Willie Nelson, Stevie Ray Vaughan, Ray Charles, Radiohead, and Wilco all played the same little TV show in Austin, Texas.
Trailer for “A Song for You: The Austin City Limits Story”
You Can’t Make This Sh!t Up
- Willie Nelson wasn’t ACL’s first performer! B.W. Stevenson taped the first show, but the crowd was so small that producers scrapped it. Willie took the stage the next day and made TV history.
- Townes Van Zandt battled drugs and alcohol while playing ACL. The singer behind “Pancho and Lefty” could be brilliant one minute and barely hold it together the next.
Watch “A Song for You: The Austin City Limits Story”
You can find “A Song for You: The Austin City Limits Story” on Prime Video.
You can also look for a free version on YouTube.
Ratings:
- My Rating: 93/100
- IMDb Rating: 7.3/10
Director’s Note: Keith Maitland directed this 96-minute documentary. He’s also known for “Tower” (2016), an animated documentary about the 1966 University of Texas tower shooting.
Release Date: 2016 (world premiere at South by Southwest in Austin, Texas).
Other Unique Stuff
- ACL started in a tiny college TV studio. It held just a few hundred fans. Today, the show tapes in a 2,750-seat theater.
- Stevie Ray Vaughan played ACL in 1983, the same year his first album, “Texas Flood,” came out. He died in a helicopter crash just seven years later, at age 35.
- A small PBS show led to a huge music festival. The Austin City Limits Music Festival began in 2002 and grew into one of America’s biggest music events.
Wrap Up:
Willie Nelson. Stevie Ray Vaughan. Ray Charles. The rare live footage alone makes “A Song for You: The Austin City Limits Story” worth watching. But the real magic is how a tiny Texas TV crew turned a shoestring show into a music institution that’s still rocking 50 years later.
Thanks for reading!
Heather Fenty, Guest Writer, Daily Doc