful lyrics have earned the respect of music’s greatest songwriters.

“Bob Dylan himself cites my father as one of America’s greatest poets and mentions ‘Big River,'” Cash said. “[Quoting] ‘I taught the weeping willow how to cry / Showed the clouds how to cover up a clear blue sky / The tears I cried for that woman are gonna flood you Big River / And I’m gonna sit right here until I die.’ That’s pretty strong lyrics. It’s poetry. My dad had a way of saying things simply but just as beautifully and accurately as any great poet, cut from the very roots of the American soul.”

Throughout his career, Johnny Cash won 19 Grammys and was inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame, Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Gospel Music Hall of Fame, not to mention recognition at the Kennedy Center Honors. But beyond the accolades, “Forever Words” captures the man inside.

“For one thing, he was a man of light and laughter. That’s not as well recognized sometimes, and that’s definitely in here,” Cash said. “There’s views into the very nature of his darkness and shortcomings in these pages. And there’s a lot of insight into the light and great endurance of his character at the end of his life. In the face of adversity, loss, seemingly insurmountable pain and the physical frailties that he had, he still continued. … He faced this darkness — and his light and strength shown.”

How was he as a father on the home front?

“He was always my best friend growing up. He truly was,” Cash said. “We spent a lot of time fishing, doing outdoors activities. I got to travel on the road with him a great deal. I went from city to city with him. I’d been to 26 countries by the time I was 4 years old. Just had a chance to really see the world and meet a lot of people and make great friends that I wouldn’t have had the opportunity otherwise.”

During one road trip, his father pointed out the very Folsom Prison he made famous.

“He showed it to me from the outside, but they wouldn’t bring the toddler in Folsom,” Cash said. “When I was young, I remember driving past it in the bus and them talking about it. I actually had a chance to go into San Quentin [State Prison] the other day, the prison itself, and that was amazing.”

After the birth of his son, Johnny Cash would tinker the lyrics to his comedic tune “Boy Named Sue.”

“At the end of the song, he would say, ‘If I ever had a boy, I would name him Bill or Frank or George.’ [After I was born] he’d say, ‘Well, actually I did have a boy and here he is: John Carter Cash.’ He’d bring me up on stage and I would take a bow, from the time I could walk until I was about 7. So he would bring me up and say, ‘Thank God he didn’t name me Sue.” I was the boy that was not named Sue!”

Soon after, Johnny and June recorded a song in his honor called “I Got a Boy (And His Name is John),” paying tribute to their only child together among six half-siblings. Like his half-sister Roseanne Cash, John Carter Cash is an artist in his own right, producing country records for legends such as Loretta Lynn, George Jones, Brooks & Dunn and even his own mother’s Grammy-winning album “Press On.”

“It was about due time that she have the opportunity to go in and make her own music,” Cash said proudly. “It was a beautiful thing that she was able to do it. My father was right there with her in the studio when she did ‘Press On’ and ‘Wildfire,’ which both went on to win Grammys, and he was supportive of her. She was an accomplished artist unto her own right and deserved the recognition.”

He also wrote his mother’s biography “Anchored in Love,” which became the Lifetime movie “Ring of Fire” (2013) starring Jewel Kilcher and Matt Ross. The film joined other biopics like “Walk the Line” (2005), starring an Oscar-nominated Joaquin Phoenix and an Oscar-winning Reese Witherspoon.

“You’d have to have a 32-hour movie to tell the whole story,” Cash said. “But ‘Walk the Line’ unto itself painted an accurate and beautiful picture of my parents’ love affair and that’s about all the two hours could afford to do. There was a good bit that was not touched on — the depths of my father’s spiritual character, he and my mother’s intellectual connection — but it did tell a beautiful love story.”

Now, after all the movies, John Carter Cash invites us into this book of poems from the very pen of his father, his soul present all around the margins of the pages, documenting his legacy for all time.

“My favorite is the one that’s on the back of the book: ‘You tell me that I must perish, like the flowers that I cherish, nothing remaining of my name, nothing remembered of my fame. But the trees that I planted still are young, the songs that I sing will still be sung.’ That was written just days before he passed away. The fact that he’d lost my mother and was moving on out of this world — he knew it was coming very soon — he could still see the light of hope and endurance of the goodness of his legacy.”

Click for more on the book “Forever Words.” Listen to the full conversation with John Carter Cash below:

Listen to our full conversation here.

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WASHINGTON — It was the greatest jam session in recording history.

