Piano Talk Live from August 19, 2020: Bill Gaither chats with Josh Turner

morning trying to get my voice down [Laughter] how old were you when you got up one morning and said uh mama i want my egg scrambled this morning and i went mama what about what age is that happening oh man i tell people you know i jokingly tell people that you know uh it was like this when i when i first came out of the womb um the first song i ever sang was tonight the bottle let me down just a baby bottle um but uh but no i i i kind of the lord kind of surprised me honestly because i even went like i developed a passion to sing uh early on in my life i sang my first country song in front of a crowd when i was 13 years old i started playing guitar and writing songs when i was 17 years old my first trip to nashville though was to the vanderbilt voice clinic with a vocal injury because i didn't know there was a proper way to sing and so i was pushing my voice i wasn't taking care of it i wasn't breathing right i was singing out of my range and so uh that basically led to a year of vocal rest and classical voice training and just learning about the anatomy and how to take care of it and as i went through that training i i started to heal i started to learn how to use my voice moved to nashville started going to belmont and i continued that training there at belmont and after a while i started noticing that my voice could do things that it never could do before and so there i was with this injury when i first found out about it i was scared to death i'm thinking my career's down the tubes like there's no way i'm going to get a record deal i've lost my voice but then the lord took that and basically made my voice even better on the you know after the the the healing of of my voice and everything so it was really a blessing in disguise so um i'm just thankful i had the perseverance and the determination to put in the hard work put in the time to be patient and see it through and like i say i i learned things through that process that are helping me today because when you have a grueling touring schedule and interviews and all that kind of stuff and you're using your voice constantly you have to learn how to take care of it or else you're going to you know hurt it again so i find as i get older that that talking is tougher on me than singing you think that's true absolutely my i tell people all the time the hardest scenario for my voice is when i'm in a loud room and i'm having a talk over noise especially as as somebody who has a lower voice it's harder for my voice to cut through the noise and and all of that and so when that that just wears me out completely and when my voice is tired um like my my whole being is is out of whack like i just don't i don't have energy i'm not in a good mood you know and it's it's all contingent upon you know the health of my voice you know folks don't understand you know that half of what we do i think this this is a whole problem with uh uh during this pandemic going back to church and saying okay you can go back to church but you got to stay six feet away you got to wear a mask you can't touch you can't hug and you can't uh exchange juices in the air i guess and you want to say you know you don't understand that's what we do that's called congregating that is that's you take that all out and just put them in front of a computer it's it's i mean i guess it'll do uh just seeing people on the screen but it's not the same as going to church but at the same time i've had to make a decision as i got older uh do it and talking to people is very very important but do they want me to talk to them or want me to give them a program on the stage that night and sometimes you just have to make a decision i can't do both right yeah yeah you know whoever wrote in the garden i think they were they had social distancing in mind you know i've come to the garden alone so they had it figured out um but yeah it's uh it's a crazy time um you know it's uh you know and i tell people i told somebody yesterday they asked me they were like you know we know you're a man of faith you know what's a message that you can kind of give to people you know during this time that we're in and i said you know yes it's a it's a tough time it's we're we're living through a lot of uncertainty people are out of work people are scared to leave their house um you know people are watching loved ones die and you know it's it's it's it's a rough time i i i won't deny that um but in the midst of that you know it things tough times always seem harder uh when you're when you're in them when you're in the thick of it and so once you get out of that and you look back you'll realize well man it wasn't quite as bad as i i thought it was when i was in it you know and and so i just tried to encourage people to take one day at a time you know jesus told us not to worry about tomorrow so you know just worry about today keep your chin up um and just focus on on your blessings and and instead of focusing on what you don't have or what you know different mandates or things that are forced on you and all that kind of stuff um you know and and so i i just uh i basically tried to tell people that you know you look back through history um there's there's been a lot of horrific things that have happened uh in certain countries and certain cultures societies and uh this is this was not a surprise to god you know uh he he knew that this was coming and um you know and i think he's going to bring a lot of good out of it we've often asked people when glory and i have a chance just to do talking and not singing we say how many how many of you have won how many of you have learned your big lessons of life during uh during great times and everything was going great you were on top of the world and a few people raised their hands how many of you have learned the real lessons of life when you when you were in the valley and when it was really really tough if if audiences are honest most people will say 90 percent of the audience will say i've learned