Heart to Heart (Merle Haggard album)

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Heart to Heart
Hearttoheartmerlehaggard.JPG
Studio album by Merle Haggard
Released 1983
Recorded 1983
Genre Country
Label Mercury
Producer Merle Haggard
Merle Haggard chronology
That's The Way Love Goes
(1983)		Heart to Heart
(1983)		 The Epic Collection (Recorded Live)
(1983)

Heart to Heart is a duet album by Merle Haggard and Leona Williams with backing by The Strangers, released in 1983 on Mercury Records. It reached number 44 on the Billboard Country music chart.

Merle Haggard American country music song writer, singer and musician

Merle Ronald Haggard was an American country singer, songwriter, guitarist, and fiddler. Along with Buck Owens, Haggard and his band the Strangers helped create the Bakersfield sound, which is characterized by the twang of the Fender Telecaster mixed with the sound of the steel guitar, vocal harmony styles in which the words are minimal, and a rough edge not heard on the more polished Nashville sound recordings of the same era.

Leona Williams American singer

Leona Belle Helton is an American country music singer known professionally as Leona Williams. Active since 1958, Williams has been a backing musician for Loretta Lynn and Merle Haggard and The Strangers, to whom she was married between 1978 and 1983. She also charted eight times on Hot Country Songs, with her only Top 40 hit being a duet with Haggard titled "The Bull and the Beaver."

The Strangers (American band)

The Strangers are an American country band that formed in 1965 in Bakersfield, California. They mainly served as the backup band for singer-songwriter Merle Haggard. However, from 1969 to 1973, they issued several records independent of Haggard, released on Capitol Records. Merle Haggard named the band after his first hit single "(My Friends Are Gonna Be) Strangers". The Strangers were voted touring band of the year by the Academy of Country Music eight times. The band continues to tour with longtime member Norman Hamlet, as well as Haggard's children Ben and Noel Haggard.

Contents

Background

Heart to Heart was released just weeks after Haggard and Williams had divorced after five years of marriage. Williams, who had replaced Bonnie Owens in Haggard's life both professionally and personally in 1974, grew to become increasingly frustrated with her supporting role in the Strangers, having harbored musical aspirations of her own; the Missouri native had been a well respected musician and singer in her own right (she had played bass in Loretta Lynn's first touring band) and wrote two #1 hits for Haggard: the telling "You Take Me For Granted" in 1982 and "Someday When Things Are Good" in 1983. According to the liner notes for the 1994 retrospective Down Every Road written by music journalist Daniel Cooper, she wrote the former while sitting on the bus in Ohio, then played it for Merle in front of several of his friends after Merle had reduced her to tears during a duet session they were recording. "He got big old tears in his eyes," Cooper quotes Leona, "and he said, 'Is that how you feel? And I said, 'Yes, it is.'" [1] As Haggard wrote in his 1981 autobiography Sing Me Back Home, "I'd reached the point in my career where I felt in charge of my music...When Leona tried to make a suggestion, I resented it. She resented my resentment. So it went. She kept saying she felt like an outsider...I couldn't understand why she got so upset by the press leaning toward good ol' Bonnie and the snide remarks about Leona coming in and breaking up my 'happy home.'" [2] In the documentary Learning to Live With Myself, fellow country star Tanya Tucker speculates that a professional competition came between the couple, remembering that Merle promised "after Leona he would never, ever marry another woman who wanted to be in show business." In his 2013 Haggard book The Running Kind, David Cantwell observes that Haggard "seems alternately to have supported and undermined her efforts" at establishing a solo career, citing their finally recording together on Mercury causing the label to lose interest in her forthcoming solo LP altogether. Their divorce served as a license to party for Haggard, who spent much of the next decade becoming mired in alcohol and drug problems. [3]

Bonnie Owens American singer

Bonnie Owens, born Bonnie Campbell, was an American country music singer who was married to Buck Owens and later Merle Haggard.

Missouri State of the United States of America

Missouri is a state in the Midwestern United States. With over six million residents, it is the 18th-most populous state of the Union. The largest urban areas are St. Louis, Kansas City, Springfield, and Columbia; the capital is Jefferson City. The state is the 21st-most extensive in area. In the South are the Ozarks, a forested highland, providing timber, minerals, and recreation. The Missouri River, after which the state is named, flows through the center of the state into the Mississippi River, which makes up Missouri's eastern border.

Loretta Lynn American country-music singer-songwriter

Loretta Lynn is an American country music singer-songwriter with multiple gold albums in a career spanning almost 60 years. She is famous for hits such as "You Ain't Woman Enough ", "Don't Come Home A' Drinkin' ", "One's on the Way", "Fist City", and "Coal Miner's Daughter" along with the 1980 biographical film of the same name.

