Today in the Palace; the ‘Hillbilly Shakespeare’
He died on New Year’s Eve 1952 in the back of his car on the road to his next concert, hopped up on speed and alcohol. Hank Williams was only 29 years old, but already he’d written an impressive amount of songs about a variety of topics; a melancholy repertoire of songs about broken love, a son who calls another man ‘daddy’ and about someone who’s been kicked out and sleeping in the doghouse.
Williams, who first learned to play the guitar from Tee-Tot, a black street performer and teetotaller, possessed the talent to turn his miserable life into lyrics and music in songs like ‘Cold, cold heart’ and ‘I am so lonesome I could cry’.
His own renditions were often heart-breaking. Well-known artists such as Tony Bennett and Jo Stafford recognized the greatness of his songs and so he became known as the ‘Hillbilly Shakespeare’.
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