Country Music

Classic Country Music Hits

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LORETTA LYNN WAS WARNED THAT ONE KISS ON CAMERA COULD END HER CAREER IN COUNTRY MUSIC. SHE DID IT ANYWAY. She told this one on herself, years later, in Coal Miner’s Daughter. Her daddy, she wrote, was color-blind two ways: he couldn’t tell certain shades apart, and he couldn’t see color in people either. So when the folks around her explained that kissing Charley Pride on national television would hurt her standing with country fans, it didn’t land as advice. It made her mad. She already knew the story of a girl singer whose career got wrecked down South over one small peck on camera with a Black friend. October 16, 1972, the Ryman. Pride was presenting Female Vocalist of the Year, a year after becoming the first Black artist to win the CMA’s Entertainer of the Year. When Loretta’s name was called, she made sure to give him a big hug and a kiss, right on camera, no hesitation. Nobody canceled her. And if they had, she said, she’d have gone home to her babies and “canned some string beans and the heck with them all.” A few hours later, on that same stage, they named her Entertainer of the Year, over Merle Haggard, Freddie Hart, Jerry Reed, and Pride himself. First woman ever to win it. The room that told her to keep her distance handed her the biggest trophy in the genre before the night was out.

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Loretta Lynn, Charley Pride, and the Kiss That Country Music Thought It Could Police According to Loretta Lynn, somebody once…

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FOUR WEEKS BEFORE THE PLANE WENT DOWN NEAR CAMDEN, PATSY CLINE SPENT FOUR NIGHTS IN A NASHVILLE STUDIO FINISHING AN ALBUM THAT ALREADY HAD A RELEASE DATE — AND THAT NOBODY EVER HEARD THE WAY SHE BUILT IT. She was thirty, and she had finally won. “I Fall to Pieces,” then “Crazy,” then “She’s Got You.” In November 1961 she’d stood on the Carnegie Hall stage with the whole Grand Ole Opry cast, the first and only night she ever played that room. So when she walked into Owen Bradley’s studio on February 4, 1963, with the Jordanaires behind her and ten violinists filling the space, nobody in Nashville treated it as anything but the next step up. Twelve songs in four nights. “Sweet Dreams.” “Faded Love.” A record slated to ship in late March. Jan Howard was standing there when Patsy came out of the back office holding a pressed copy of what they’d just made. She lifted it and said one short sentence about it. To everyone in that room it sounded like a proud singer, nothing more. On March 3 she played a benefit in Kansas City for a hurt disc jockey’s family. Two days later the plane carrying her, Cowboy Copas, Hawkshaw Hawkins and Randy Hughes came down in the woods outside Camden, Tennessee. And that one sentence stopped sounding like pride.

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Four Nights in Nashville, and the Album Patsy Cline Never Got to Hear Finished By early February 1963, Patsy Cline…

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HE LEFT A STOCK CAR RACE BEFORE THE CHECKERED FLAG TO MAKE HIS OPRY SLOT — AND THEN HE REFUSED TO LEAVE THE STAGE. Starting in 1965, Marty Robbins took the last segment of the Grand Ole Opry, an arrangement that let him spend Saturday evening racing at the Nashville Speedway first. He’d come through the Ryman door in a rhinestone Nudie suit with racing grease still under his fingernails, and the crowd loved him more for it. Then came a summer night in 1968. He’d walked away from the race early to get there, only to find the Opry running behind and his own time onstage in jeopardy. He sang his full slot anyway. Then he kept singing. It went over so well that it stopped being a one-night thing: he’d catch the stage manager’s eye, signal for one more song, and then do it all over again, some nights for well past an hour. Here’s what nobody mentions in the retelling. Those extra minutes weren’t free, and they weren’t the Opry’s to hand out. Somebody else in Nashville was paying for every one of them.

