Country Music

Classic Country Music Hits

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BONNIE OWENS DIVORCED MERLE HAGGARD IN 1978. YEARS LATER, HE CALLED AND ASKED HER TO COME BACK ON THE ROAD. Owens was never merely the woman standing behind his microphone. She had records of her own, won the ACM’s Top Female Vocalist honor in 1965 and received co-writing credit on “Today I Started Loving You Again.” So why would an artist with her own place in Bakersfield history return to the band of the ex-husband she had left? Their divorce became final in October 1978. That same month, Haggard married singer Leona Williams—with Bonnie serving as a bridesmaid. After years apart professionally, Bonnie rejoined the Strangers and once again became part of Haggard’s stage sound. She had remarried by then, and illness eventually forced her to retire. Her return was not a 28-year vigil for a former husband. The sentence Haggard used when he called her back reveals something more complicated about the place she held in his music.

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Bonnie Owens, Merle Haggard, and the Call That Brought Her Back on the Road When people remember the classic Bakersfield…

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38 NUMBER ONE HITS. AND PEOPLE STILL CALL HIM “THE CONVICT.” Merle Haggard was born in a converted boxcar. His father died when he was nine. By twenty, he was prisoner A45200 at San Quentin. He saw Johnny Cash play inside those walls. Something broke open. When he got out in 1960, he dug ditches for his brother. Played honky-tonks for beer money. Nobody was waiting for him. Then came “I’m a Lonesome Fugitive.” Number one. Then “Mama Tried.” Then “Okie from Muskogee.” Then thirty-five more. He wrote over 250 songs. Recorded nearly 70 albums. Pioneered an entire sound out of Bakersfield that made Nashville nervous. Country Music Hall of Fame. Grammy Lifetime Achievement. Kennedy Center Honor. A full pardon from Ronald Reagan. He kept touring into his late seventies. Died on his 79th birthday, on his tour bus, still on the road. San Quentin held him for three years. Music held him for fifty-six. Maybe it’s time we stopped introducing him as an ex-con — and started introducing ourselves as his fans.

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Merle Haggard: The Life Behind 38 Number One Hits For a long time, people tried to reduce Merle Haggard to…

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HER FIRST CONCERT CAME AT 80. BUT THE WORDS JELLY ROLL SAID NEXT TURNED IT INTO SOMETHING SHE’D WAITED A LIFETIME FOR. During his show, Jelly Roll noticed that 80-year-old Miss Marley had chosen him for the very first concert of her life. He stopped and spoke directly to her from the stage. “I’m gonna be honest, I think you’re lying,” he joked. “I don’t think you’re 80. You look 60.” Then his voice changed. “Thank you for picking me, Miss Marley. I hope you have the night of your life.” But Jelly Roll didn’t want this to be her only concert. He told her he hoped it would begin a run of 50 more shows over the next 20 years—and joked that she might still be coming to see him at 100. Most artists hope fans stay with them for a lifetime. Miss Marley waited almost an entire lifetime just to begin.

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Her First Concert Came at 80. But the Words Jelly Roll Said Next Turned It Into Something She’d Waited a…

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ONE OF THE MOST IMPORTANT COUNTRY SONGS EVER WRITTEN. SHE DIDN’T THINK ANYONE WOULD BUY IT. IT BECAME HER NAME. “Well, I was born a coal miner’s daughter…” Loretta Lynn wrote “Coal Miner’s Daughter” completely alone — on a $17 guitar that wouldn’t stay in tune. “Every word is true,” she said. It began in a one-room shack in Butcher Holler, Kentucky. Daddy worked all night in the Van Lear coal mines, all day in the cornfields — eight kids to feed. He died in 1959, his lungs ruined by coal dust. He never heard the song. In a couple of hours, she poured out nine verses — the washboard, the Bible by coal-oil light, shoes with holes patched with cardboard. Then she doubted anyone would buy “a song just about me.” The label shelved it for nearly a year. It hit No. 1 in 1970. Then a bestselling book. Then an Oscar-winning film. Then, simply, who she was. “She blazed so many trails for all of us girls in country music,” Miranda Lambert said. “Thank you for all the songs.” Some singers write songs. Loretta Lynn wrote the truth — and the truth outlived her.

