BITTER SWEET, Ky. — Whenever someone asks me about my occupation, I’m inclined to tell them I’m a story teller more than anything else. That is what I actually do and that is really what most songwriters do; they tell stories.

Some do it better than others and while often the best songwriters stay behind the stage, one of the best, in my opinion, is as unique a performer as he is a songwriter.

Tom T. Hall, a fellow Kentuckian from a small town in the East Mountains is such a prolific writer, he reminds me of a painter. I could always see the picture he painted in every song he recorded.

Hall got his musical start at home in Olive Hill, Ky. playing bluegrass at local events. But writing was something he always did, first as poetry and then with music.

While he had some successes in the early 1960s, it was a song he wrote, which was performed by a relative newcomer named Jeannie C. Riley, that ignited his career. Harper Valley PTA proved to be a monster hit winning the Country Music Assoc.’s single of the year in 1968. And the rest, as they say, is history.

Hall would go on to be quite popular through the 1970s with such hits as Old Dogs, Children and Watermelon Wine, I Love and The Year that Clayton Delaney Died – a song Hall wrote about his boyhood hero.

It was those life experiences he wrote about with such great detail that brought his music to life.

While I saw Hall perform several times, I never got to meet him; but I did have the good fortune to know one of his early fellow musicians, Curley Jarvis.

We became good friends and Curley often told me stories about Hall, the mountain town where they grew up and the music we all loved so much.

Curley passed away a few years ago; and I miss him, but his stories have stayed with me as have the stories Hall has given us through his music and the songs he wrote for others. I guess his music means more to me because of Curley.

As I sit here writing this column, I’m hard pressed to know of anyone else who writes the way Hall does. Don’t get me wrong, there are many great writers out there but few writer-painters.

While he has been retired for a number of years, Hall’s songs live on as does the memory of Curley Jarvis. I never think of one without thinking of the other.

Tom T., you get an A in my class; and Curley, you get a wave from me to Heaven whenever I pass through Olive Hill.

Bluegrass Johnson comes from a long line of country music performers and enjoys a passion for the rhythm and melody. From the hills of Kentucky, he will offer his opinions on a variety of new country music each week. Readers with questions or comments may write to Johnson in care of this publication.