A powerful music saga evolving from the growth of a new nation and the human conditions interacting with advancements in technology that was the coal in the fire box of the iron horse locomotive creating the steam to move the trends down the main line and the various musical sidetracks. From Rodgers running off with a medicine show at 13 years old with the antagonist pain of losing his mother as a six year old boy to Merle Haggard picking up influences passed to him from Rodgers who also influenced Lefty Frizzell and Bob Wills, to Haggard’s influence then on Gram Parsons, the Eagles, Lynard Skynyrd to Keith and Mick and the Rolling Stones in rock music and on to an endless list of country acts. Merle would hop a freight train running away from home at 11 years old after losing his fiddle playing dad as a boy of nine.
This is the story of a simple man from very humble beginnings, who overcame many tragedies in his life to become, as his plaque at the Country Music Hall of Fame states: "The man who started it all”. It is the story of a man with a very unstable childhood pursuing a dream of being an entertainer, and eventually singing on the radio the top-selling artist in the late 1920'. It is a story of broken hearts and dreams, including the twin tragedies of death and sickness. Ultimately it is the story of being in the right place at the right time to take advantage of the emerging technologies of the day to achieve and surpass childhood dreams and success. It is a story of a man who picked up his craft almost accidentally as he was struggling to make ends meet. A man whose influences are still relevant in the music today.
With the backdrop of the turn of a century, then the great drought leading to the Dust Bowl, on top of the terrible TB pandemic and the 1929 Great Depression. During the hard times we are seeing the early days of recording technology, the talking machine, the wireless, the flickers and the talkies, medicine shows, rag-operas and tent-show, minstrel shows and vaudeville, actors and hucksters, snake doctors and hobos and the great iron horse riding the rails laying the foundation for a new era. Jazz, black-face singers and race music and hillbilly music evolving and setting the stage for country and western music to Rock and Roll... the great music trail cut by Jimmie Rodgers “The man who started it all”.
Following the Documentary Saga is the Biopic Movie
Jimmie Rodgers
The Man Who Started It All
WITH AN ALL-STAR LIST OF CAMEOS MANY FROM THE DOCUMENTARY
Like a locomotive, Jimmie Rodgers came into this world with a force that is still strong over one hundred years later. And like the trains that crisscrossed the country, Jimmie Rodgers’ legacy crosses over every aspect of the American music scene. His music echoes in tunes we hear today as his memory is enshrined in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and the Country Music Hall of Fame, where on his plaque it states, “The Man That Started It All.” Known as “The Father of Country Music”, he has garnished the W.C. Handy Blues Award and is in the Grammy Hall of Fame and the Songwriter Hall of Fame. No other entertainer in history can list these accomplishments.
WAITING FOR A TRAIN
A Virtual Streaming Franchise Treatment ... after The Pitch
A three act chronicle memoir trilogy told by
Buffalo Benford
In the Dylan liner notes of THE SONGS OF JIMMIE RODGERS: A TRIBUTE, he says, “Jimmie Rodgers of course is one of the guiding lights of the 20th Century whose way with song has always been an inspiration to those of us who have followed the path. A blazing star whose sound was and remains the raw essence of individuality in a sea of conformity, par excellence with no equal”.
ACT 1 - CHRONICLE # 1
JIMMIE RODGERS SAGA TRAILER