Charlie Daniels, whose music had broad roots and flowered across genres, dies in Nashville at 83

Daniels in 2019 (Photo by Alan Poizner, the Tennessean)

Charlie Daniels, a versatile musician and songwriter who was one of the rockingest members of the Country Music Hall of Fame, died Monday in Nashville of a hemorrhagic stroke. He was 83.

Years before the Charlie Daniels Band had a No. 1 hit in 1979 with “The Devil Went Down to Georgia,” the Wilmington, N.C., native "had long established a remarkable, multifaceted career in Nashville," the Tennessean notes. "As a session musician, he played on three of Bob Dylan’s albums — including the revolutionary 'Nashville Skyline' — as well as recordings for Ringo Starr and Leonard Cohen. He was a fixture of the touring circuit for the next 40 years, became a tireless advocate for servicemen and women, and entered the information age as one of country music's most outspoken conservative voices."

The broad roots of his music were illustrated by the Volunteer Jam, the freewheeling Southern music festival that he started in 1974, featuring Roy Acuff, Stevie Ray Vaughn, James Brown and the Marshall Tucker Band," Bill Friskics-Warren notes in The New York Times. "Modeled after the Allman Brothers, another regular act at the Jam, Mr. Daniels’s band used dual lead guitarists and dual drummers in the service of an expansive improvisational sound that included elements of country, blues, bluegrass, rock and Western swing."

From "Uneasy Rider" and "Long Haired Country Boy," mid-1970s songs that embraced marijuana, Daniels did "Devil" and "In America," the first of many patriotic numbers. He trended toward country and gospel music in his later years, joining the Grand Ole Opry in 2008 and the country hall of fame in 2016. The hall's CEO, Kyle Young, told the Tennessean, "His music fused the immediacy of Southern rock with the classic country storytelling that he heard as a child. He brought new audiences to country music, pointing people to the sources even as he explored the edges."

Deal Funeral Directors of Statesboro, Ga., is handling arrangements and says it is "hosting a register signing Tuesday-Friday 9-3 this week for fans of Charlie Daniels to come by and sign."