Johnny Cash is a well-known country artist who flourished between the 1950s and the early 21st century. He remained successful and continued to record until his death in 2003. Throughout his career he has performed as a solo artist as well as with his wife, June Carter Cash, and with backup bands that added bass and lead guitar elements to Johnny’s vocals and rhythm guitar.

Although Johnny Cash began singing and songwriting when he was just a child, he didn’t formally get involved with a band until he moved to Memphis, Tennessee in 1954. He formed his first band with Luther Perkins, who played guitar, and Marshall Grant, who played bass. The style of their early music was rockabilly, and Johnny’s early musical influences included gospel music and popular country music that was played on the radio as well as music by Irish artist Dennis Day.

A key component of Johnny Cash’s sound is his bass-baritone vocal range, and during his career, he belted out deep notes too low for many other singers. He also usually played acoustic guitar rather than electric guitar, and typically played Martin guitars. This gave his music a distinctly rich and acoustic sound. Cash was also known for sticking a dollar bill in the strings of his guitar near the nut or capo, which gave the rhythm guitar a more percussive or washboard sound, filling out the sound since he did not use a drummer.

Johnny’s rhythm guitar style made frequent use of alternate picking of the bass notes, meaning that he would alternate picking the low E string, the A string and/or the D string between strumming the rest of the guitar strings. Songs like “Get Rhythm” and “Folsom Prison Blues” are two of many songs in which Cash used alternate picking.

Cash’s vocal style may be difficult for some singers because of his extremely low range. For people who really want to sing Cash’s songs, transposing them into a higher key can make the song easier for people without deep singing voices.

Cash’s guitar style is intermediate. The alternate picking can be difficult for a beginner because of the level of muscle coordination involved. However, it is not difficult for a player with some practice to learn, and because Johnny doesn’t play complex rhythms, once a student learns the alternate picking style, playing the rhythms is relatively simple.

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