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When Marty Robbins Stole a Little Time from the Clock In Nashville, some stories are remembered for the music, and…

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HE RAN 188 MPH IN A CAR THAT QUALIFIED AT 177 — AND THE ONLY REASON ANYONE EVER FOUND OUT IS THAT HE TOLD THEM HIMSELF. On May 7, 1972, Marty Robbins pulled into Talladega for the Winston 500 the way he always did: as a part-timer who paid for his own #42 Dodge Charger with money he made singing. He qualified ninth, around 177 mph, right about where a man like him belonged. Then he spent the afternoon running with Pearson, Baker and Petty, and somebody clocked his Charger at 188. When it was over, an inspector came looking for him. Rookie of the Race, they said, they wanted him for the presentation. Nobody had torn his engine down. Nobody was asking a thing. He told them he couldn’t take it, and asked them to check his carburetor. It cost him the finish, the prize money, and a last-place line in the record book. Robbins said later he walked out of that weekend with friends he hadn’t had on Saturday. His whole explanation came down to the difference between two words, and he never once seemed to think it was a hard choice.

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He Ran 188 MPH in a Car That Qualified at 177 — and the Only Reason Anyone Ever Found Out…

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HE WROTE IT FOR THE TROOPS AND NEVER MEANT TO RECORD IT. TWENTY-FOUR YEARS LATER, IT’S THE BIGGEST HOT 100 HIT OF HIS CAREER. After America’s 250th birthday weekend, Toby Keith’s “Courtesy of the Red, White and Blue (The Angry American)” re-entered the Billboard Hot 100 at No. 11 — higher than anything he ever charted in his lifetime. In one tracking week it pulled 15.3 million official U.S. streams, 2.6 million in airplay audience and 6,000 downloads sold, plus career bests at No. 2 on both Streaming Songs and Digital Song Sales. Back in 2002, the same song stalled at No. 25. “Red Solo Cup” later got him to No. 15. That was his ceiling for more than twenty years. The part that keeps getting left out is that the record almost never existed. Toby wrote the song in the raw months after 9/11 and played it for service members on his USO stops, with no intention of ever taking it into a studio. Then one man heard him do it and said something Toby couldn’t argue his way out of — not a producer, not a label executive. He recorded it. What that man told him is the reason a 24-year-old song is sitting at No. 11 this week.

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The Song Toby Keith Never Meant to Record Became the Biggest Hot 100 Hit of His Career For years, Toby…

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THE QUEEN OF COUNTRY MUSIC DIDN’T CHOOSE HER OWN NAME. HER HUSBAND DID—DURING A MARRIAGE THAT LASTED NEARLY 74 YEARS. In 1937, 18-year-old Muriel Ellen Deason married Johnnie Wright, a cabinetmaker and aspiring musician. He later chose “Kitty Wells” as her stage name, borrowing it from the old ballad “Sweet Kitty Wells.” Country music’s conventional wisdom said women could not sell records or headline shows. By 1952, Wells had decided to stop working and stay home with her family. So why did she agree to walk into Castle Studio for one more session? The song was “It Wasn’t God Who Made Honky Tonk Angels.” It made her the first solo woman to reach No. 1 on Billboard’s country chart and changed what Nashville believed a female singer could achieve. She and Johnnie remained together until his death in 2011. Wells followed less than ten months later. The decision that changed country music began inside a marriage that lasted almost a lifetime.

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The Marriage Behind Kitty Wells and the Song That Changed Country Music Before Kitty Wells became a legend, she was…

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THE DAY AFTER JANIS JOPLIN DIED, KRIS KRISTOFFERSON HEARD HER SING HIS SONG FOR THE FIRST TIME. Joplin had recorded “Me and Bobby McGee” only days before October 4, 1970, during the sessions for Pearl. Kristofferson had been in Peru filming and did not know she had cut it. But what did he do after producer Paul Rothchild played him the tape? He and Joplin had shared a brief romance, and Kristofferson later described their bond as more like brother and sister. In March 1971, her version reached No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100—her only leader on that chart and the second posthumous No. 1 in Hot 100 history. The chart triumph became public. The private aftermath of that first playback is the part most retellings leave behind.

