Carolyn Dawn Johnson recently sat down with Top Country to dish about her favourite things. Here’s your chance to get to know CDJ.
Q
What are your top three favourite foods?
A
Pretty much any kind of potatoes, filet mignon, crème brulee
Q
What is your all-time favourite quote?
A
“You Can If You Think You Can”
Q
What’s a song you wish you wrote?
A
‘The Song Remembers When’ -Trisha Yearwood; ‘What Matters Most’ -Ty Herndon; ‘You Lie’ -Reba; ‘If I Ever Lose My Faith’ -Sting; ‘I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For’ -U2; ‘I Thought That He Walked On Water’ -Randy Travis; ‘The House That Built Me’ -Miranda Lambert (just to name a few of the hundreds I wish I would’ve wrote)
Q
Who are your three favourite songwriters?
A
Matraca Berg, Walt Aldridge, Charlie Black (& Sting, Bono, Bruce Springsteen, Gary Burr, Allan Shamblin, Alanis Morisette, Joni Mitchell…..too many to choose from)
Q
Who are your three favorite authors?
A
Malcolm Gladwell, Dr. Seuss, Napolean Hill
Q
Elvis or Hank? Why?
A
Elvis – what’s not to love about him? I love his voice and the diversity of the material he has sung. Realistically, it’s probably his personality and charisma that really draws me to him. Overall, it seems that Elvis was a pretty spectacular human being and that really makes me love him.
Q
Sweet or salty?
A
Depends on what day you catch me.
Q
Mountain or beach?
A
Beach.
Q
Top 3 favourite movies?
A
Shawshank Redemption, Gorillas In the Mist, The Notebook
Q
What is your favourite thing to do with your kids?
A
Pretty much everything!!!! I guess if I have to choose, it’d be Snuggling……by itself, or in combination with reading books, talking, or watching a child’s movie.
Q
What are your 3 biggest pet peeves?
A
Packing, delayed flights, rude & judgemental people who often force their opinions on others and can’t see any other side.
Q
Songwriting or playing live?
A
Depends on if I’m writing a great song or a not so great one, and also depends on if I’m having a rockin’ or mutual respect kind of night with the audience or not. They both have their enormous value, and can take me to a very high place, but they are different highs.
Q
Best childhood memory?
A
It’s so hard to remember childhood things…..some of the things I can kind of remember were back on our farm in Deadwood….playing hide and seek or tag in our big pile of round hay bails with my brothers. My brothers and I wearing our rubber boots and having boat races in the flooded water in our backyard, caused by the melted snow in the spring. Also, playing with and helping raise many litters of cats.I loved it when our animals on the farm had babies. I named every piglet, calf, kitty…
Q
Favourite career moment?
A
Too many to just say one. Seriously, I’ve had some great moments. Here’s a few…..singing the encore songs onstage alongside Reba McEntire, Martina McBride, Sara Evans and Jamie O’Neal on the Girls Night Out Tour, The CCMA awards night Sept 10th, 2001, receiving the Top New Female Vocalist Award at the Academy of Country Music Awards, interviewing K.D. Lang, meeting & talking with Merle Haggard when I opened for him, being introduced by my friend Brad Paisley on the Opry for the first time, singing a duet on the Opry with Charley Pride…..wow, I actually am going to stop….but I have many , many more….
Q
If you were stranded on a desert island, what 3 records would you want with you?
A
Vivaldi- Four Seasons, Patty Loveless- When Fallen Angels Fly, Tom Petty- Full Moon Fever
Q
If you could be anything besides a country music singer, what would you be?
A
A Music Teacher, A Childbirth Educator, A Midwife
Q
If you could meet anyone, alive or dead, who would it be?
A
This sounds like such a cop out, but it’s true…..God….and I’d have a lot of questions….
Q
What is the best advice you were ever given?
A
Sing and sing until you find your own voice.
Q
What song you are most proud of writing?
A
These questions are almost impossible for me, I’m terrible at making these kind of decisions, I can’t narrow down to just one…..I’m proud of every song I write…..I just like some more than others.
