And Then I Wrote

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First few days found me a little uneasy. I had my guitar, a pencil, and a blank notebook. Hank might throw out an idea, hoping it might spark something in me. When that didn't work, he might tell me a joke, or I might tell him one, hoping that joking would lead to some kind of song. It didn't...And one afternoon, after we had just sat around throwing the bull, he said, "I'm going to the office to make a few calls. You work on something by yourself." [12] Nelson was born on April 29, 1933, in Abbott, Texas. The son of Myrle and Ira D. Nelson, Willie and his older sister, Bobbie, were raised by their paternal grandparents during the Great Depression.

In 1947 Nelson joined the gospel group Bud Fletcher and the Texans, which already featured Bobbie on piano. He continued to attend school and lettered in numerous sports. The band played the local club circuit for the next few years and Bobbie and Bud Fletcher married. It was during this time Nelson first appeared on local radio. Air Force

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Nelson took the fire as a sign that things needed to change. Returning to his native Texas with family in tow, he settled in Austin and soon became an important part of the city’s country music scene, performing regularly at its many venues. Red Headed Stranger: Charts & Awards (Billboard Singles)". AllMusic. Rovi Corporation . Retrieved June 12, 2011. Nelson also continued to collaborate with a range of recording artists. In 2008, he performed live in Amsterdam with rap icon Snoop Dogg, and the duo went on to work together on the video for "My Medicine." In 2009, Nelson teamed up with music group Asleep at the Wheel to release the country swing album Willie and the Wheel, and that same year he released Naked Willie, which included new mixes of his early recordings. In 2010, Nelson released the critically acclaimed Country Music, a collaboration with producer T Bone Burnett. Nelson starred as the titular role of the Red Headed Stranger, the 1986 western drama film based on his 1975 album of the same name. He would later go on to appear in films such as The Dukes of Hazzard (2005), Blonde Ambition (2007), Beer for My Horses (2008) and Zoolander 2 (2016). "Always on My Mind" and "To All the Girls I've Loved Before" In 1991, Nelson was dealt a devastating blow when his 33-year-old son Billy died on Christmas Day in what Nelson describes as “a terrible accident” in It’s a Long Story. Rarely discussing his children’s lives publicly, Nelson writes he believes “the children of entertainers – especially the children of wandering troubadours – pay a big price. Sharing your dad with the world isn’t fun. And when that dad has moved through three tumultuous marriages and is on his fourth – well, that’s no picnic. I regret the pain that my lifestyle has caused my kids.”

The 1980s brought continued musical success. Nelson’s ballad "Always on My Mind" won the Grammy Award for Best Country Vocal Performance in 1982, and the album of the same name topped both the country and pop charts. Though Tougher Than Leather (1983), Without a Song (1984) and City of New Orleans (1984), did not prove to be crossover hits, all three still reached the top of the country charts. Nelson teamed up with Julio Iglesias for the ballad "To All the Girls I've Loved Before" (1982), a massive international success. The Highwaymen Adding to his resume of successful collaborations, the following year Nelson joined with Johnny Cash, Jennings and Kristofferson to form the country supergroup the Highwaymen. “You wouldn’t think that our four uneven voices would blend. But they did. They fit together like a jigsaw puzzle,” Nelson writes of the group in It’s a Long Story. After receiving the Gershwin Prize for Popular Song by the Library of Congress in 2015, Nelson released Summertime: Willie Nelson Sings Gershwin (2016), a tribute to the iconic songs of George and Ira Gershwin and featuring duets with artists such as Crow and Cyndi Lauper. According to one of his autobiographies, Nelson wrote many songs while still living in Texas. Among these is “Crazy”, which became a big hit for superstar Patsy Cline, helping to jumpstart Willie’s career. I knew the Cline version before I knew that Nelson wrote it, and there are marked differences in delivery between the two recordings. Patsy Cline's is melodic and whimsical, while Nelson's near-spoken-word vocal in his version reveals more personal pain. He actually sounds kind of crazy, or at least hurt and lost. It’s incredible.

