Song in the Storm – Lyle Lovett & Michael Martin Murphey Return to Kerrville to Give Back
The Event: Homecoming with a Purpose
Kerrville, Texas is more than just a dot on the map. For country and folk legends Lyle Lovett and Michael Martin Murphey, it’s where stories began — dusty roads, open skies, and songs that stretched beyond the hills.
But in August 2025, those hills were flooded. Heavy rains turned creeks into raging rivers, washing away roads, barns, and memories.
So when word spread that Lovett and Murphey were returning home for a special benefit concert called “Song in the Storm,” it didn’t just feel like an event. It felt like a reunion, a reckoning, and a rescue.
The show took place at the Cailloux Theater, restored after floodwaters nearly breached its lobby weeks before. Outside, sandbags still lined sidewalks. Inside, rows of families, ranchers, and lifelong locals filled every seat, some of them having lost everything.
Murphey took the stage first — silver hair beneath a felt hat, voice as steady as the land he sang about. He talked about growing up in nearby Oak Cliff, about the river that gave them life now taking it away, and about how music has always been a first response long before FEMA arrives.
Lovett joined him later, the two trading verses, stories, and smiles. But no moment hit harder than when Murphey introduced a song he hadn’t played live in years — “Geronimo’s Cadillac.”
The Song: “Geronimo’s Cadillac” – A Protest, A Prayer, A Warning
Released in 1972, “Geronimo’s Cadillac” was one of the earliest country protest songs to ever find commercial success.
Written with Charles Quarto, the song is a deeply poetic metaphor — using the image of the U.S. government giving a car to the Apache leader Geronimo, only to deny him the road to drive it on.
“Oh, they put Geronimo in a Cadillac…
But they don’t make cars like that no more…”
But beneath the metaphor is something achingly relevant today: how we often give with one hand, and take with the other.
How power can feel generous — but still leave people stranded.
That night in Kerrville, the song wasn’t about Geronimo anymore.
It was about Texas.
It was about farmers promised relief that hadn’t arrived.
It was about towns that felt left behind — even when the news cameras had moved on.
Murphey didn’t shout the lyrics.
He whispered them.
And in that whisper, people heard themselves: the broken promises, the quiet resilience, the weary but unbroken spirit.
As he finished, there was no polite applause.
There was something quieter — a stillness, a reckoning. A moment of understanding shared by hundreds.
And then, with a deep breath, Murphey said:
“If they can’t drive the Cadillac, we’ll build a new road.”