Page 130 - Been There… Done That!

Gary Graham
One of the lighter moments was when I was scolding one of the contestants and country music legend Roy Acuff, who was having a battle with dementia, came over to me and said: “Don’t worry, I think you’ll win.” What do you say when someone you’ve respected for years is on a downhill slide? I felt honored to have been in the company of a staple in country music, the man who sang “The Wabash Cannonball.”
As a teenager, I had watched Ozark Jubilee on TV with Red Foley and one of his regulars was Brenda Lee. And here I was working on a TV show with her. I spent most of the day with her and her husband and Brenda said it made her day that I was talking about her days on the Jubilee. She even let me change one of her songs in the show to her massive hit “I’m Sorry.” Things like that, I’ll never forget.
That was my last year with “Wrangler Country Showdown.” The next year Wrangler signed me to do basically the same thing, but with Willie Nelson, called the Music Invitational, featuring rock, country and blues contests.
I had several encounters with Willie over the years and found him to be insanely talented. He could literally create a song out of a rock in the road and over the years he had written over a thousand songs. The thing about Willie’s songs was that many other artists had huge hits on them as well. The first time I was on the bus with Willie, we sat down at the booth and – typical Willie, not having much to say – poured out a bag of pot and began to roll a joint. I just sat there and he finally asked, “Does this offend you?” I said, “not
128