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The Day After Janis Joplin Died, Kris Kristofferson Heard Her Sing “Me and Bobby McGee” When Janis Joplin died on…

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ALAN JACKSON NEVER NEEDED A SPEECH TO MAKE HIS POINT. At the 1994 ACM Awards, producers required “Gone Country” to run over a pre-recorded backing track. Jackson still took the stage, but drummer Bruce Rutherford sat behind the kit without drumsticks. The music continued perfectly, and anyone watching closely could see exactly what was happening. The audience saw the protest. What Jackson could not see was how another quiet stand, five years later, would land inside George Jones’s living room. After Jones declined an invitation to perform a shortened version of “Choices” at the 1999 CMA Awards, Jackson began singing “Pop a Top.” Then he cut his own song short and moved into the chorus of “Choices.” No announcement. No explanation. Just a room rising to its feet—and a reaction at home that gave the moment its lasting weight.

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Alan Jackson Never Needed a Speech to Make His Point Some of the most memorable moments in country music are…

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16 ROUNDS OF CHEMO IN 24 WEEKS, NOT ONE DELAYED — AND SHE CALLED IT “THE HAPPIEST DAY.” Last Thursday at GEODIS Park in Nashville, Thomas Rhett stopped his opening-night show to celebrate someone who wasn’t in the stadium. His sister-in-law Macy Page, 33, was home resting — she’d just rung the bell after her final round of chemo for stage 3 breast cancer. “I love you, Macy, wherever you are,” he said. But what was happening inside that family during those same 24 weeks is where this story turns. Macy still faces surgery, and likely radiation. She says she has peace because the Lord has gone before her. This October, she and her husband Tyler will mark ten years married, with the hardest climb already behind them. Some of the loudest moments in country music never happen on a stage.

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16 Rounds of Chemo in 24 Weeks, and the Day Macy Page Called “The Happiest Day” Some of the most…

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HE SOLD 85 MILLION RECORDS. BUT WHEN SALLY DIED, EDDY ARNOLD ONLY LASTED EIGHT MORE WEEKS. In March 2008, Sally Arnold passed away in a Tennessee hospital at 87. Eight weeks later, on May 8, Eddy Arnold followed her — just one week before his 90th birthday. After 66 years of marriage, he simply didn’t stay long in a world without her. Rewind to 1940. A young singer named Eddy Arnold was performing in Louisville with Pee Wee King’s band, still broke, still unknown, still years away from the Grand Ole Opry. The story goes that a girl named Sally Gayhart came up after the show and asked for his autograph. He gave her his name that night. A year later, in November 1941, she took it for good. Everything came after Sally. “Make the World Go Away.” “Bouquet of Roses.” 85 million records, the Country Music Hall of Fame, a farm boy from Chester County becoming one of the most successful voices in American music. And through all of it, friends said the same thing: he always told people he could never have done any of it without her. She stayed home, raised their two children, managed the money, and shared him with the whole world — because she knew exactly how much of him belonged to her. But the detail I can’t forget is from their last years. Sally grew too frail to go out. So Eddy, at 89, would drive into town, buy one sandwich, and bring it home. Every single day, they split that sandwich for lunch — the plowboy and the girl from Louisville, still sharing everything, sixty-six years after an autograph. Some men chase the spotlight their whole lives. Eddy Arnold just kept coming home for lunch.

