Country Music Story Archives - West Virginia Public Broadcasting

Morgan Wade Rises In Country But Stays Anchored In Appalachia

Morgan Wade’s album “Reckless” launched her as a country music star, but her connection to Appalachia has kept her rooted in place. Inside Appalachia host Mason Adams recently spoke with Wade.

This conversation originally aired in the January 20, 2023 episode of Inside Appalachia.

Morgan Wade’s album “Reckless” launched her as a country music star, but her connection to Appalachia has kept her rooted in place.

The 2021 album became a hit on the strength of its single “Wilder Days,” charting at number 14 on Billboard’s Heatseekers charts. Wade grew up in Floyd, Virginia, where she became a sensation, first as a talented local musician and then again when she started to rise in country music.

Wade toured throughout the last two years, including a run opening for Chris Stapleton. At one point, she played Nashville’s famed Ryman Auditorium, long known as the home of the Grand Ole Opry — and then a few days later came back to play at the Floyd Country Store, a small venue that hosts the Friday Night Jamboree.

Inside Appalachia host Mason Adams recently spoke with Wade.

Adams: You’ve been all around the country and played famed venues like the Ryman in Nashville. But you keep coming back to local places like the Floyd Country Store. What’s that like, to balance between traveling around the world and coming back to where you grew up?

Wade: There’s always going to be something special about coming back home. This past year, doing the country store, it was really incredible. I got to shake everybody’s hand and stand there, and thank them for coming out. It was like a trip down memory lane. A lot of these people I haven’t seen in years. Every time I come back home, I feel a little more grateful for all those people. I really realized I was blessed to grow up in the setting that I grew up in.

Adams: How does touring change your conception of home?

Wade: Growing up in a small town, you kind of get a little stir crazy and you’re like, “There’s nothing to do here,” and you want to leave and go somewhere else. But as I’ve gotten older, I love the simplicity of a small town, and coming back home to this familiar, easygoing place is a really good feeling.

Adams: Appalachia is known for its music and so is Floyd. How did coming up in that culture affect your approach to songwriting and how you write music?

Wade: I talk about the Floyd Country Store a lot. I love that place. I spent most Friday nights with my grandfather up at the Floyd Country Store, because they have the bluegrass music, and people are out on the streets playing, and it’s just a really good time. That was my first introduction to live music. I don’t play bluegrass music. But the thing about bluegrass — take the instrumentation out of it, just focusing on the lyrics. They’d be singing these extremely sad, dark songs, but it sounded happy with the banjo music with it. I would always listen and connect with a lot of the words. They were singing about smoking and drinking and failed relationships and dark stuff like that. A lot of people don’t really see it that way. But I’m such a lyric person and always have been. That was my first introduction to music. As a person that does focus on lyrics, I took a lot away from that.

Adams: Can you tell me about the new single that came out “The Night (Part 1)” and “The Night (Part 2)?” Where did those songs come from?

Wade: “The Night (Part 1)” came out, I think in May 2019, the original one. It was the first song that I wrote about my sobriety and dealing with my mental health. It was just one of those that I sat down, and I recorded it on my phone, just a video in my room. I didn’t think I would do anything with it, but I ended up putting it online. Then that video blew up, it really took off. I didn’t expect that, because it was so personal to me that I didn’t expect other people to really connect with it. So of course they did. You know, when I’m playing shows, “The Night” is one of the songs that people are singing along just as loud to that one as they are “Wilder Days.”

I wrote “The Night (Part 2)” about a year and a half ago. It was just the continuation of where I’m at. I’m not in the same place that I was in when I wrote “The Night (Part 1),” but I still had those struggles. I still have these dreams, where I’m taking shots. I am five years into my recovery, but I’ll still have these dreams that I relapse. It’ll take me a while after I wake up to really realize, “Oh, that was a dream.” It’s hard sometimes when you’ve been on a tour, and you’ve been gone for two months, to come back home and really be able to relate to the people around you and be able to kind of come back down from that high that you’ve had on the road. My main point of that song was just like, while things do get better, there’s still struggles, no matter what part of your life you’re in, no matter where you’re at. In your journey, you’re still going to have struggles. While it does get better, there’s a lot of ups and downs. The main purpose of that song was just really putting it out there, where I’m at what I’m feeling.