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How Loretta Lynn Turned a Hard Childhood Into One of Country Music’s Most Important Songs “Well, I was born a…

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EVERYONE THOUGHT KITTY WELLS WAS SINGING ABOUT SOMEONE ELSE. By 1959, Kitty Wells had already proven what no one believed a woman could do in country music. She sold records. She headlined shows. She was the Queen. So when she recorded “Mommy for a Day,” people heard a sad story about a mother who only got to see her little girl on Sunday afternoons. A broken home. A broken heart. Another country tearjerker. That was not what Kitty was singing about. What most people did not know was that seven years earlier, Kitty Wells was ready to quit. She wanted to stop touring. Stop performing. Stay home and raise her three children. Be a full-time mother. Then “Honky Tonk Angels” changed everything. And she could not go back. She chose the stage. She chose the road. And every night, somewhere between the applause and the silence of another motel room, she knew what that choice cost. Kitty did not sing “Mommy for a Day” like an actress playing a role. She sang it like a confession. Maybe that is why the pain in her voice never sounded performed. It was not performed. It was remembered — every Sunday she missed, every bedtime she was not there for, every moment she traded for a song. Maybe the saddest songs are not written by the people who imagine pain. They are sung by the ones who chose it — and never stopped paying.

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Everyone Thought Kitty Wells Was Singing About Someone Else By 1959, Kitty Wells had already done something that once seemed…

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THE FIRST TIME RANDY TRAVIS RELEASED “ON THE OTHER HAND,” IT STOPPED AT NO. 67. A YEAR LATER, THE SAME SONG WENT TO NO. 1—AND HELPED PULL NASHVILLE BACK TOWARD ITS COUNTRY ROOTS. Before Randy Travis became the voice behind “Forever and Ever, Amen,” he was Randy Traywick, a troubled teenager from North Carolina who kept finding his way into courtrooms and jail cells. He had dropped out of school. He had been arrested more than once. He could sing, but talent alone was not enough to keep his life from falling apart. Then Lib Hatcher heard him perform. Lib helped run a Charlotte nightclub called Country City U.S.A. She gave Randy work, a place on the bandstand and something he had rarely been given before: responsibility. When he faced the possibility of returning to jail, she stood before the court and agreed to supervise him. At night, Randy sang the songs of George Jones, Lefty Frizzell and Merle Haggard. His voice was low, patient and unmistakably traditional. It sounded nothing like the polished country-pop Nashville was chasing in the early 1980s. That was exactly the problem. Record labels repeatedly turned him down. His sound was considered too old-fashioned. But Lib kept taking him back to Nashville until Warner Bros. finally signed him and changed his name to Randy Travis. His first Warner single was “On the Other Hand.” Released in 1985, it barely moved. The song stalled at No. 67—a result that could have ended a new artist’s career before most listeners had even learned his name. Warner released “1982” next. It climbed to No. 6, and suddenly radio programmers began paying attention to the deep-voiced singer they had overlooked. So the label made an unusual decision. It released “On the Other Hand” again. The recording had not changed. Randy had not changed. But this time, listeners were ready. By July 1986, the same song that had failed a year earlier was No. 1. Its story was simple: a married man tempted by another woman, until the wedding ring on his hand reminded him what he stood to lose. Randy did not oversing it. He let the guilt remain quiet. He let the steel guitar breathe. He sounded like the country music Nashville had nearly left behind. Then came Storms of Life. Then a run of seven straight No. 1 singles beginning with “Forever and Ever, Amen.” Soon, traditional voices like Alan Jackson and Clint Black were finding room on country radio again. But before Randy Travis helped change the direction of country music, he was a young singer whose first major single had failed. The song needed a second release. Randy had once needed a second chance. Lib Hatcher gave him one long before Nashville did.