Haggard had to obtain permission from Epic Records to record with Williams, who was signed to Mercury. Heart to Heart was Haggard's third duet album in two years, having recorded A Taste of Yesterday's Wine with George Jones and Pancho and Lefty with Willie Nelson. Heart to Heart was not the success those LPs had been, however, peaking at number 44 on the Billboard country albums chart. [4] A single, the co-written "We're Stranger's Again," did not crack the country Top 40. Haggard contributed four songs to the set, including two written with Williams. Highlights include the Freddy Powers song "It's Cold in California" and "Don't Ever Let Love Sleep," as well as the title track, but on a couple of songs, "Sally Let Your Bangs Hang Down" and "I'll Never Be Free", Williams contributions are reduced significantly, reinforcing the stifling image of her as merely Haggard's backup singer. In the late nineties, Williams initially agreed—and then declined—to be interviewed by Tom Carter for Haggard's second autobiography My House of Memories, which would be published in 1999. Haggard alluded to this in the book and, apparently affronted, never mentions Williams by her name, simply referring to her as "wife number three." He also stated that Williams leaving him was "one of the best things to have ever happened to me." [5] Williams did later participate in the American Masters documentary dedicated to Haggard.

Epic Records American record label

Epic Records is an American record label owned by Sony Music Entertainment, a subsidiary of Sony Corporation of America, Inc., the North American division of Japanese conglomerate Sony. The label was founded predominantly as a jazz and classical music label in 1953, but later expanded its scope to include a more diverse range of genres, including pop, R&B, rock, and hip hop. Epic Records has released music by artists including Glenn Miller, Tammy Wynette, George Michael, The Yardbirds, Donovan, Shakin Stevens, Europe, Cheap Trick, Meat Loaf, Stevie Ray Vaughan, Ted Nugent, Shakira, Sly & the Family Stone, The Hollies, Celine Dion, Mariah Carey, ABBA, Anastacia, Boston, Dave Clark Five, Gloria Estefan, Pearl Jam, Rage Against the Machine, and Michael Jackson. Along with Arista, Columbia and RCA Records, Epic is one of Sony Music Entertainment's four flagship record labels.

<i>A Taste of Yesterdays Wine</i> 1982 studio album by George Jones and Merle Haggard

A Taste of Yesterday's Wine is an album by American country music artists George Jones and Merle Haggard, released in 1982. They are backed by Don Markham and Jimmy Belken of The Strangers, and feature the song "Silver Eagle," written by Gary Church, also of The Strangers. This was their first album together; their next album together, Kickin' Out the Footlights...Again, would not come until 24 years later in 2006.

George Jones American musician

George Glenn Jones was an American musician, singer and songwriter. He achieved international fame for his long list of hit records, including his best known song "He Stopped Loving Her Today", as well as his distinctive voice and phrasing. For the last twenty years of his life, Jones was frequently referred to as the greatest living country singer. Country music scholar Bill Malone writes, "For the two or three minutes consumed by a song, Jones immerses himself so completely in its lyrics, and in the mood it conveys, that the listener can scarcely avoid becoming similarly involved." Waylon Jennings expressed a similar opinion in his song "It's Alright": "If we all could sound like we wanted to, we'd all sound like George Jones." The shape of his nose and facial features earned Jones the nickname "The Possum."

Professional ratings
Review scores
SourceRating
Allmusic Star full.svgStar full.svgStar empty.svgStar empty.svgStar empty.svg [4]

Track listing

  1. "Heart to Heart Talk" (Lee Ross)
  2. "Let's Pretend We're Not Married Tonight" (Merle Haggard, Leona Williams)
  3. "You Can't Break the Chains of Love" (Lewis Porter, Franklin Tableporter, Jimmy Wakely)
  4. "Waltz Across Texas" (Ernest Tubb)
  5. "We're Strangers Again" (Haggard, Williams)
  6. "Waitin' On the Good Life to Come" (Haggard)
  7. "Don't Ever Let Your Lover Sleep Alone" (Haggard)
  8. "It's Cold In California" (Freddy Powers)
  9. "I'll Never Be Free" (Bennie Benjamin, George Weiss)
  10. "Sally Let Your Bangs Hang Down" (Rose Maddox)

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References

  1. ↑ Down Every Road 1962–1994 compilation album. Liner notes by Daniel Cooper
  2. ↑ Haggard, Merle; Russell, Peggy (1983). Sing Me Back Home: My Story. Simon & Schuster. ISBN   978-0-671-45275-9.
  3. ↑ Cantwell, David (2013). Merle Haggard: The Running Kind. University of Texas Press. ISBN   978-0-292-71771-8.
  4. 1 2 "Heart to Heart > Review". Allmusic . Retrieved February 19, 2015.
  5. ↑ Haggard, Merle (2010). My House of Memories: An Autobiography. Harper Collins. ISBN   978-0-062-02321-6.
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