Adams: I wanted to ask about another lyric on “Other Side:” “You knew my skin back before I had all these tattoos.” Now it seems like a lot of people recognize you because of your tattoos and that iconic album cover. How did you start getting tattoos, and what’s your relationship with them now?

Wade: I grew up in a Southern Baptist Church. And so tattoos were not something that they promoted, obviously. I grew up really thinking that tattoos are really bad. Then I went to college, and I was a freshman, everybody I knew pretty much had at least one tattoo. My friend was like, “Hey, I think you would like to get a tattoo. I think if you got one, you’d see it’s not that bad.” Then just a broke college kid, you know, the real smart thing to do is to go spend what little money you have on a tattoo. I went over to a tattoo shop in Roanoke and got my first tattoo. I’m pretty sure it wasn’t, even a month later, I went and got three more. And then it was just on from there. I promised my mom I won’t get any past the elbow, and then it became a sleeve, and then it became my hands, and here we are. I’ve got quite a few. It’s kind of like with my songs, I’ve gotten all these tattoos at a different place in my life. This is something I enjoy doing, and I’m not going to stop.

Adams: What’s next for you? You know, you’ve worked hard and achieved this breakthrough success. What are your ambitions for the next record and beyond that?

Wade: I’m almost finished with writing the next record. I’m actually going to write a couple days this week. Right at the beginning of next year [2023], I’m gonna go in the studio. I’ve cut half the record already, but I think there’s a lot of pressure because “Reckless” did so good.

I’ve got a big, almost completely sold out tour starting in February, and so I’m gonna be busy. I’m gonna be really busy. I think I’m gonna take me a little two-week vacation in January, [and] go somewhere really warm. And after that, it’s game on.

River Ice Jams And Country Musician Morgan Wade On This West Virginia Morning

On this West Virginia Morning, our Inside Appalachia Host Mason Adams recently spoke with country musician and Virginia native Morgan Wade. “Wilder Days” is the first track on her country album Reckless. The album was released in 2021 and became a hit, charting at number 14 on Billboard’s Heatseekers charts. We hear about her tour and about coming home to Floyd, Virginia.

On this West Virginia Morning, our Inside Appalachia Host Mason Adams recently spoke with country musician and Virginia native Morgan Wade. “Wilder Days” is the first track on her country album Reckless. The album was released in 2021 and became a hit, charting at number 14 on Billboard’s Heatseekers charts. We hear about her tour and about coming home to Floyd, Virginia.

Also, in this show, The Allegheny Front, based in Pittsburgh, share its latest story about ice jams on rivers during the winter.

West Virginia Morning is a production of West Virginia Public Broadcasting which is solely responsible for its content.

Support for our news bureaus comes from West Virginia University, Concord University, and Shepherd University.

Listen to West Virginia Morning weekdays at 7:43 a.m. on WVPB Radio or subscribe to the podcast and never miss an episode. #WVMorning

Loretta Lynn, Coal Miner's Daughter And Country Queen, Dies

Loretta Lynn, the Kentucky coal miner’s daughter whose frank songs about life and love as a woman in Appalachia pulled her out of poverty and made her a pillar of country music, has died. She was 90.

In a statement provided to The Associated Press, Lynn’s family said she died Tuesday at her home in Hurricane Mills, Tennessee.

“Our precious mom, Loretta Lynn, passed away peacefully this morning, October 4th, in her sleep at home in her beloved ranch in Hurricane Mills,” the family said in a statement. They asked for privacy as they grieve and said a memorial will be announced later.

Lynn already had four children before launching her career in the early 1960s, and her songs reflected her pride in her rural Kentucky background.

As a songwriter, she crafted a persona of a defiantly tough woman, a contrast to the stereotypical image of most female country singers. The Country Music Hall of Famer wrote fearlessly about sex and love, cheating husbands, divorce and birth control and sometimes got in trouble with radio programmers for material from which even rock performers once shied away.

Her biggest hits came in the 1960s and ’70s, including “Coal Miner’s Daughter,” “You Ain’t Woman Enough,” “The Pill,” “Don’t Come Home a Drinkin’ (With Lovin’ on Your Mind),” “Rated X” and “You’re Looking at Country.” She was known for appearing in floor-length, wide gowns with elaborate embroidery or rhinestones, many created by her longtime personal assistant and designer Tim Cobb.

