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Charlie
Daniels

Charlie Daniels
  • Inducted
    2016
  • Born
    October 28, 1936
  • Died
    July 6, 2020
  • Birthplace
    Wilmington, North Carolina

Charlie Daniels pioneered the blending of southern rock sounds with mainstream country music, mingling musical traditions ranging from folk and bluegrass to gospel, country, and rock.

Session Beginnings

The son of a lumberman, Charles Edward Daniels learned how to play fiddle and guitar in high school. Soon after he was playing in rock & roll bands. By the time Daniels was eighteen, Elvis Presley had cut “It Hurts Me,” a song co-written by Daniels and record producer Bob Johnston. At the urging of Johnston, Daniels moved to Nashville in 1967 to be a session musician.

Daniels gained work quickly, playing on recordings by a range of artists including Leonard Cohen, Flatt & Scruggs, Claude King, Al Kooper, Marty Robbins, Pete Seeger, Ringo Starr, and, most famously, Bob Dylan. In addition to playing on Dylan’s Nashville Skyline, Daniels can be heard on Dylan’s Self Portrait and New Morning albums.

Songs

The South's Gonna Do It
Charlie Daniels Band

00:00  /  00:00

Still in Saigon
Charlie Daniels Band

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Boogie Woogie Fiddle Country Blues
Charlie Daniels Band

00:00  /  00:00

“The Devil Went Down to Georgia,” and Other Hits

Daniels began his career as a recording artist on the Kama Sutra Records label in 1970 and soon formed the Charlie Daniels Band, forging a southern rock sound. He broke through with a Top Ten pop single in 1973 with “Uneasy Rider,” and the next year began to define his sound with the album Fire on the Mountain, featuring the Top Forty pop hit “The South’s Gonna Do It Again.”

Moving to Epic Records, Daniels scored an even bigger hit in 1979 with “The Devil Went Down to Georgia,” a rousing story song about a fiddle contest with Lucifer.

The record went #3 pop, #1 country, and sold more than a million copies. It earned the Country Music Association’s Single of the Year award for 1979 and a Grammy for Best Country Vocal Performance by a Duo or Group. In addition, the Charlie Daniels Band was named the CMA’s Instrumental Group of the Year for 1979 and 1980. The cherry on the cake was the Charlie Daniels Band being featured singing the hit song in the blockbuster Hollywood movie Urban Cowboy (1980), which helped ignite a boom in country music’s popularity.

The success of “The Devil Went Down to Georgia” and its accompanying platinum-selling album, Million Mile Reflections, marked a turning point for the Charlie Daniels Band toward country music. From 1979 to 2011, the band placed twenty-nine hits on the country charts. Charlie Daniels became a member of the Grand Ole Opry cast in 2008.

Videos

“Drinkin’ My Baby Goodbye” 

“The Devil Went Down to Georgia.” 

“In America”

Image Gallery

  • Charlie Daniels, 1990. Photo by Matt Barnes.

    Charlie Daniels, 1990. Photo by Matt Barnes.

  • Charlie Daniels at age five.

  • Charlie Daniels (far left) with the Jaguars, a band that enjoyed a regional hit with “Jaguar,” a rock instrumental recorded in Fort Worth, Texas, in 1959.

  • Bob Dylan, Fred Carter Jr., and Charlie Daniels during a recording session for Dylan’s album Nashville Skyline in Columbia Studio A, Nashville, 1969. Photo courtesy of Sony Entertainment Music Archives.

  • From left: Columbia Records staff producer Bob Johnston on harmonica, Leonard Cohen on vocals and guitar, and Charlie Daniels on fiddle, Isle of Wight Festival, Newport, England, August 31, 1970. Photo by Richard Imrie.

    From left: Columbia Records staff producer Bob Johnston on harmonica, Leonard Cohen on vocals and guitar, and Charlie Daniels on fiddle, Isle of Wight Festival, Newport, England, August 31, 1970. Photo by Richard Imrie.