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How Randy Travis Turned a Failed Single Into a Country Music Turning Point Before Randy Travis became the voice behind…

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THEY DIVORCED IN 1978. SHE STAYED ON HIS TOUR BUS ANYWAY. NOT AS HIS WIFE. NOT AS HIS LOVER. JUST AS THE WOMAN WHO BELIEVED IN HIM MORE THAN HE BELIEVED IN HIMSELF. IN 2026, PEOPLE WOULDN’T EVEN KNOW WHAT TO CALL THAT. Bonnie Owens won Female Vocalist of the Year in 1965. Same year she married Merle Haggard. Same year she quietly stepped back from her own spotlight — to raise his kids, carry his notepad, and catch every lyric before it disappeared. Merle said it plain: “There wouldn’t have been no ‘Mama Tried’ or ‘Working Man Blues’ if it wouldn’t have been for her.” They wrote “Today I Started Loving You Again” on a hamburger bag after a 90-day Texas tour. He gave her half the royalties. Then they divorced. And she kept singing backup for him anyway. He once said: “We were greater friends than we were lovers.” Years later, Alzheimer’s took her memory. Merle visited her in hospice. She pulled him to her room. On the wall — a photo of them, young and beautiful. She pointed at it and whispered: “He’s my favorite.” She didn’t recognize the man standing right beside her was him. Some love stories don’t need a wedding ring to be eternal.

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They Divorced in 1978. She Stayed Anyway. In 2026, people might not know what to call a love story like…

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THEY HELD HIS FUNERAL AT HIS OWN RANCH IN PALO CEDRO, CALIFORNIA. NO CAMERAS. NO CELL PHONES. NO CROWD OUTSIDE. MERLE HAGGARD HAD PLANNED EVERY SONG HIMSELF. He left 38 No. 1 hits, 30 studio albums, and a body of work that made Garth Brooks — the best-selling solo artist in American history — say simply: “Today, we lost the greatest country artist of all time.” The service on April 9 was exactly what he asked for. His tour bus, the Silver Chief, stood at the edge of the field as a windscreen for the mourners. Marty Stuart officiated. Connie Smith sang Precious Memories. Kris Kristofferson played three songs, and when a gust of wind scattered his lyric sheets mid-performance, he smiled and said: “Merle’d done that on purpose.” The funeral closed with his three sons — Marty, Noel and Ben — standing together to sing Today I Started Loving You Again. No microphones. No stage. Just three boys saying goodbye to their father the only way he ever taught them: through a song. Willie Nelson said four words: “He was my brother.” He had predicted his own death one week before it happened. He died on his 79th birthday. Even the ending was on his own terms.

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Merle Haggard’s Final Farewell at His Ranch in Palo Cedro There are some goodbyes that feel planned long before anyone…

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NASHVILLE’S BIGGEST STAR MARRIED AT 18. EVERYONE SAID IT WOULDN’T LAST… In 1937, Ellen Muriel Deason — a guitar-playing teenager from Nashville — married a cabinetmaker named Johnnie Wright. She was 18. He gave her a stage name from an old folk song: Kitty Wells. Nobody gave them a chance. Two broke kids chasing music in the Depression. Nashville insiders smirked. The industry said women couldn’t sell records. Roy Acuff himself told Johnnie: don’t let your wife headline — women don’t belong up there. But here’s what Nashville never saw coming… They didn’t just survive. They built everything together. He drove the bus. She sang the songs. They raised three children on the road and turned their family into a touring act. When “It Wasn’t God Who Made Honky Tonk Angels” hit No. 1 in 1952 — the first time any woman topped the Billboard country chart — Johnnie was standing side-stage, exactly where he’d always been. Their last show together: New Year’s Eve, 2000. Seventy-four years married. Johnnie died in 2011. Kitty followed in 2012. Same home. Same love. Same story — from beginning to end. They said it wouldn’t last. It outlasted everything Nashville ever built.

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Nashville’s Biggest Star Married at 18. Everyone Said It Wouldn’t Last… In the middle of the Depression, when money was…

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“WITHOUT ONE GUITAR, MERLE HAGGARD WOULD HAVE DIED A CRIMINAL — HERE’S THE PROOF” Born in a converted railroad boxcar in Bakersfield. Father dead by nine. First jail cell at eleven. By the time Merle Haggard turned 20, he was inmate #A-45200 at San Quentin — serving time for burglary, no future in sight. Then he said the truest words of his life: “I would’ve become a lifetime criminal if music hadn’t saved my ass.” Inside those walls, he earned his high school equivalency. Worked the prison textile plant. Played guitar in the inmate country band while lifers on Death Row gave him advice that hit harder than any sermon. “To be part of what you’re singing about is somewhat painful. You’ve got to climb inside it all.” Released in 1960, he dug ditches for his brother’s electric company by day and chased music by night. His first single sold 200 copies. Eight years later, “Mama Tried” hit #1. “A house without love ain’t a home.” Neither is a life without purpose. Merle didn’t just survive San Quentin. He turned it into 38 #1 hits, a Kennedy Center Honor, and a voice for every working man who ever believed it was too late to start over. That’s not luck. That’s a guitar in the right hands at the right moment — and a man brave enough to grab it.