On December 4, 1956, Elvis Presley, Johnny Cash, Carl Perkins and Jerry Lee Lewis united at Sun Record Studios in Memphis for a night that became known as the “Million Dollar Quartet.”

Now, it’s your chance to relive this historic moment as the national tour of the Tony-winning Broadway show “Million Dollar Quartet” hits for two lively shows this Sunday.

“Carl Perkins … was putting down a single, ‘Matchbox,’ so he was in the studio to record that. (Label owner) Sam Phillips had these guys stop by. So it was this one night in history — the only night in history — when they’ve all gotten together to jam,” says Evan Buckley Harris, who plays Johnny Cash.

All four famous artists were relatively young at the time.

“They were all pretty much newcomers. Johnny is actually the oldest one and he’s only 24 years old at the time. You have Elvis and Jerry about 21-22 years old and Carl was 24, but he was a few months younger than Cash … They’re all kind of new to it, getting their feet wet in the industry,” Harris says.

The jukebox musical features an array of legendary songs, including Cash’s “Folsom Prison Blues,” Lewis’ “Great Balls of Fire,” Presley’s “Hound Dog” and Perkins’ “Blue Suede Shoes.”

“You’ll get hits from each one of these guys, along with some of their earlier gospel tunes … One of the great things about the show is that even if you don’t know the story of it and exactly what happened, you’ll come in knowing these songs. People just love it … They get up and sing and dance and the just know all of them. They hear the first few notes of the song and just go crazy,” Harris says.

But singing such famous songs presents its own set of challenges.

“We really wanted to get that honest 1956 version of that person down pat as best as possible without going caricature or imitation … Most people are used to seeing the ’70s Elvis in Vegas, or most people are used to seeing the ’60s version of Johnny Cash, so that’s been the trick really, is making it as honest as possible to the 1956 version of these guys,” Harris says.

So how did Harris hone his inner Johnny Cash?

“I had heard his music really all my life … Like everyone, I’ve seen the movie ‘Walk the Line’ … So after that movie came out, I really started looking into what his life was really like and his family life, and when I got this role, I did even more research. I started watching interviews with him, watched a ton of live footage to get his style down,” Harris says.

If you thought Harris had big shoes to fill in his portrayal of The Man in Black, co-star Skip Robinson has even bigger shoes to fill in portraying the undisputed King of Rock ‘n Roll — Elvis.

“He’s been doing Elvis stuff for a long while now and has covered a lot of his music … Vocally, it’s just there. You hear the guy sing the first note and it’s wowing. He always get an applause right there. He’s got the hip swivels, he’s got the lip thing going on, he gives the whole image real well,” Harris says.

While Elvis landed a hit with “Blue Suede Shoes,” the song was originally a Carl Perkins tune, making Christopher Wren an all-important piece to the “Million Dollar Quartet” puzzle.

“The guy can play the guitar. He does a fantastic job nailing all those solos. A lot of it is Chuck Berry style, because that was Carl Perkins, a lot of his inspiration. So you’ll see a lot of that Chuck Berry, ‘Johnny B. Goode’ playing style, which is really cool … He’s another huge driving force in the show.”

As for the high-energy, ivory-tickling Jerry Lee Lewis, actor Jason Cohen takes on the most acclaimed role of all, as original cast member Levi Kreis won the Tony for Best Featured Actor in a Musical.

“(Cohen) just is Jerry Lee Lewis in real life. On and off the stage, the guy is just as wild in all the best ways. And that really translates onto stage. That’s one of the biggest things for Jerry Lee Lewis, he’s really the fuel of this show in many ways, and Jason does a very good job with that,” Harris says.

Rounding out the cast are Jackie Goode as Elvis’ girlfriend Dyanne and Matthew Scott as record label founder Sam Phillips, who also serves as the show’s narrator.

“He does a brilliant job really driving the show and just motoring these scenes along … and really gives a heartfelt performance … Dyanne’s kind of a tricky one, because she was there that night, but she wasn’t really a singer. So that was something that was really added for the show,” Harris says.

From start to finish, it’s a one-of-a-kind chance for audiences to enter a time machine.

“You’re gonna see a true ’50s rock ‘n roll concert and you’re gonna get a feel of what it was like ’cause it’s so different from a concert nowadays. These songs were so simple, yet they were the major influencing factor for rock ‘n roll nowadays. That’s what the audience is gonna see, and that’s what we aim for them to get out of it — to feel like, ‘Wow! We really just saw these guys perform live.'”

‘Million Dollar Quartet’ performs twice on Sunday. Click for ticket information. Listen to the full chat below:

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