Take Me Home Country Roads

 

 

Welcome to 132nd edition of Monday’s Music Moves Me.  This week’s theme is “Songs that tell a story of your life“!

Whenever I think of my life, I always think of John Denver’s Take Me Home Country Roads song. It was a favorite of mine in 1971 hitting the charts at #2 and still today it remains a favorite tied to sentimental feelings. Join me as I paint a picture through songs – a story of my life!

Coming from humble beginnings from the Appalachian hills of McDowell County – Home of the Rocket Boys (A.K.A October Sky), I am a southern West Virginia gal at heart.  In my quest to find the ultimate West Virginia songs, I stumbled upon this slideshow presentation of the area I call home set to Kathy Mattea’s  Green Rolling Hills of West Virginia.

 

The mountaineer’s way of life can be found in the coalfields. It’s a hard labor, but essential for the coal miner’s existence and our country’s dependency on coal.  I always felt proud and still do to say, I’m a coal miners’ daughter.

My years in my native home state were short. At the tender age of 17, I married and moved away. The summer of 1979 this became my new home.

The Osborne Brothers did the original, but I decided to use Buck Owens version of Rocky Top. This old classic is the fight song of the University of Tennessee’s – Knoxville. Big Orange fan’s sense a swell of pride as the school’s marching band performs this tune dozens of times throughout a game.

Dolly Parton, one of American’s great female country artists, is not only from East Tennessee, but she got her start here in Knoxville in 1956 on The Cas Walker Show. Unlike Dolly who grew up in the Tennessee hills, the mountains are a short call away for us. However, on clear days, we can see those beautiful Smoky Mountains from our home and although, we are not native Tennesseans we feel like the Tennessee mountains are our home.