Story Behind the Song: 'Wildfire' by Michael Martin Murphey

"She comes down from Yellow Mountain/ On a dark, flat land she rides/ On a pony she named Wildfire."

So begins the vivid tale told in "Wildfire," the 1975 hit Michael Martin Murphey recorded and co-wrote with Larry Cansley.

Murphey took inspiration from a ghost story his grandfather told him. He shared the "Story Behind the Song" with Bart Herbison of Nashville Songwriters Association International.

Bart Herbison: Every time I'm around you, I think of my blessings. Because when this song came out, I was a DJ at a 250-watt AM radio station in Paris, Tennessee. I got in trouble all the time. We had a program director that wanted to stick to the playlist, and we'd always spin "Wildfire" and "Carolina in the Pines" back to back. So, take us back to "Wildfire" and how that was written. What's it about? 

MMM: I think I was 23 years old. It took me over 40 years to figure out what "Wildfire" is about, and I still don't totally understand the song. It came to me in a dream. I do know that there's a legend that was told around the Southwest about a horse that could never be captured, and that horse represented freedom and escape.  

BH: Your inner spirit, really.  

MMM: If you will. Yeah. My grandfather was a storyteller. My earliest memories are sitting on the front porch listening to him tell stories. He's from Kentucky and came to Texas to be a cowboy and have a cattle ranch. That was their culture. At the end of the night, instead of watching television or turning on the radio, they would sit on the front porch and tell jokes and stories.

I did finally recall, when I was a little boy there, this ghost story that was told about a horse that can never be captured. But there was no girl in it. It wasn't exactly the dream that I had, but it was about the ghost horse. I guess what I dreamed was just kind of fleshing out the old legend. ...

I also remember liking the Book of Revelation better than any other book in the Bible, and there's a vision that's mentioned in the Book of Revelation where John says, "When Jesus comes back, he's going to be riding a white horse."

That makes perfect sense to a cowboy. I'm glad, because that means there are going to be horses in heaven, right? So, this legend is that this horse can never be captured. He's out there on the range and the mustangers are trying to capture him, bring him down. Rather than be killed or captured, he leaps over a chasm into the darkness and then comes back as a ghost. He does this over and over and over. When he comes back as a ghost, what he's doing is to take people away from hard times. They can get on this horse's back, sort of like Pegasus ... and they can take you right away from all their troubles. Kind of indicating also that maybe the only way they're ever going to get out of their hard times is for their spirit to be carried away.  

BH: While that story is so specific and paints such a visual picture, I have always found it's also a favorite song of my family and my friends that will come on. Somehow it twists a little personal for every listener. What they need, they seem to find. I've found it for six decades, Michael. Whatever I need, in here I find.  

MMM: I'm glad you brought that up because that's my favorite form of songwriting, writing in such a way that the listener can read into it a little bit more than what you read into it, or even change the total meaning. You can't believe how many people have come up to me and told me their version of "Wildfire." For years and years, I would never name a horse Wildfire. ... I didn't wanna spoil what other people thought Wildfire looked like.

BH: You did name a horse Wildfire.

MMM: I never thought I would. I ran into this little Palomino filly. Her color was as golden as the sun. You could take a gold coin on a bright, clean, cloudy day and put it right next to her coat and the coin would melt into the color of her coat. That's the definition of a great Palomino. Plus, she just had a disposition.

By that time, I had started developing a show where I go out and sing songs on horseback with a wireless microphone. When I sang "Wildfire," I always explained this is my horse, Pappy Jack, or this is my horse, Thunderbolt. I'd probably never name a horse Wildfire, but when I met that horse, I knew that was the one. I called her Miss Wildfire. She lived to be 25 years old. She was probably the best mind of any horse I've ever ridden. You could ride her in a parade. You could ride her in the arena around fireworks, guns going off. As long as you let her know that you were there, she trusted you.

That's very rare for a horse. Horses, like people, get a mind of their own sometimes. So, if you can ever meld the two minds together, it was definitely melded in the case of that horse. I'll just tell you at the end of her life, she was in a pasture in Wisconsin where I was living up there with my daughter who had lived in Wisconsin. I had moved to Colorado by then.

I knew I couldn't ride her anymore, so I said, "I'll just let her be the grandkids' horse and let her have a nice life out in the pasture."

She had a few problems with lameness. I got a phone call and it was Jessica. She said, "Dad, this afternoon Miss Wildfire walked off into the corner of the pasture far enough away where she knew that we couldn't reach her and she laid down on her side."

Which, in horsemanship, means she was cast. ... What happens is, if a horse can't get up when it's cast, it's going to pass. It's going to die, because of the way they breathe. She was dying and she knew it, so she intentionally laid down. She was not in good health, so the last act of that horse was to spare us the pain of having to put her down. So, there are going to be horses in heaven. I know I'm going to see her again.

That song has led me down so many paths and it's been so good for me. It really was what justified me making the "Cowboy Songs" album and getting into the cowboy music side of country music. I had a justification because of the song "Wildfire," because cowboys liked the song. We'd be here all day if I told you all the pathways that I'd gone down, but without that song, my life just wouldn't have been the same.  

About the series

In partnership with Nashville Songwriters Association International, "Story Behind the Song" features Nashville-connected songwriters discussing one of their compositions.