the real important stuff in life when i was on my back and i was struggling and i was telling you so if that is the case uh this is a wonderful opportunity to learn and i with you have heard a lot of people say uh the grass is a little greener this year the skies are a little bit bluer the waters are a little bit clearer the fishing is more fun the drinking coffee at a distance with my friends is even better and and for us who've got a good marriage you have one and i have one the time with gloria has just been great i mean we've been together 57 years and and and most nights we'll be eating alone and we'll look at you look at each other and say well if we have to do this i don't know if anybody else i'd rather do this with you know yeah absolutely and you know it's it's good to you know be forced to kind of slow down at times it like you say it you you tend to pay attention to what's around you more and and you focus on on the blessings that you have um instead of being so busy and so frantic to where you lose sight of that or start taking those things for granted and you're right you know we learn more we grow more you know during tough times you know god has a way of of pruning us um and that doesn't necessarily mean that it was his will for us to endure that hardship or go through some tough time or endure some kind of loss but uh you know romans 8 28 says that he's gonna you know bring good out of uh that for for those who love him and you know one of my favorite verses is james 1 12 that says blessed blessed is the man who remains steadfast under trial and uh you know i feel like i've been under trial you know for a long time and i've i've tried and done my due diligence just to remain steadfast through a lot of that and uh you know it's not easy you know god never never promised that it would be easy he you know jesus told us that we would have suffering in this world but to uh be courageous because he's he's conquered the world so um you know i'm thankful for that that wisdom and that insight you know that still rings true today and for you who uh may may uh be seeing this fine man for the first time josh turner has been one of country music's most recognizable voices selling more than 8.5 million units and amassing more than 2.5 billion global streams that's a bunch of people listening to you that's billion with the b b as in bill but you know it's amazing uh you could be around forever and they're still folks in fact it it was it was fun for gloria and me we were going to muncie the other night and somebody sent me a copy of your new uh uh project and so i mean gloria and i are big fans of your uh of your voice and uh and we started listening that and reading the copy you uh you made a a point in the copy where you say uh i've always loved sad songs and i thought that that's interesting speak to that josh you as a country music fan in growing up well i i haven't always understood that i i always gravitated towards you know those sad songs because i always i always felt more you know when i when i heard those sad songs i felt sorry for the the singer and the song i felt sorry for whatever the situation was um you know i guess i had empathy there but you know it just it made me think more um i tried to relate it to my own life and and ask like what would i do in that certain situation or or whatever and um you know and it and i think in some ways too you know it's it's kind of biblical because i you know what's the verse about you know it's it's better to be um in mourning than to be at a feast or whatever i can't remember the exact verse but um you know it it's i think i think the presence of of the the holy spirit is is is you know you can feel it more in in those kinds of situations because you know the the spirit ministers to to the brokenhearted so and it seems i have a friend mark lowry who says god god always uses broken vessels to pour out his oil for healing when i was a kid speaking of sad songs and we grew up in the country home even in indiana and my mom would play uh red foley's old song old chef when i was a lad and o'shea was a pup and every time my brother and i would get into that song we love that song and we get to the last verse where he was growing old and the vet said uh we're going to have to put oshap down and then i'd always stand up and say don't kill him but it was a redemptive song because it would end up saying but if god has a heaven there's one thing i know oh ship has a wonderful home and so and so country music always i think has talked has touched on those nerves one of the writers that you're saluting or one of the singers and writers that you're saluting in this process is hank williams and i don't know of anyone who really touched on the nerve of [Music] what real life is all about real life is and as i wonder where you are i'm so lonesome i could cry i mean you talk about great great lines uh the country music writer has always done that yeah hank williams was very in touch with you know the human heart and human emotion and real life and what was going on around him he one of his uh famous quotes was if you can't write a song in 20 minutes it ain't worth writing that's debatable but uh but like i understand what he's saying you know it's like you have to have a grasp on what you're writing about in order to write about it and so um so yeah it it's it's it's been a part of country music um you know from the the beginning and and it's uh it's been an art form art form and a genre that allows you know a singer to sing about anything they want to and that's that's one of the things one of the main things that appealed to me early on as a young boy about country music was that i wasn't restricted to singing about you know a certain subject matter it just it was like a you know a blank canvas and you could just go and paint whatever you wanted to paint and um and so that that's always been very freeing to me uh and that includes those sad you know heartbreak songs so have you sung uh in montgomery at the city auditorium there that that they