American Masters – Merle Haggard

I love this PBS program, but last nights program on Merle Haggard was real special. Certainly brought back memories of my college years in the 60’s at Fresno State. That is where I first heard Haggard and was introduced to the “Bakersfield Sound” and country music in general. More of my education came out of the classroom as I saw racism and real dirt poor poverty for the first time. The things Haggard sang about in his songs. (Seeing a family of twelve in a tar paper shack in 105 degree heat was a wake-up for me - never complained about no air conditioning in the dorms after that.) The great central valley may have been the breadbasket of the world, but in the sixties the sons and daughters of the Okies were being forced to change and it was not always comfortable. Merle Haggard’s music and life is a really metaphor or the turmoil in this most conservative region of the country. He is most definitely the “poet of the common man.”  www.pbs.org/wnet/americanmasters/episodes/merle-haggard/watch-the-full-film/1605/