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By 1970 Nelson had set up home in Ridgetop, Tennessee, and that year his house burned down. During the blaze Nelson describes running inside and grabbing two guitar cases. “One contained [his guitar] Trigger and the other two pounds of primo Columbian pot,” he writes in It’s a Long Story.

a b c Edwards, David; Callahan, Mike. "The Liberty Records Story". Both Sides Now. Both Sides Now Publications . Retrieved February 7, 2011. In 1952, Nelson married for the first time, to Martha Matthews, with whom he had three children — Lana, Susie and Billy — before they split up a decade later. He followed by marrying singer Shirley Collie in 1963 and then Connie Koepke in 1971, with whom he had daughters Paula and Amy. However, despite these successes, Nelson’s own recordings fell on deaf ears during this period. He did not fit the traditional Nashville country music mold, and whenever producers tried to make him fit they only succeeded in stripping away the qualities that helped make him unique, such as his unusual manner of phrasing.Kosser, Michael (2006). How Nashville Became Music City, U.s.a.: 50 Years of Music Row. Hal Leonard Corporation. ISBN 9780634098062. Nelson would team up with Jennings again soon after to record the popular single "Mamas Don't Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be Cowboys," which won the 1978 Grammy Award for best country vocal performance by a duo or group. Nelson has a strong compassion for animals, and over the years he has been involved with various animal-welfare groups, including the Society for Protective Animal Legislation, Best Friends Animal Society and the Animal Welfare Institute. With the latter, Nelson has become deeply involved in a campaign to save horses from slaughter. His group Willie and the Nelson Family, which features his sister, Billie, recorded the song “Wild Horses” to benefit the cause. IRS and Legal Troubles Best Known For: Willie Nelson is a country singer-songwriter known for hit songs like "Crazy" and "On the Road Again." And Then I Wrote is the debut studio album by country singer Willie Nelson, recorded during August and September 1962 and released through Liberty Records.

Nelson and Connie divorced in 1988 and he married D'Angelo in 1991. They have two sons, Lucas and Jacob Micah, and live in a sustainable solar-powered community in Hawaii, on the island of Maui. “It’s love that brought Annie and me together, and it’s love that, nearly 30 years later, has kept us together,” Nelson wrote in 2015 of his fourth marriage. “When it comes to romantic relationships, that’s a record for me. Took me damn near a lifetime to get it right.” A&E Concert Special After signing a new record deal with Legacy Recordings, in 2012 Nelson released the album Heroes, which featured appearances by Merle Haggard, Snoop, Kristofferson and Sheryl Crow, among others. It reached No. 4 country and No. 18 pop, his highest-charting effort since “Always on My Mind.” That same year, the Country Music Association honored Nelson with an all-star tribute at the CMAs in Nashville. However, with 1975’s Red-Headed Stranger, Nelson had his real first taste of success. Not only did the album reach No. 1 on the country charts, but it also crossed over to the pop Top 40. Among the highlights from the recording is the Fred Rose–penned number “Blue Eyes Crying in the Rain,” which gave Nelson his first No. 1 country hit and earned him his first Grammy Award for best country vocal performance.Of his longtime love affair with marijuana, Nelson writes in It’s a Long Story that “just as I’ve always loved robust coffee beans and the strong buzz produced by the brew, I felt the same way about cannabis. It pushed me in the right direction. It pushed me in a positive direction. It kept my head in my music. It kept my head filled with poetry.” In 2008, Nelson released Moment of Forever, which garnered much critical praise. He also scored a Grammy that same year for the single "Lost Highway," a duet performed with Ray Price, whose recording of “Night Life” nearly a half-century before had been one of Nelson’s earliest successes. Collaborations: Snoop Dogg, Merle Haggard, Sheryl Crow and More