say part of that city auditorium uh was the auditorium where his funeral was held and then right around the corner there's a little museum have you been to that i've i've been to the museum um i've been uh i didn't get to go inside the old home place down in georgiana but i've been there i've seen that house uh where he grew up and um i've been to the gravesite probably five times in my life and i've i've been to the city auditorium i haven't played there um i have played in montgomery but just not at that venue but taking my picture with the hank statue down there and all that um but uh yeah i've just i've always loved um you know hank and you know his music inspired my very first hit long black train so um i have him to thank for that and uh you know it's just uh you know i i've just loved you know the the storytelling and and just the emotions that country music has made me feel throughout the years and how it's been a comfort to me um you know in good times and bad you know gloria and i have spent our lives in gospel music and uh and we've held in high regard the gospel legends in our field but boy i got to tell you country is so closely tied to who we are and what you know what we do we watched all eight sessions be eight hours of listening to the ken burns country music history and man gloria and i just sat there and said you know this is amazing the two fields are so intertwined and and they're both they're both about real life and real stuff of course hank williams on his tombstone with all the great uh secular songs he wrote the song that's on his tombstone is i saw the light i saw the light no more in darkness no more light praise the lord i saw light yeah yeah and that that was a song as you know that was on my my last record i served a savior and um won a dove award and i think i called you on the phone after that and just uh it was just checking in with you and congratulating you on your award and all that so uh so yeah um it was probably sonya isaacs that helped me win that award i don't know she would probably take the credit for it knowing so do you but but i got to go home with the award so you got the bird on your wall right that's right that's right but there is something when we play uh in that part of the country in southern alabama that i have to think uh here's part of my history here's part of part of where i grew up you made a reference uh with this uh with this uh project you call it uh turner's mount rushmore of country music i was one time asked who are the who was the biggest male influence in my life and the first person came to my mind was my father and he was great he was wonderful but i said to this person asked a question mine would be a composite of five people it's funny that you listed five artists uh and i said it had to be my my dad and my granddad but i lifted three other people who who were in our field and you said on the field uh your your mount rushmore example of the greatest in the country music field would not be just one person that influenced you but you had five major influences yeah it was you know i've always referred to it as my mount rushmore of country music and it's basically randy travis john anderson johnny cash vern goslin and hank williams and you know those five artists the biggest thing that i learned from those five was how to be josh turner they're all five of them are very iconic and the way that they looked and the way they sounded and the way that they approach songs and uh and they they all five you know have made a huge um contribution to country music and made a mark on country music and so i've i've always said that with any song of mine that you hear you can hear at least one you know traces of at least one of those artists and so um they've made a huge influence on me and a huge impact on me and they still are i'm still learning from them and you know i'm just thankful that i have them to call heroes and even some of them i've been able to call friends like randy travis and and john anderson when you were in belmont i read one time uh when you were a student at belmont you went out to hickory uh lake and knocked on johnny cash's door i did i did um yeah it was you know looking back on that that experience i think it was a divine appointment because i had i was a student at belmont i didn't have a record deal yet i had like 25 dollars in my checking account and i was reading johnny cash's autobiography and i had read about the neurological disorder that he had been diagnosed with and so one day after reading some in his book i sat back and i was thinking if johnny cash dies and i don't get to meet him i'm going to be so disappointed and so i came up with this crazy plan of like just driving to his house and finding out where he lived and all that and so i did and this was before gps and all that so i i got lost a couple times before i got there and by the time i found the place uh the sun had gone down it was dark outside which made me nervous and and so when i finally find the house uh it's it's real dark around the house it's on the lake i see several suvs in the in the driveway and the gate is just wide open and so i just drove on in and parked and uh went up to the only door i saw and and knocked and nobody came and um and i'm sitting there thinking like okay that gate was open they obviously were expecting somebody because they wouldn't just have the gate open for no reason um this is johnny cash's house we're talking about and so i knocked again still no answer and i'm thinking man this like what in the world so i walked around the corner of the house and it was just pitch black dark around there and i'm like okay i'm not going over there i'll they'll you know they'll call the cops on me so i i went back to the original door and i'm there's a stained glass window to the side of the door and i can see a painting of june on the wall so i'm like this has got to be the place so i'm not really really hard on the door and i hear this voice from the depths of the house saying coming coming and so i'm waiting