Glen Campbell: I’ll Be Me
County-music legend Glen Campbell was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease in June of 2011. The diagnosis could have ended his career. Instead, Campbell and his family made the news public. Then they hit the road with what was to be a short musical farewell, entitled Glen Campbell’s Goodbye Tour. The tour was supposed to take three weeks. Instead, Campbell ended up playing 151 sold-out shows over 425 days, from Carnegie Hall to the Hollywood Bowl.
How did he do it? “The audience being there somehow triggers his ability to access that [musical] part of his brain,” says U2 guitarist The Edge in the movie about the tour, Glen Campbell: I’ll Be Me. The Edge’s explanation is probably as good as any; what is indisputable is that the man who recorded Rhinestone Cowboy, Wichita Lineman, Galveston and By the Time I Get to Phoenix, among many other indelible recordings, rose to the musical occasion with pluck and true grit. I’ll Be Me tracks Campbell on and offstage, features commentary by musicians who know him, including Paul McCartney, Bruce Springsteen, Vince Gill, Jimmy Webb – who wrote many of Campbell’s greatest hits, including Lineman, Phoenix and others – and offers a close-up look at the singer and his family as they navigate a difficult diagnosis. (“It’s a rough, rough disease,” Springsteen says in the film. For Campbell “to be out there rolling the dice” in front of an audience night after night “is pretty brave.”) The film opens Friday, October 24 in New York and Nashville, and soon goes nationwide. It should be of particular interest to residents of this region – True Grit, the 1969 Western starring Campbell and John Wayne, was filmed around Ridgway – as well as anyone who loves his music or whose family has been touched by Alzheimer’s (I’m in all three of those groups). Volunteers of America, which is working with the documentary’s producers to raise awareness of Alzheimer’s-type dementia and its challenges for patients and caregivers, hosts three advance screening events of I’ll Be Me in Montrose, Telluride and Delta this weekend, on Friday at the Pavilion (6 p.m.), Saturday at the Nugget (1:30 p.m.) and Sunday at the Delta Center for the Performing Arts (also 1:30). There is no charge to attend. Contact VOA’s Regional Marketing Coordinator Erin Berge by phone at 970/275-1220 or email (
eberge@voa.org) if you’re interested in will call tickets. To learn more about VOA, visit voavalidation.com.