Guy Clark — Monahans, Texas Origins

Guy Clark was born on November 6, 1941, in Rockport, Texas, and grew up in Monahans in Ward County in the Permian Basin — an oil-patch town in the vast flat desert of west Texas that gave him the landscapes and characters that populate his songs. Clark is the songwriter's songwriter: his compositions — 'Desperados Waiting for a Train,' 'L.A. Freeway,' 'Dublin Blues,' 'Homegrown Tomatoes,' 'Randall Knife,' 'The Cape' — are models of literary precision and emotional restraint that have been recorded by Emmylou Harris, Jerry Jeff Walker, Ricky Skaggs, and dozens of others. He was the centre of the Austin and Nashville outlaw country scenes without quite belonging to either.

Clark moved to Houston as a young man and absorbed the Texas folk scene before settling in Nashville in the early 1970s, where he and his wife Susanna became the hub of a songwriting community that included Townes Van Zandt, Steve Earle, Rodney Crowell, and Nanci Griffith. His home on Doyal Street in Nashville was an informal salon where musicians gathered to play, drink, and argue about songs. His own recording output was modest — he was always more interested in the craft of the song than in commercial success — but his influence on a generation of singer-songwriters is incalculable.

Monahans is in Ward County in west Texas, on Interstate 20 between Midland and El Paso. The Monahans Sandhills State Park, with its dramatic dune landscape, is nearby. Clark died in Nashville in May 2016. His grave is in Nashville; his legacy is the extraordinary body of songs he left behind.