and all of a sudden i see the door open and it's johnny cash was he a black answer answering the door he his hair was kind of messed up he had reading glasses on he had a gold necklace on with a cross on it and he had like a button-down denim shirt kind of halfway buttoned and uh he was wearing bedroom shoes and um he kind of flinched because i obviously wasn't who he was and i sure as heck didn't expect johnny cash to be answering the door um and so i reached out my hand and i said mr cash i'm josh turner i'm from south carolina i'm a student at belmont university and just kind of started talking about how big of a fan i was and you know i appreciated his his witness and all the stuff he did with billy graham and and i had read about the neurological disorder that he had and i just wanted him to know that i've been praying for him and i i was probably talking 90 miles an hour i finally like i finally just kind of had to take a breath and i told him i said i'm sorry my heart's about to beat out of my chest and so he kind of laughed and said well you know we're all human and so i i just uh i just let him know that you know i cared about him that he was a hero of mine and that uh i'd been praying for him and um you know wished him the best and so he shook my hand again and said you know how much he appreciated me and and said he was going to go back inside and rest and i said i understand and so he shuts the door and i go to walk back to my truck and i just break down crying because i could not believe what had just happened and so all the way back to campus i'm just like trying to digest all of this and the morning that i woke up the day that that i found out that he had died i was so thankful that i had taken that risk because that was the only opportunity i ever had to meet him what a story what a story and what a beautiful response from him i mean i mean he could have somebody else go the door or a number of other things so you so you found a very you found what you thought he was right yeah somebody asked me yesterday what what i learned from that experience and i said well i learned that if a young artist ever knocks on my door don't shoot him because he might end up being famous and talking about me one day that's a that's a great story and then listening to the project when we came to the caretaker song the the undertaker uh and i knew uh one of the five with johnny cash i said i said that has to be a johnny cash song and i never heard it before that's the first time i've heard it it's undeniably johnny cash and that that's one of the reasons that i chose this song was the fact that i'm like yeah i could pick fault some prison blues or i'll walk the line or ring a fire or whatever it may be yeah um yeah but that's that's that's too easy you know and i i wanted to give johnny cash more credit than that because i i feel like you know you can sing any one of his songs and some everybody's going to know that it's a johnny cash song because he was that iconic and so the caretakers is one of those songs that i fell in love with years ago because it it tells such an interesting intriguing story about a guy who lives in a cemetery and uh the first lyric of the song is i live in the cemetery old caretaker they call me and from that first line he has your attention and you want to know what the rest of the song is about and so it's basically he he spends so much time there that he sees all these funeral services taking place and he sees all these people come and go and how they behave in the wake of losing a loved one and it gets him thinking it's like okay what kind of effect am i having on the people around me and who's gonna show up when they lay me in the ground you know and and so it's always been a compelling story for me and musically it changes tempo three times and um and i you know kind of injected my name in the place of johnny's uh in there to make it more personal and and so it uh it it and it's also the first time i've ever played guitar on a record so um you know i owe that to my producer kenny greenberg he asked me if i would play guitar on it because i i had done this song on an opry country classic show one night and marty stewart was introducing me and i came out just sat on a stool when i played this song and i don't know what the crowd thought about it but because it's such a morbid song but um but kenny loved the recording so much he said man you need to play on this and he said you know we need to try to recreate this and so that's what happened and um and yeah it's a special moment on the record you know marty is obviously just a big country music band and i don't know of anybody more knowledgeable about the history of the music than marty and marty lived right next door to johnny before the house burned down and marty's a good friend also gloria and i've always been intrigued with uh chris christopherson a rhodes scholar and a country music icon and an actor talented larry gatlin says his his poetry that sunday morning coming down many of the great songs he wrote he is one of a kind but i have said this in other settings as far as a gospel song in the last century one of the most honest gospel songs that i know of is please help me jesus i've wasted it so help me jesus i know what i am now that i know that i needed you so help me jesus my souls in your hands and i think of that scripture of the two people coming into the temple the one was very arrogant i'm glad i'm not like that guy and the other one just simply said you know what i am i'm a rich was that a great experience where were you together when you filmed that or when you recorded it or did you just send the tape to chris i had already recorded the song and then uh we started talking about the idea of bringing chris in to to sing on it and um i've been friends with chris and his wife lisa for a long time and so i texted lisa back thanksgiving last year and i said what are the the chances of chris coming in and being a part of this project and uh singing on this song and she said when and where i was just