Former U.S. president Jimmy Carter, who long championed popular music and was a multiple Grammy winner for a series of audio books, died today (Dec. 29) at the age of 100 after spending nearly two years in hospice care.
A native of tiny Plains, Ga., Carter grew up steeped in the Southern roots of music. As a kid, his frequent visits to church and access to the family’s battery-powered table radio offered a constant source of fresh sounds. As he ran for the governor’s office, crisscrossing Georgia, Carter apparently never needed to pick up a hymn book when visiting churches — he knew God’s songs by heart.
More from Spin:
The Year in Fictional Music
5 Albums I Can’t Live Without: Corey Feldman
Outtakes: 2Pac
The Allman Brothers were central to Carter’s successful 1976 presidential run, and Carter stood by Gregg Allman after a drug bust. Earlier, in the 1976 race for the Democratic nomination, Jerry Brown brought out the Eagles and Linda Ronstadt, but it was too late. As shown in the 2020 documentary Jimmy Carter: Rock & Roll President, a pre-“Margaritaville” Jimmy Buffett stepped up when the Carter crowds were thin at a Portland, Ore., campaign stop.
At Carter’s Inaugural Ball, after he defeated Gerald Ford for the White House, Paul Simon performed a chilling, poignant and perfect version of “American Tune.” Later, the staunch Republican Charlie Daniels is shown gigging in support of Carter’s re-election. And when the KKK showed up at a benefit concert, Carter calls them out in no uncertain terms, declaring that their time had come and gone.
There’s also the apocryphal story of Willie Nelson smoking marijuana during a White House visit; Nelson revealed in Rock & Roll President that the toker was actually Carter’s son.
“The one thing that has held America together is the music we share and love,” Carter said in the film, adding that he considers Nelson and Bob Dylan among his best friends. Dylan even recited portions of Lynyrd Skynyrd’s “Simple Man” in the doc.
During the last decade of his life, Carter won three Grammys for the audio book versions of his best-sellers Our Endangered Values: America’s Moral Crisis (2006), A Full Life: Reflections at 90 (2015) and Faith – A Journey for All (2018).
To see our running list of the top 100 greatest rock stars of all time, click here.
