The Tennessee Three

The Tennessee Three
Johnny Cash and the Tennessee 3 in 1961.
Background information
Genres	Country, rock and roll, rockabilly, blues
Years active	1954–present
Associated acts	Johnny Cash
Members	Bob Wootton Lisa Horngren Vicky Wootton Scarlett Wootton Montana Wootton Derrick McCullough
Past members	Former members

The Tennessee Three was the backing band for country music and rockabilly singer Johnny Cash for nearly 25 years, until Cash's reorganizing of the group and naming it The Great Eighties Eight in 1980.

The group provided the unique backing that would come to be recognized by fans as "the Johnny Cash sound."

Roy Cash, Sr., older brother of Johnny Cash, was service manager at an Automobile Sales Company dealership in Memphis, Tennessee. In 1953, while the younger Cash was stationed in Germany with the US Air Force, Luther Perkins joined the staff at Automobile Sales, where he met co-workers Marshall Grant and A.W. 'Red' Kernodle. Grant, Kernodle and Perkins began bringing their guitars to work, and would play together when repair business was slow.

When Johnny Cash moved to Memphis after returning from Germany in 1954, Roy Cash introduced him to Grant, Kernodle and Perkins. The four began to get together in the evenings at Perkins' or Grant's home and play songs. It was during this time that they decided to form a band, with Grant moving to an upright bass, Kernodle to a six-string steel guitar, and Perkins buying a Fender Esquire electric guitar Perkins' performance style on the Fender resulted in the band's famous steady, simple "boom-chicka-boom" or "freight train" rhythm.

By 1955, Cash and his bandmates were in the Memphis studio of Sun Records, to audition for owner Sam Phillips. Kernodle was so nervous that he left the session, not wanting to hold back the group. The band presented themselves as the "Tennessee Three", but Phillips suggested that they call themselves Johnny Cash and the Tennessee Two. When Cash moved to Columbia Records in 1958, the group followed him.