Johnny Cash announced Monday that he is ill with Parkinson's disease, a degenerative nerve disorder that causes muscle tremors and weakness. Although he was performing as recently as Saturday night, he has canceled his book tour to promote "Cash: The Autobiography" and postponed a tour that began three weeks ago and was supposed to run through mid-December.
\\Cash, 65, first spoke about the disease publicly at his Saturday night concert in Flint, Mich., according to an Associated Press report. When he was having trouble during the show, the singer told the audience he had Parkinson's. At first, many in the audience thought he was making a joke, but Cash said he was serious. "It's all right," he said. "I refuse to give it some ground in my life."
\\The only performer inducted into both the Country Music Hall of Fame and the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, Cash first made a name for himself blending the two genres at Sun Records, the label that launched Elvis Presley. After recording such hits as "Folsom Prison Blues" and "I Walk the Line," Cash signed with Columbia in 1958. Over the years, he has worked with various rock acts, including Bob Dylan (on Dylan's 1969 album, "Nashville Skyline") and U2 (on "The Wanderer," a track on their 1993 record, "Zooropa").
\\Although his hits were fewer and farther between after he left Columbia for Mercury in the mid-eighties, Cash experienced a creative and commercial comeback after signing with American Recordings in the early nineties. On an album of the same name, produced by label chief Rick Rubin, Cash returned to the simple, stripped-down sound that marked his biggest successes. On that album and 1996's "Unchained," Cash recorded several songs written by alternative and hard rock acts, including Soundgarden ("Rusty Cage"), Beck ("Rowboat") and Glenn Danzig ("Thirteen").
\\Although there is no cure for Parkinson's, its symptoms can be treated, and Cash expects to make up the concerts he postponed. "Johnny feels confident that once the Parkinson's is medically stabilized, he can res