Magnolia Wind
by Guy Clark and Shawn Camp
“It has a charm about it … there’s something about the lilt and the sentiment in that song that quiets an audience. I don’t understand it, but it’s there,” said Shawn Camp of his cowrite with Guy Clark, “Magnolia Wind.”
That charm of the song’s melody and lyrics has organically worked its way into our culture. You’ll hear “Magnolia Wind” played from stages and in living rooms alike, and it has been recorded by various artists since being written in 2002, including versions by Clark (The Dark, 2002), Camp (Live At the Station Inn, 2003), John Prine and Emmlyou Harris (This One’s for Him: A Tribute to Guy Clark,2011), and Mountain Fever Records artist Amanda Cook (Deep Water, 2017).
While the song and its story have been around for a good while, Cook first heard it in 2017 at a bluegrass jam. “This event in Henderson, Alabama, has been going on for 40 years,” she said of the semi-local-to-home jam that she used to attend regularly and still tries to get to when her tour schedule allows. “One night, in the wee hours of the morning, I walked up on Jared Dailey singing ‘Magnolia Wind.’ Jared is an incredible guitar player and singer, and he puts the soul into a song. I hadn’t heard it before, and the way he sang it, I thought he must have written it. After listening, I asked him, ‘Did you write that? Where did that come from?!’ He told me it was a Guy Clark/Shawn Camp song and that I should look it up.”
The moment she arrived home, Cook made a beeline to her office to do just that. She laughed as she recalled for us how her husband reacted to her playing music after she’d been gone jamming for four days. “Dennis had been cutting grass and was in the shower when I got home,” said Cook. “I dropped my suitcase, put my guitar up in the key of E, and started working up the song. When he came in, he said, ‘Gosh, haven’t you had enough?’
“I tell that story on stage a lot because when I heard Jared putting his spin on it, that’s what drew me to the song, but then the words are so beautiful, and it’s such a descriptive love song. When I perform it, I dedicate it to Dennis. I think about him and how I wouldn’t want to live this life – especially the musician life – without him. When we went in to record it, it fell down so naturally. We didn’t make it a single, but it’s still highly requested.”
The Back Story: One Song Leads to Another
A love song for sure, “Magnolia Wind” was a spin-off of sorts. It derived from a song Clark and Camp first wrote, “Sis Draper,” about a traveling fiddler from Arkansas. As the late Clark once explained (Goldminemag.com), “After we wrote ‘Sis Draper,’ it occurred to each of us almost simultaneously that we could write songs about each character in ‘Sis Draper,’” he said. “The rest just sort of evolved … ‘Magnolia Wind’ is a made-up song about some boy who’s in love with Sis.’”
Camp added that “Magnolia Wind” turned out to be one of a dozen related songs. “It has some fantasy in it, but Sis Draper was a real, live person from Perry County, Arkansas,” he said, describing Draper as a beloved friend to his family. “She was already a superstar in my mind when I met her because my grandpa and my Uncle Cleve always bragged about her. Actually, the first autograph I ever signed was for Sis. She asked me for my autograph when I was about eight years old. I thought, ‘I don’t have an autograph … wait, what’s an autograph?’”
The Writing: A Profitable Bull Session
Camp and Clark’s writing sessions typically started with coffee and conversation. “Generally, he had a cigarette going, and he always had a new guitar he had built,” Camp reminisced. “I’d be playing one of his guitars … and I don’t know, when you’re in that frame of mind of writing songs, sometimes good things happen, and the melodies just come out. That’s the kind of environment it was. We’d shoot the bull and just talk our way into whatever we were writing that day.”
Shawn Camp is a name you know, a voice you’ve heard. He has written successfully for himself and other artists in country, bluegrass, Americana, and other genres. In bluegrass alone, besides Cook, there’s Del McCoury (“My Love Will Not Change”), Ricky Skaggs (“Sis Draper”), Junior Sisk (“The Guilt Was Gone”), Don Rigsby (“Hillbilly Heartache”) and many more. Just this past year, Camp’s song “A Beautiful Time” was the title cut on Willie Nelson’s Grammy-winning album. A bold singer and performer in his own right, Camp is lead singer for the Earls of Leicester and a multi-instrumentalist who has toured with Clark, Prine, Jerry Reed, Trisha Yearwood, Alan Jackson, and the Osborne Brothers. He is a repeat nominee for the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame and a two-time winner of the IBMA Male Vocalist of the Year. Camp also co-produced the aforementioned This One’s for Him: A Tribute to Guy Clark. A massive labor of love, the project won Americana Album of the Year (2012) and featured contributions from 34 amazing artists.
Clark is a household name and a legendary artist and songwriter. He was a Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame Member (2004), a Grammy-winner (2014, My Favorite Picture of You, also co-produced by Camp), and an Academy of Country Music Poet’s Award honoree. His songs have been recorded by a who’s who of renowned artists that include Nelson, Harris, Rodney Crowell, Lyle Lovett, Johnny Cash, and many more.
That day, as these award-winning writers got in the zone, they began dreaming out loud about Sis Draper and her life and loves. As for how they got to that famous hook, Camp offered, “Picture a dance hall setting, with magnolia trees all around outside. The lights are strung up, it’s a perfect evening, and that magnolia scent is on the breeze. That mental picture was in my mind.”
From such inspiration came loving, longing lines leading into the hook: It’s once in a lifetime and it won’t come again / It’s here and it’s gone on a magnolia wind. There’s a touch of sentimental wit here and there (i.e., lil’ ol cold feet … lonesome stew), and then there’s that final, heart-tugging chorus with its lilting, charm-filled melody: I’d rather not walk through the garden again / if I can’t catch your scent on a magnolia wind.
As part of the Sis Draper series of songs, “Magnolia Wind” is, technically, about a boy so deep in love that he would sooner give up daily comforts and even sustenance than the one he loves. That said, the song is a perfect example of how a great song can resonate differently with each listener. “Everybody takes what they take from it,” said Cook, who took it as a sweet love song to her husband. For Camp, it’s an honest love story and a sweet reminder of his family, fiddles, and Guy Clark. “It’s a song that hits close to home for me,” said Camp. “I’ll always love performing it. Some songs are that way, you find one that touches you every time and that one does.”
