There's a new rider in the sky, and the skies are blue over Kornfield Kounty.
Roy Clark —a legendary superpicker, Country Music Hall of Fame-er, Grand Ole Opry member and co-host of the Hee Haw television series — has died at his home in Tulsa, Oklahoma.
A press release said Clark, who was 85, succumbed to complications from pneumonia. To many, Clark was one of the most sincere personalities in country music. He was, unarguably, one of the genre's first crossover stars and never took for granted the stardom he achieved late in life (major success didn't come until he was 30 and Clark often found himself guest hosting for Johnny Carson on The Tonight Show).
“A TV camera goes right through your soul,” Clark once said about being on Hee Haw for 24 years. “If you’re a bad person, people pick that up. I’m a firm believer in smiles. I used to believe that everything had to be a belly laugh. But I’ve come to realize that a real sincere smile is mighty powerful.”
Watch a Hee Haw episode with Mel Tillis and Buck Owens below.
This article appears in Nov 15-22, 2018.