Thank God I'm a Country Boy

John Sommers, who played guitar, banjo, fiddle and mandolin in Denver's band, wrote it on New Year's Eve 1973 while driving from his home in Aspen to Los Angeles. He said he felt peaceful, happy and content and began scribbling notes about it along the way. The studio version is on Back Home Again, and the fiddle breaks quote the old-time tune Sally Goodin.

A live recording made on 26 August 1974 at the Universal Amphitheatre in Los Angeles appears on An Evening with John Denver. Released as a single in 1975, it reached number one on the Hot Country Singles chart on 31 May and on the Hot 100 a week later. It is one of six songs released in 1975 that topped both charts. Denver's 1977 television special took its title from the song.

Live and covers

The Baltimore Orioles have played it in the seventh inning stretch since the summer of 1975. Denver sang it on top of the Orioles dugout in Game 1 of the 1983 World Series and again on 20 September 1997, 22 days before his death. Billy Dean took a cover to number 27 on the country chart in 2004, Hampton the Hampster reached number 12 in Australia with it in 2001, and Alvin and the Chipmunks recorded it in 1981. Dolly Parton has sung a bluegrass arrangement in concert and on her 1970s variety show.