floored by that response um they were willing from the get-go and they made it happen um they we sent them the tracks and everything he did it out in hawaii she took some video footage of of him and took some pictures while he was in there and uh when we got it all put together i just i mean man you know every time i hear it i just i can't believe that it exists you know to have a country music hall of famer a former highway man you know just incredible singer songwriter actor you know it's just uh he's lived an incredible life and and to be on little old josh turner's record is pretty humbling he could have easily you know told me no um but yeah he made the effort to come into the studio and do that and it just it turned out great and it's one of my favorite tracks on the record well it's same here we loved it we loved it gospel songs and country tunes talk a lot about this subject about uh being grateful for what you got and uh and i and i love this particular song a a 40 room mansion sitting on the hill i've never lived in a place like that and i never will but i've got the mornings i i love the butt but i've got the morning sun and i've got the evening and i got a woman that i love lying close to me and i've got good friends i got the moon and stuff my bills are paid there's food on the table shoes shoes on my feet yeah that could be a praise to worship song [Music] yeah it kind of pretty much you know it was written by max d barnes um and uh and it was a initially he had originally a hit by my hero and my friend john anderson and this song's always um you know just made me feel good every time i hear it every time i sing it and it's something i can relate to um it's something i kind of live out you know in my daily life and um so i i could have sung i could have chosen any john anderson song because they're all good and and uh and and worth worth singing but i i landed on this one because of the way it's always made me feel and having john come in and sing on it you know was was great you know john and i've been friends now for almost 20 years and um so it's always good to collaborate with him and and sing with him you know he's been through a lot of health challenges himself and to hear how great he sounded on this record was it did my heart a lot of good and one of the one of the jokes that i made to the studio musicians the day that we recorded this song was the the original version of this song was in the key of d and so with how low my voice is i'm always having to adjust the key you know to where it suits my voice right and uh and so we we ended up doing it in c sharp and so i told uh i told all the guys that you know the original version of this song was written by max d barnes but my version was written by max c sharp barnes [Music] all the musicians thought it was funny and i tell non-musicians that and it's they smell crickets like nobody nobody gets it so let me tell you a story like that one uh you know i'm a songwriter and i play the piano but it's i'm i i'm not a gordon mode okay so uh so i was playing a tune that we're getting ready to track in the session and uh when i got done ben speer his friend of mine and we were with a bunch of musicians looked at me and said bill i have never heard anybody play as long as you have played and improve as little as you have improved which was very which was very funny with a group of musicians yeah the next week or so i was out playing for a soloist in our field a gospel soloist by the name of doug odom he was uh he was a great uh singer in the early days and we were trying to get our songs gloria and i were trying to get our songs out so i would go out play for him if he'd sing he touched me because he lives a couple of cartoons while we were out there so doug had heard that story and he thought he was f it was funny we were in a little country church somewhere about a hundred people and so when he introduced me he said this is my accompanist bill gaither uh he's not really that great of keyboard player in fact i've never heard anybody play as long as he has played and improved as little as he's improved crickets those old farmers just went and so when it was over people came out and said i didn't appreciate what he said about your play so you hear you talk about bill gather that way did you do this uh did you record this during the time you were down uh this spring and summer um i started recording it kind of the end of last year um well i take that back it was it was more like the end of summer last year because i i guess it would have been uh early september i guess uh last year when i went into the studio to do the tracks and everything and then from that point i started doing all my vocals and everything and then um you know all of my part was done um prior to the shutdown with the pandemic and all of that and uh we had a few guest appearances that had to happen um after that so we we we got all that done uh it was tricky navigating some of that but we got it all done it sounds great and i'm very proud of this record and um you know so i'm looking forward to seeing what the fans think about it great josh it's always a joy to talk with you i love your heart love i love your attitude about life and it comes out in your voice when i hear it it just you sounded so relaxed and so good to spend this time with you my friend absolutely good spending time with you always good to see you and talk to you and and tell gloria we said hey blessings same here same here all right

Channel: Gaither Music TV

Views: 29,140

Rating: 4.891892 out of 5

Keywords: bill gaither, josh turner, bill gaither and josh turner, josh turner music, josh turner podcast, josh turner talking, bill gaither talking, bill gaither piano talk live, bill and gloria gaither piano talk live, piano talk live with bill and gloria gaither, gaither facebook live, facebook live with bill and gloria gaither, josh tuner new album, bill gaither podcast, bill gaither more than the music

Id: dMHUhd2rb-U

Length: 37min 32sec (2252 seconds)

Published: Wed Aug 19 2020