Johnny Cash Passes Music Wisdom Onto Daughter

Worried that his daughter was falling in love with rock and pop while forgetting the family’s Country roots, Cash gave the 18-year-old Rosanne a very special gift in 1973: a list of “100 Essential Country Songs.”

“The list was assembled from my father’s intuitive understanding of each critical juncture in the evolution of country music,” Rosanne said. “I endeavored to learn them all, and it was an education.”

The album will feature Rosanne performing her own version of songs by Bobby Bare, Hank Snow and Bob Dylan, as well as duets with Bruce Springsteen, Jeff Tweedy and Elvis Costello.

“I looked to that list as a standard of excellence, and to remind myself of the tradition from which I come,” she said.

"If my father had been a martial arts master, he might have passed a martial arts secret on to me, his oldest child. If he had been a surgeon, he might have taken me into his operating room and pointed out the arteries and organs. If he were a robber baron, he might have surveyed his empire and said, 'Honey, some day this will all be yours!' But he was a musician and a songwriter, and he gave me The List."