Jack Clement: “When I Dream”

I’m not going to even write about this.

This is the start of Jack’s inspired – even more to the point, inspiring – set at the “Cowboy Jack Clement Tribute Concert” on January 30.

I wrote about it, and included my introductory remarks, in my February 4 post – so just scroll down the website if you want to read more about it. And as a surprising (and truly heartening) update to that post: Jack has just been named as one of the three 2013 inductees in the County Music Hall of Fame.

But see if you don’t find this as heartbreaking as Eddy Arnold did when he heard Jack perform the song in his residency at the Country Music Hall of Fame a few years ago. Eddy Arnold was in tears – and I don’t think there was anyone at the Tribute Concert who was any less moved.

Jack has often been depicted as a Shakespearean clown – maybe even a tragic clown. But here he simply reveals himself as an artist who has never been afraid to bare his soul. Sometimes. At his own discretion.

Wait for the concert film for the full stereoscopic version of Jack’s haunting set (not to mention all the other genuinely moving performances), but for now this will just have to do. And it does.