  • Charlie Daniels Band accepting gold and platinum records at the 21 Club in New York City, 1979. Back row, from left: Charlie Hayward, Fred Edwards, Charlie Daniels, Jim Marshall, unidentified, tour manager David Corlew. Front row, from left: Tommy Crain and Don Murray.

    Charlie Daniels Band accepting gold and platinum records at the 21 Club in New York City, 1979. Back row, from left: Charlie Hayward, Fred Edwards, Charlie Daniels, Jim Marshall, unidentified, tour manager David Corlew. Front row, from left: Tommy Crain and Don Murray.

  • President Jimmy Carter and Vice President Walter Mondale welcome Charlie Daniels to the White House, Washington, D.C., 1978. Carter used Daniels’s song “The South’s Gonna Do It Again” during his 1976 presidential campaign, and Daniels performed at one of the president’s inaugural balls in 1977.

    President Jimmy Carter and Vice President Walter Mondale welcome Charlie Daniels to the White House, Washington, D.C., 1978. Carter used Daniels’s song “The South’s Gonna Do It Again” during his 1976 presidential campaign, and Daniels performed at one of the president’s inaugural balls in 1977.

  • Charlie Daniels and bassist Charlie Hayward perform at Guantanamo Bay Naval Base in Cuba, 1992.

    Charlie Daniels and bassist Charlie Hayward perform at Guantanamo Bay Naval Base in Cuba, 1992.

  • Charlie Daniels leans as Brenda Lee places a Medallion around his neck, signifying membership in the Country Music Hall of Fame. Looking on is Kyle Young, CEO of the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum. The 2016 Medallion Ceremony, held October 16 in the museum’s CMA Theater, marked the official induction of Daniels, producer and record company owner Fred Foster, and singer Randy Travis. Photo by Jason Davis.

    Charlie Daniels leans as Brenda Lee places a medallion around his neck, signifying membership in the Country Music Hall of Fame. Looking on is Kyle Young, CEO of the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum. The 2016 Medallion Ceremony, held October 16 in the Museum’s CMA Theater, marked the official induction of Daniels, producer and record company owner Fred Foster, and singer Randy Travis. Photo by Jason Davis.

  • Charlie Daniels accepts his induction into the Country Music Hall of Fame during the 2016 Medallion Ceremony in the CMA Theater at the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum. Photo by Jason Davis.

    Charlie Daniels accepts his induction into the Country Music Hall of Fame during the 2016 Medallion Ceremony in the CMA Theater at the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum. Photo by Jason Davis.

The Charlie Daniels Influence

Among Daniels’s accomplishments was the launch of his annual Volunteer Jam concerts in 1974. These multi-artist extravaganzas, sometimes stretching past ten hours in length, became must-see musical spectacles for thousands. During the jams, legends of country music such as Roy Acuff, Alabama, Bill Monroe, Ray Price, and Tammy Wynette shared bills with acts as diverse as James Brown, Don Henley, Billy Joel, B.B. King, Little Richard, Steppenwolf, and Stevie Ray Vaughan. A Volunteer Jam Tour including the Charlie Daniels Band, the Marshall Tucker Band, and the Outlaws crisscrossed the United States in 2007. Subsequently, tours kept the tradition alive.

In recognition of his “unique and indelible influence on generations of music makers,” Daniels was honored as a BMI Icon in 2005.

“When Charlie Daniels was asked how he does what he does, he answered, ‘I just try to play like me, and to sing like I talk,’” Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum CEO Kyle Young said during the 2016 Medallion Ceremony welcoming Daniels to the Country Music Hall of Fame, pointing toward Daniels’s rejection of musical labels.

—Jack Bernhardt

Adapted from the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum’s Encyclopedia of Country Music, published by Oxford University Press

The success of “The Devil Went Down to Georgia” and its accompanying platinum-selling album, Million Mile Reflections, marked a turning point for the Charlie Daniels Band toward country music.

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