A Conversation with Jerry Reed (continued)

JR: You know, people think when you give your heart to the Lord, you're restricted. But hey, that's where the freedom is. You know what I mean?

PM: I hear that. Here you may be answering my next question, which was I imagine that at different times in your life you considered yourself a songwriter first, a picker first, a session man first, an entertainer first. You've been a lot of things to a lot of people. But what do you consider yourself first these days?

JR: Hey, that's like trying to pick out your favorite leg.

PM: Yeah.

[laughter]

JR: Because everything I ever did meant something when it happened, it really did. The hit songs kept me in the business when I was starving, and the sessions, when my records weren't happening, and then the records led me to the movies, to network television and the movies. And I know it's a part of--it was just God's plan. You come here with a stamp on you, son.

PM: Yeah.

JR: The good Lord sends you here for something--everybody--I don't care who you are. And so picking the favorite--they're all a gift from the Almighty, so I don't have a favorite. I'm just grateful for every one of them.

PM: I mean, just paging through your session career alone is mind boggling, you know--Elvis, Waylon, Bobby Bare. I even saw a record you were on of Robert Mitchum's in '67.

JR: Oh, yeah.

PM: Could he sing?

JR: Yeah. Yeah, Mitchum could sing.

PM: Because if you listen to his speaking voice, you'd think that, yeah, I'll bet he could sing.

JR: Yeah, he could sing, yeah. The one that I really remember is Dean Martin.

PM: Oh!

JR: Boy, what a character.

PM: One of my favorite singers.

JR: [laughs] And I loved him. I enjoyed that album with him.

PM: He had to be a very funny man.

JR: Oh, I'm telling you, he is just what you see on television.

[laughter]

PM: So many musicians have tried, but you actually succeed in having a notorious film career. Are you going to do any more movies?

JR: No. It's going to be music for me, from now on, son, because there's nothing on earth as powerful as music, period. I mean, it's pretty hard to fight and hate and be angry when you're making music, isn't it?

PM: [laughs] Yeah, I never could.

JR: Ain't nothing like it, son. Nothing like it.

PM: In sharing your experience with our readers, would you tell us one thing that you really did right and one thing you really did wrong with your career?

JR: [laughs] It'll have to be mostly all wrong.

PM: [laughs]

JR: I have a saying: I'm living proof that God is alive and well because he allowed me a level of success in my life in spite of myself.

[laughter]

JR: You can print that. You know, the things I did right, he directed. The things I did wrong were of my own doing. And I did a lot of them. But he never, ever let me go. That's what's so wonderful. He never--it's like it says in John, "Once they're mine, no one can take them away from me." And he watched after me in all my down time, and kept watch over me so I could come back. That's the wonderful part of my testimony.  continue

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