Bassist Marshall Grant, a founding member of Johnny Cash’s Tennessee Two band, died on Sunday, August 7th. He was 83 years old.
With Cash’s rhythm guitar and lead guitarist Luther Perkins’ distinctive single-note playing, Grant helped develop the “boom chicka boom” style that became a signature of Cash’s early recordings. Grant performed on Cash’s original recordings of classics such as “I Walk the Line,” “Ring of Fire” and “Sunday Morning Coming Down.” He also played on two of Cash’s most famous albums — At Folsom Prison (1968) and At San Quentin (1969). He left Cash’s band in 1980.
Grant attended rehearsals for the Johnny Cash Music Festival on Wednesday, and became ill afterward.
“Had Dad not had Marshall, he wouldn’t have had the ‘Johnny Cash sound,’ and he wouldn’t have become all that he was, in his fullness,” Rosanne Cash told The Tennessean newspaper. “And I wouldn’t have become a songwriter or a musician. There’s a whole lineage that wouldn’t have happened.”
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