Her honesty and unique place in country music was rewarded. She was the first woman ever named entertainer of the year at the genre’s two major awards shows, first by the Country Music Association in 1972 and then by the Academy of Country Music three years later.

“It was what I wanted to hear and what I knew other women wanted to hear, too,” Lynn told the AP in 2016. “I didn’t write for the men; I wrote for us women. And the men loved it, too.”

In 1969, she released her autobiographical “Coal Miner’s Daughter,” which helped her reach her widest audience yet.

“We were poor but we had love/That’s the one thing Daddy made sure of/He shoveled coal to make a poor man’s dollar,” she sang.

“Coal Miner’s Daughter,” also the title of her 1976 book, was made into a 1980 movie of the same name. Sissy Spacek’s portrayal of Lynn won her an Academy Award and the film was also nominated for best picture.

Long after her commercial peak, Lynn won two Grammys in 2005 for her album “Van Lear Rose,” which featured 13 songs she wrote, including “Portland, Oregon” about a drunken one-night stand. “Van Lear Rose” was a collaboration with rocker Jack White, who produced the album and played the guitar parts.

Born Loretta Webb, the second of eight children, she claimed her birthplace was Butcher Holler, near the coal mining company town of Van Lear in the mountains of east Kentucky. There really wasn’t a Butcher Holler, however. She later told a reporter that she made up the name for the purposes of the song based on the names of the families that lived there.

Her daddy played the banjo, her mama played the guitar and she grew up on the songs of the Carter Family.

“I was singing when I was born, I think,” she told the AP in 2016. “Daddy used to come out on the porch where I would be singing and rocking the babies to sleep. He’d say, ‘Loretta, shut that big mouth. People all over this holler can hear you.’ And I said, ‘Daddy, what difference does it make? They are all my cousins.’”

She wrote in her autobiography that she was 13 when she got married to Oliver “Mooney” Lynn, but the AP later discovered state records that showed she was 15. Tommy Lee Jones played Mooney Lynn in the biopic.

Her husband, whom she called “Doo” or “Doolittle,” urged her to sing professionally and helped promote her early career. With his help, she earned a recording contract with Decca Records, later MCA, and performed on the Grand Ole Opry stage. Lynn wrote her first hit single, “I’m a Honky Tonk Girl,” released in 1960.

She also teamed up with singer Conway Twitty to form one of the most popular duos in country music with hits such as “Louisiana Woman, Mississippi Man” and “After the Fire is Gone,” which earned them a Grammy Award. Their duets, and her single records, were always mainstream country and not crossover or pop-tinged.

The Academy of Country Music chose her as the artist of the decade for the 1970s, and she was elected to the Country Music Hall of Fame in 1988.

In “Fist City,” Lynn threatens a hair-pulling fistfight if another woman won’t stay away from her man: “I’m here to tell you, gal, to lay off of my man/If you don’t want to go to Fist City.” That strong-willed but traditional country woman reappears in other Lynn songs. In “The Pill,” a song about sex and birth control, Lynn writes about how she’s sick of being trapped at home to take care of babies: “The feelin’ good comes easy now/Since I’ve got the pill,” she sang.

She moved to Hurricane Mills, Tennessee, outside of Nashville, in the 1990s, where she set up a ranch complete with a replica of her childhood home and a museum that is a popular roadside tourist stop. The dresses she was known for wearing are there, too.

Lynn knew that her songs were trailblazing, especially for country music, but she was just writing the truth that so many rural women like her experienced.

“I could see that other women was goin’ through the same thing, ‘cause I worked the clubs. I wasn’t the only one that was livin’ that life and I’m not the only one that’s gonna be livin’ today what I’m writin’,” she told The AP in 1995.

Even into her later years, Lynn never seemed to stop writing, scoring a multi-album deal in 2014 with Legacy Records, a division of Sony Music Entertainment. In 2017, she suffered a stroke that forced her to postpone her shows.

She and her husband were married nearly 50 years before he died in 1996. They had six children: Betty, Jack, Ernest and Clara, and then twins Patsy and Peggy. She had 17 grandchildren and four step-grandchildren.