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Without One Guitar, Merle Haggard Would Have Died a Criminal: Here’s the Proof Merle Haggard’s life did not begin with…

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BONNIE OWENS DIVORCED MERLE HAGGARD IN 1978. YEARS LATER, HE CALLED AND ASKED HER TO COME BACK ON THE ROAD. Owens was never merely the woman standing behind his microphone. She had records of her own, won the ACM’s Top Female Vocalist honor in 1965 and received co-writing credit on “Today I Started Loving You Again.” So why would an artist with her own place in Bakersfield history return to the band of the ex-husband she had left? Their divorce became final in October 1978. That same month, Haggard married singer Leona Williams—with Bonnie serving as a bridesmaid. After years apart professionally, Bonnie rejoined the Strangers and once again became part of Haggard’s stage sound. She had remarried by then, and illness eventually forced her to retire. Her return was not a 28-year vigil for a former husband. The sentence Haggard used when he called her back reveals something more complicated about the place she held in his music.

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38 NUMBER ONE HITS. AND PEOPLE STILL CALL HIM “THE CONVICT.” Merle Haggard was born in a converted boxcar. His father died when he was nine. By twenty, he was prisoner A45200 at San Quentin. He saw Johnny Cash play inside those walls. Something broke open. When he got out in 1960, he dug ditches for his brother. Played honky-tonks for beer money. Nobody was waiting for him. Then came “I’m a Lonesome Fugitive.” Number one. Then “Mama Tried.” Then “Okie from Muskogee.” Then thirty-five more. He wrote over 250 songs. Recorded nearly 70 albums. Pioneered an entire sound out of Bakersfield that made Nashville nervous. Country Music Hall of Fame. Grammy Lifetime Achievement. Kennedy Center Honor. A full pardon from Ronald Reagan. He kept touring into his late seventies. Died on his 79th birthday, on his tour bus, still on the road. San Quentin held him for three years. Music held him for fifty-six. Maybe it’s time we stopped introducing him as an ex-con — and started introducing ourselves as his fans.

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HER FIRST CONCERT CAME AT 80. BUT THE WORDS JELLY ROLL SAID NEXT TURNED IT INTO SOMETHING SHE’D WAITED A LIFETIME FOR. During his show, Jelly Roll noticed that 80-year-old Miss Marley had chosen him for the very first concert of her life. He stopped and spoke directly to her from the stage. “I’m gonna be honest, I think you’re lying,” he joked. “I don’t think you’re 80. You look 60.” Then his voice changed. “Thank you for picking me, Miss Marley. I hope you have the night of your life.” But Jelly Roll didn’t want this to be her only concert. He told her he hoped it would begin a run of 50 more shows over the next 20 years—and joked that she might still be coming to see him at 100. Most artists hope fans stay with them for a lifetime. Miss Marley waited almost an entire lifetime just to begin.

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ONE OF THE MOST IMPORTANT COUNTRY SONGS EVER WRITTEN. SHE DIDN’T THINK ANYONE WOULD BUY IT. IT BECAME HER NAME. “Well, I was born a coal miner’s daughter…” Loretta Lynn wrote “Coal Miner’s Daughter” completely alone — on a $17 guitar that wouldn’t stay in tune. “Every word is true,” she said. It began in a one-room shack in Butcher Holler, Kentucky. Daddy worked all night in the Van Lear coal mines, all day in the cornfields — eight kids to feed. He died in 1959, his lungs ruined by coal dust. He never heard the song. In a couple of hours, she poured out nine verses — the washboard, the Bible by coal-oil light, shoes with holes patched with cardboard. Then she doubted anyone would buy “a song just about me.” The label shelved it for nearly a year. It hit No. 1 in 1970. Then a bestselling book. Then an Oscar-winning film. Then, simply, who she was. “She blazed so many trails for all of us girls in country music,” Miranda Lambert said. “Thank you for all the songs.” Some singers write songs. Loretta Lynn wrote the truth — and the truth outlived her.