Johnny Cash

"It's been a great spiritual experience sharing my feelings with my audience. And that's what performing is. It's communicating your feelings through lyrics, recitation, or dialogue between songs."

• Born John R. Cash. Cash on Feb. 26, 1932, in Kingsland, Arkansas. Died Sept. 12, 2003, in Nashville, Tennessee
   
• Johnny Cash scored back-to-back hits with "Folsom Prison Blues" and "I Walk The Line," the former climbing to No. 5 on the country singles chart and the latter breaking into the Top 20 on the Billboard Hot 100. He scored his first No. 1 album with 1969's Johnny Cash At San Quentin.
   
• Cash won his first career GRAMMY for 1967 for Best Country & Western Performance, Duet, Trio, Or Group for "Jackson," a duet with his future wife June Carter. In 1970 Cash performed "A Boy Named Sue" on "The Best On Record," a TV special commemorating the 12th GRAMMY Awards.

• Did you know? In 1956 Cash joined an impromptu jam session in a studio with Elvis Presley, Carl Perkins and Jerry Lee Lewis. A portion of the recordings was eventually released as The Million Dollar Quartet in 1981.

• In 1999 Cash was honored with a Recording Academy Lifetime Achievement Award. In 1998 his songs "I Walk The Line" and "Ring Of Fire" became his first recordings inducted into the GRAMMY Hall Of Fame.

• Cash recorded the 1964 album Bitter Tears at the height of his early success to put a spotlight on the plight of Native Americans. Dennis Banks, co-founder of the American Indian Movement, called the move "the earliest and most significant statement on behalf of Native people and our issues."