October 21, 1935: Country Musician Mel Street Born in Virginia

Country musician Mel Street was born near Grundy, Virginia, on October 21, 1935. He gained early show business experience on WHIS radio and television in Bluefield. In the late 1960s and early ‘70s, he hosted his own radio show in Bluefield. During this time, he developed his signature honky-tonk style, inspired by country crooners of the ‘50s and ‘60s.

In 1970, he recorded the song ‘‘Borrowed Angel,” which was picked up by Royal American Records and became a top-10 hit in 1972.

Street moved to Nashville and followed up “Borrowed Angel” with 22 more hits, the most significant being ‘‘Lovin’ On Back Streets,’’ ‘‘Smokey Mountain Memories,’’ and ‘‘If I Had a Cheating Heart.’’ By the mid-1970s, he was considered one of the biggest up-and-coming talents in Nashville. However, clinical depression and alcoholism took a toll on him. Mel Street committed suicide on his 43^rd birthday in 1978. Street’s idol, George Jones, sang at his funeral.

Four additional Mel Street songs were released after his death, including “The One Thing My Lady Never Puts Into Words,” which reached number 17 on the charts in 1979.

July 9, 1923: Singer Molly O'Day Born in Pike County KY

Singer Molly O’Day was born in Pike County, Kentucky, on July 9, 1923. She played guitar and sang, while accompanied by her brothers “Skeets” and “Duke” Williamson.

While just a teenager, Molly played with Skeets on radio stations in Charleston, Williamson, Beckley, and Bluefield, where she met bandleader “Lynn” Davis. After getting married, O’Day and Davis moved frequently. Although they performed duets, it was Molly’s solo numbers that made her one of the pioneer female singers in country music. She signed with Columbia Records in 1946 and cut 36 recordings.

In 1950, Molly and Lynn gave up show business. After which, Molly sang only in churches, and Lynn became a minister. In 1973, they started a gospel radio program in Huntington. Here’s a clip of Molly singing the show’s theme song, “Living the Right Life Now”:

Molly died in 1987 at age 64, but Lynn continued the show until his own death in 2000.

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WVPB presents special sneak peek of ‘Country Music: A Film by Ken Burns’

Buy Tickets – April 16 at 7:30 p.m. – Creative Arts Center in Morgantown

Event to showcase live performances by legendary Mountain State artists Kathy Mattea, Charlie McCoy

As part of a national 30-city promotional tour crisscrossing the United States, West Virginia Public Broadcasting will present a special screening of the upcoming PBS documentary, “Country Music: A Film by Ken Burns,” on Tuesday, April 16, at 7:30 p.m., at the Lyell B. Clay Concert Theatre in the Creative Arts Center at West Virginia University in Morgantown.

The film’s writer and producer, Dayton Duncan, and producer Julie Dunfey, will showcase an exclusive selection of excerpts from the film specific to the Mountain State’s rich country music heritage. Beloved West Virginia country music artists Kathy Mattea and Charlie McCoy, both of whom are featured in the documentary, will perform live with the Mountain Stage Band.

All tickets are general admission and available for $13 plus applicable fees. Doors will open at 7 p.m. and early arrivals will be treated to a performance by the WVU Bluegrass and Old Time Band in the lobby prior to the show.

Get Tickets Here

Chuck Roberts, WVPB executive director and CEO, said an event of this magnitude wouldn’t be possible without support from PBS and collaboration with WVU’s College of Creative Arts and Reed College of Media. He said everyone involved in organizing the event recognizes its importance.

“Country music has flowed through West Virginia since before the genre had a formal name,” Roberts said. “Our history is steeped with a respect and love for this kind of music and it is ingrained in who we are. We are honored to be able to present a fantastic event celebrating the film and our state’s unique place in country music history with the help of our partners and sponsors.

“I encourage everyone to come out for this special experience. There is really no better place West Virginians should be that Tuesday evening in April,” Roberts said.

