In 1969, The Johnny Cash Show premiered with a little help from Bob Dylan. When network executives pitched the show to Cash, he wasn’t sure he wanted to do it. He eventually agreed to do it as long as he could pick the guest stars. Cash said that he specifically wanted Dylan on the show. Though Dylan typically wouldn’t have agreed to appear on television, he did it for Cash. Cash understood this, so he decided to personally ask Dylan to appear.
Johnny Cash was extremely impressed with Bob Dylan
When Cash first heard Dylan, he thought he was a seasoned country singer, not a 22-year-old from Minnesota.
“The first time I heard him — I don’t know where it was, I believe in Las Vegas — I thought it was an old country singer,” Cash said, per the book Cash on Cash: Interviews and Encounters With Johnny Cash. “And then I realized somebody told me who he was — and I said, this is really unbelievable that he could get airplay singing that kind of music.”
Cash quickly became a fan and eventually started a correspondence with the younger artist.
“Then I bought his records,” Cash said, adding, “I bought Freewheelin’ and the Bob Dylan album, then I wrote him a letter and he wrote back, and we wrote each other back and forth for weeks, months. I just heard a fresh approach to some old themes, but really done well with an insight that had never been put on record. I just loved his work, loved him. Always have. Still do. I just think he’s still the best thing out there.”
He only wanted to do his show if the ‘Blowin’ in the Wind’ singer was a guest
In 1969, network executives approached Cash about hosting a television show. At first, he wanted no part of the program.
“I said, ‘I don’t want to do that, it’s too confining, it’s awful hard,” he said. “You gotta give your life to that camera. So they kept after me. They kept begging, calling meetings, and they would come down here from New York and I would have meetings with them, and finally I said, ‘June [Carter Cash] and I have been talking about it and we’ll give it a try if we can have the guests that we want on the show.’”
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Cash said he wouldn’t even make the show if he couldn’t get Dylan.
“‘First of all, I want Pete Seeger on,’ and they all looked at each other and kind of nodded their heads, and I said, ‘But the musical guest I want on the first show is Bob Dylan,’ and they looked at each other again and said, ‘Bob Dylan?’ I said, ‘Yeah. If I can’t have him, I don’t want to do a show.’”
They agreed and said they’d speak to Dylan, but Cash stopped them.
“So they said, ‘OK we’ll try to get him . . .’ I said, ‘No, you don’t have to. I’ll ask him myself,’” Cash said. “I was trying to keep him from going through that hassle, with the agents and the deals and all that. They did get involved, of course, but I asked him myself first. He said he didn’t do TV, but he’d do it for me.”
This was a smart move on Cash’s part. Dylan is both deeply private and distrustful of the media. He has said that they often misrepresented him and made him feel like a fool. Cash approached him, so it would have felt like he was doing a favor for a friend, not making a media appearance. He likely would have said no if Cash hadn’t stepped in. This proved that Cash knew Dylan well.
Bob Dylan was so excited to meet Johnny Cash that he started jumping on the bed
Dylan and Cash’s relationship worked so well because of the mutual admiration they had for each other. Though Cash was the first to reach out, Dylan had grown up listening to his music. When they first met, Dylan could hardly contain himself.
“June and I were working together then, and I’d go onstage in those little places, and I’d sing my songs and call them folk songs, waiting for Bob to show up,” Cash said. “He never did show up in the Village, but I was booked at the Newport Folk Festival in Newport, Rhode Island [in 1964], and that’s where I met him. And Joan Baez too. Bob came in my room with Joan Baez and started jumping up and down on my bed and hollering ‘Johnny Cash! Johnny Cash! It’s really you!’ He was laughing, and just acting the fool, you know? It was a lot of fun.”