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Eddy Arnold and Sally: The Love Story Behind 85 Million Records When people talk about Eddy Arnold, they usually begin…

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BEFORE “WALKIN’ AFTER MIDNIGHT” MADE PATSY CLINE A STAR, SHE WAS SINGING ON A REGIONAL TV SHOW HOSTED BY JIMMY DEAN — AND THE TWO DIDN’T ALWAYS SEE EYE TO EYE. Beginning in the fall of 1954, Patsy became a featured singer on Connie B. Gay’s Town and Country television broadcasts around Washington, D.C. Jimmy Dean was the host. Roy Clark, George Hamilton IV and Billy Grammer were part of that same circle. Patsy was still years away from “Crazy” and “I Fall to Pieces.” She had the voice, but national stardom had not arrived yet. And she and Jimmy weren’t exactly close. Years later, Bill Anderson remembered their relationship as “not quite oil-and-water” — two strong personalities sharing the same stage without always fitting comfortably together. That is what makes the old footage matter. Before either name became part of country music history, Jimmy Dean was introducing the show, and a young Patsy Cline was standing nearby, still fighting to be heard.

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SHE GAVE UP HER OWN SINGING CAREER AND TAUGHT FOUR CHILDREN TO HARMONIZE IN A CAR WITH NO RADIO. AT NINETY, REBA McENTIRE’S MOTHER FINALLY GOT HER NAME ON A RECORD. Jacqueline Smith wanted to be a country singer. People in Oklahoma said she could have been as big as Patsy Cline. She was teaching school by sixteen. She married Clark McEntire, a three-time world champion steer roper, and raised four children on a ranch in Chockie, Oklahoma. The family car had no radio. So on the long drives to her husband’s rodeos, Jacqueline taught the children to sing harmony in the backseat. One of them was Reba. Reba went on to sell tens of millions of records. Her mother stayed a teacher, a librarian, a school secretary. Then, more than fifty years after those car rides, Reba made a gospel album. She refused to record “I’ll Fly Away” until her mother and her sisters could get to Nashville. When they arrived, all three sang harmony behind her — exactly the way Jacqueline had taught them. On another track, her mother suggested a change to the words. Reba put her name on it as a co-writer. “Sing It Now: Songs of Faith & Hope” came out in February 2017. Jacqueline McEntire was ninety years old. She died three years later, at ninety-three.

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THE BUCKLE RONNIE DUNN WORE TO ACCEPT HIS 18TH ACM AWARD ISN’T AN AWARD AT ALL. Every artist who performs at Cheyenne Frontier Days walks away with one, and Brooks & Dunn have played the Daddy of ’em All several times over the years. You don’t beat anybody for it. You show up, you play the rodeo grounds in Wyoming, and the silver is yours. That is what sat on his belt on May 17 at the MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas, when Brooks & Dunn won Duo of the Year at the 61st ACM Awards. Second year running, and the eighteenth time in that category. No duo has ever won it more. “I don’t know why y’all aren’t getting sick of us,” Kix Brooks said at the podium. It was the second time in seven months the buckle made national television, because Dunn had it on in November too, when they took Vocal Duo of the Year at the CMAs in Nashville. So a man with closets full of trophies keeps reaching past all of them for the one piece of silver he didn’t have to win. On August 19 the ACM hands Cheyenne Frontier Days a trophy of its own, Fair/Rodeo of the Year, at the Honors ceremony in Nashville. Ronnie Dunn was wearing that place on his belt long before anyone thought to give it an award.

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On November 19, 2007, Charlie Daniels was at Nashville’s Ryman Auditorium for his annual Christmas For Kids benefit concert, an event created to help children in need enjoy a better Christmas. During the show, Martina McBride walked onto the stage carrying a small gift box. Inside was a card with news Charlie had waited decades to hear. He was being invited to become a member of the Grand Ole Opry. Charlie stepped back, clearly overwhelmed as the audience rose to its feet. For a man who had come to Nashville years earlier with his wife and young son, it was one of the highest honors country music could give him. “This is very emotional for me,” he told the crowd. The moment was especially fitting because Charlie had spent that evening trying to give something to other people. He came to the Ryman to help children at Christmas. Before the night was over, country music had given Charlie Daniels a gift of its own.