Elvis Presley and Johnny Cash: the musical ghosts of the American South

In the southern United States, music has a surprisingly tangible geography, made up of stories and legendary figures. Indeed, it is not confined merely to records and musical notes, but extends to houses, streets, churches, recording studios and even cultivated fields. And if you decide to follow these roads, losing yourself between Tennessee and Arkansas and tracing the musical threads that link towns and suburbs, two figures keep reappearing: those of Elvis Presley and Johnny Cash. Two figures who still resonate in the collective imagination across the globe and whom everyone, regardless of their musical background, knows: almost the same age, both sons of poor families who set out from the fringes of the South, only to become global icons and ultimately come to represent two different ways of portraying America.

Their stories take different paths, yet they often intersect, as happened at 706 Union Avenue in Memphis, at the legendary Sun Studio: the birthplace of American rock and roll and a veritable temple where the records of both these artists came to life. Elvis would soon become an image even before he was a name: the figure etched into television, cinema, iconic outfits, cars and his beloved home, Graceland. For Johnny Cash, however, one must drive towards eastern Arkansas, where Dyess appears amidst a flat expanse of fields and roads. The white house where Cash was born and spent his childhood is emblematic of this artist precisely because it embodies his austere nature, in stark contrast to the black he always wore.

And whilst Elvis and Cash are often remembered as opposites – the King and the Man in Black, glitz and darkness, spectacle and conscience – what emerges when you look at them more closely is how both built their greatness by taking different Southern voices and transforming them into something capable of travelling the world. Both also discovered the dark side of their rise to fame, amid addiction and loneliness. Both started from nothing, only to become immortal icons. And, above all, both still represent two mirrors of America today: illustrating the possibility of starting from nothing and becoming huge, still resonating across the globe, and becoming symbols of the endless stories of a country capable of continually reinventing its own myths.