Guitar,Piano,Vocal,Voice - Level 4 - Digital Download SKU: A0.1425031 By Johnny Cash. By Stan Jones. Arranged by John Fries. 20th Century,Country,Folk,Pop,Standards. Score. 3 pages. John Fries #1005925. Published by John Fries (A0.1425031). TYPE JOHN FRIES IN THE SEARCH BAR TO SEE ALL I HAVE TO OFFER. Thanks, John. (Ghost) Riders in the Sky: A Cowboy Legend is a cowboy-styled country/western song written in 1948 by American songwriter, film and television actor Stan Jones. A number of versions were crossover hits on the pop charts in 1949, the most successful being by Vaughn Monroe. The song tells a folk tale of a cowboy who has a vision of red-eyed, steel-hooved cattle thundering across the sky, being chased by the spirits of damned cowboys. One warns him that if he does not change his ways, he will be doomed to join them, forever trying to catch the Devil's herd across these endless skies. The story has been linked with old European myths of the Wild Hunt and the Dutch/Flemish legend of the Buckriders, in which a supernatural group of hunters passes the narrator in wild pursuit.
