Keith Carradine

Having earned an Academy Award for his original song “I’m Easy,” actor Keith Carradine launched a brief venture into recording. The San Mateo, California native, born August 8, 1949, as the son of actor John Carradine, first picked up guitar in a bluegrass ensemble at age fourteen and simultaneously began appearing in school productions. He enrolled in theater studies at Colorado State University yet left after one semester, heading back to the Los Angeles area and securing a part in the Broadway company of Hair. After roughly twelve months in New York he returned to Los Angeles and made his film debut in the 1970 feature A Gunfight. Director Robert Altman soon spotted him and gave him a role in the 1971 film McCabe and Mrs. Miller. While starring in Altman’s subsequent picture Thieves Like Us, the director became aware of Carradine’s songwriting, leading to a featured part as a country performer in the 1975 ensemble film Nashville, where several of his compositions appeared on the soundtrack. The track “I’m Easy” captured the Academy Award for Best Song; Carradine’s single, issued by Asylum Records, reached the pop Top Ten. Capitalizing on that momentum, he released the album I’m Easy in 1976 and the follow-up Lost & Found in 1978 before concentrating once more on screen work. In 1991 he reentered musical theater by originating the lead in The Will Rogers Follies, earning a Tony nomination, and three years later he provided narration for the children’s video Annie Oakley. Collector's Choice paired I’m Easy and Lost & Found on a two-fer disc in 2004.