To Serenade the Stars Trivia Quiz

Answer:

Henry John Deutschendorf, Jr., born in 1943 in Roswell, New Mexico, was one of two sons born to U.S. Air Force officer, Henry John "Dutch" Deutschendorf and Oklahoman Erma Louise Swope. His grandmother gave him a 1910 Gibson "F-hole" acoustic jazz guitar when he was about 11 years old, the same one she had played. That started him on the road to a career in music. He took lessons on guitar, and joined a boys' choir. He moved to Los Angeles when he was 20 and changed his surname to Denver, the capital city of Colorado, his favourite state. Here he joined the Mitchell Trio as lead singer; this 1960s group sang folk songs including some of Denver's early compositions. Peter, Paul and Mary recorded Denver's song "Leaving On A Jet Plane", their first and only number one hit.

In 2002, Denver was posthumously inducted into the Colorado Performing Arts Hall of Fame, after his death when the home-made light plane he was piloting crashed in the sea off Monterey, California, in 1997. Just a few months before he died, he wrote to his mother, saying, "I wouldn't have been the man I am, nor would I sing the way I do nor would I have written the songs without the influence and inspiration you have been to me. God bless the day you were born."

John Denver's philosophy, which aptly expresses the sentiment of "This Old Guitar", is summed up in this quote: "Music does bring people together. It allows us to experience the same emotions. People everywhere are the same in heart and spirit. No matter what language we speak, what colour we are, the form of our politics or the expression of our love and our faith, music proves we are the same."

The "lovely lady" mentioned in "This Old Guitar" is Annie Martell, also the subject of arguably his most famous ballad, "Annie's Song". He married Annie in 1967 but they were divorced in 1982. "This Old Guitar" first appeared as the last track on Denver's eighth album "Back Home Again" in 1974, and was one of this author's favourites.