Burns, Duncan and Dunfey spent eight years researching and producing the film, an eight-part, 16-hour documentary premiering on West Virginia Public Broadcasting television September 15 at 8 p.m. They conducted interviews with more than 100 people, including 40 members of the Country Music Hall of Fame. Written by Duncan, the documentary chronicles country music’s early days, from southern Appalachia’s songs of struggle, heartbreak and faith to the rollicking Western swing of Texas, California’s honky-tonks and Nashville’s ”Grand Ole Opry.” Duncan said he can’t wait to tell the tale of West Virginia’s impact on country music.

“West Virginia — its artists, its radio stations, and its fans –– has had a significant influence on the evolution of country music,” Duncan said. “We were thrilled to interview Little Jimmie Dickens, Connie Smith, Kathy Mattea and Charlie McCoy to tell their stories — and the life of Hawkshaw Hawkins is an incredibly moving tale. I’m particularly happy that Kathy and Charlie will be there to perform as well.

Julie Dunfey, Ken Burns and Dayton Duncan spent eight years researching and producing the film, “Country Music: A Film by Ken Burns.” West Virginia Public Broadcasting will present West Virginia-specific clips from the film during a special Morgantown screening that also will feature live performances by Mountain State music legends Kathy Mattea and Charlie McCoy.

ABOUT THE PRODUCERS

Dayton Duncan is the lead producer and writer of “Country Music” and has been involved with the work of Ken Burns for more than 25 years on films including “The West,” “Lewis & Clark: The Journey of the Corps of Discovery,” “Mark Twain,” “Horatio’s Drive,” “The National Parks: America’s Best Idea” and “The Dust Bowl.” Duncan also has served as a consultant or consulting producer on all of Burns’s other documentaries, beginning with “The Civil War” and including “Baseball,” “Jazz,” and “The War,” among others. He has authored 13 books, worked in both New Hampshire and national politics.

Julie Dunfey began her association with Ken Burns as a co-producer of “The Civil War.” Most recently, she was a producer on “The National Parks: America’s Best Idea,” “The Dust Bowl” and now, “Country Music.” Along with Burns and Duncan, she was nominated in 2013 by the Producers Guild for Outstanding Producer of Long-Form Television.

West Virginia country music legends Kathy Mattea and Charlie McCoy will perform live in Morgantown April 16 at the WVU Creative Arts Center during West Virginia Public Broadcasting’s special screening of “Country Music: A Film by Ken Burns.” For ticket information, go to wvpublic.org/countrymusic.

ABOUT THE MUSICAL ARTISTS

Kathy Mattea was born in Kanawha County, West Virginia, and has enjoyed a career with highlights including two GRAMMY wins, four CMA Awards, four Number 1 country singles, and five gold albums as well as a platinum collection of her greatest hits. Mattea was inducted into the West Virginia Music Hall of Fame in 2011.

A multi-instrumentalist, Charlie McCoy hails from Fayette County, West Virginia, and is one of the most prolific studio musicians of any genre. He has recorded 35 solo albums and his work has been on recordings by Roy Orbison, Bob Dylan, Dolly Parton, Simon and Garfunkel and George Jones. His autobiography “50 Cents and A Boxtop” was released in 2017. He was inducted into the West Virginia Music Hall of Fame in 2008 and the Country Music Hall of Fame in 2009.

ABOUT THE SPONSORS

Funding for the documentary, a production of Florentine Films and WETA in Washington, D.C., was provided by Bank of America, the Annenberg Foundation, the Arthur Vining Davis Foundations, Belmont University, Tennessee Department of Tourist Development, the Metropolitan Government of Nashville and Davidson County, Rosalind P. Walter and by members of “The Better Angels Society,” including The Blavatnik Family Foundation, the Schwartz/Reisman Foundation, the Pfeil Foundation, Diane and Hal Brierley, John and Catherine Debs, the Fullerton Family Charitable Fund, the Perry and Donna Golkin Family Foundation, Jay Alix and Una Jackman, Mercedes T. Bass, Fred and Donna Seigel, Gilchrist and Amy Berg, James R. Berdell Foundation, David Bonderman, Deborah P. and Jonathan T. Dawson, Senator Bill and Tracy Frist, Susan and David Kreisman, Rocco and Debby Landesman, Lillian Lovelace, John and Leslie McQuown, the Segal Family Foundation, Michelle Smith. Major funding was provided by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and PBS.