Whether your campfire is burning next to a lake in Minnesota, a glade in Florida, or atop of a Montana mountain, you are enjoying a front row seat to the greatest show on earth-the beauty of this land. Besides good company, good food, we’d all agree good music undoubtedly takes the experience up a notch or two.

We fall in love to songs. We lay those we love to rest to music that comforts our wounded souls. We rock our children to sleep to tunes they will recall their entire lives. We are manipulated by music to spend our money, pursue our mates, and would we know how to feel watching a movie without a soundtrack to guide our way?

When we ventured out of the swamp, our cave, a tree, it use to be to get music to the campfire you’d need to fashion a lute, something to bang on or something to strum. You could lug a windup phonograph around I suppose. It was the transistor radio that brought the game, the weather report, the Beatles to campfires from coast to coast. My first boom box rocked the night. Thirty pounds of batteries—perhaps I exaggerate a smidge—you were guaranteed a couple of hours of play be it by 8-track, cassette or shiny silver CD discs. Now, a devise a bit bigger than a pack of gum or your phone can provide your campsite with days of good tunes!

For those who show-up this 4th of July to the fire without a banjo on your knee, to celebrate our freedom might I recommend my Patriotic Country Camping Playlist. It contains tracks from some of my favorites including:

• Toby Keith
• Jason Aldean
• Kenny Chesney
• Brooks & Dunn
• Johnny Cash
• Billy Ray Cyrus
• Chely Wright
• Waylon Jennings
• Trace Adkins
• Charlie Daniels
• Aaron Tippin
• Lee Greenwood
• Alan Jackson
• Phil Vassar

I hope you enjoy!