Post Byrds/Burritos--Gram Parsons & Emmylou
Posted: Sun May 29, 2011 4:54 pm
Gram's importance to the development of country/rock music... Gram was the cosmic cowboy and his immersion of true country into his soul made for some of the best in the genre.
Interview with Gram about "GP" with Emmy
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_mVKggDKrGE
In My Hour Of Darkness
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sbw0yFuE ... re=related
The serendipitous pairing of Emmylou Harris & Gram Parsons, through introductions by Chris Hillman, cannot be more important. Gram's two solo albums are unmistakably intertwined with his musical and emotional relationship with Emmylou.
....Harris soon returned to performing as part of a trio with Gerry Mule and Tom Guidera. One night in 1971, members of the country rock group The Flying Burrito Brothers happened to be in the audience. Former Byrds member Chris Hillman, who had taken over the band after the departure of its founder Gram Parsons, was so impressed by Harris that he briefly considered asking her to join the band. Instead, Hillman ended up recommending her to Parsons, who was looking for a female vocalist to work with on his first solo album, GP. Harris toured as a member of Parsons' band, The Fallen Angels, in 1973, and the couple shone during vocal harmonies and duets. Harris was quite pleased, and invested a lot emotionally in their relationship. Later that year, Parsons and Harris worked on a studio album, Grievous Angel. Parsons died in his motel room near what is now Joshua Tree National Park on September 19, 1973, from an accidental overdose of drugs and alcohol. Parsons's Grievous Angel was released posthumously in 1974, and three more tracks from his last sessions with Harris were included on another posthumous Parsons album, Sleepless Nights, in 1976. There was one more album of recorded material from that period of time that was packaged with the name, Live 1973, but was not released until 1982.
The working relationship between Harris and Parsons is of great importance in country and country-rock music history. Parsons offered Harris a study in true country music, introducing her to artists like The Louvin Brothers, and provided her with a musical identity; Harris's harmony and duet vocals, on the other hand, were lauded by those who heard them, and helped inspire Parsons' performances. His death left her devastated at an emotional and musical crossroads. She eventually carried on with her own version of Parsons' musical vision, and was instrumental in bringing attention to his achievements. Harris's earliest signature song, and arguably her most personal one, "Boulder to Birmingham", written shortly after Gram's death, showed the depth of her shock and pain at losing Parsons. It was, according to her best friend Linda Ronstadt, the beginning of a "lifetime effort to process what had happened", and was just the first of many songs written and/or performed by Harris about her life with (and without) Parsons.
I would rock my soul in the bosom of Abraham
I would hold my life in his saving grace.
I would walk all the way from Boulder to Birmingham
If I thought I could see, I could see your face.
—"Boulder to Birmingham"
lyrics by Emmylou Harris
-wiki
"Emmylou Harris' Pieces of the Sky is one of the more welcome entries in her catalog. Before the auspicious and provocative Elite Hotel, issued later in 1975, Pieces of the Sky was the kind of record that became Harris' signature style for most of her time at Warner Brothers, and is one of the most auspicious debut recordings in the history of country music. Accompanied by the Hot Band featuring James Burton, Rodney Crowell, Brian Ahern, Rick Cunha, Glen D. Hardin, Linda Ronstadt, Amos Garrett, Mike Auldridge, and a slew of others, Harris offers a palette of songs that range from traditional country music, including her understated yet deeply moving read of Billy Sherrill's "Too Far Gone," Dolly Parton's "Coat of Many Colors," Merle Haggard's "(Tonight) The Bottle Let Me Down," the Louvin Brothers' "If I Could Only Win Your Love," and the Bryants' "Sleepless Nights" (a staple of Harris when she played with the late Gram Parsons). From the then-current crop of country songwriters, she opened the album with Crowell's "Bluebird Wine" and Shel Silverstein's "Queen of the Silver Dollar." There's also another Lennon-McCartney selection included, with "For No One." But the most moving track on the set is "Boulder to Birmingham," a Harris original and her tribute to the memory of Parsons. In her voice one can hear the human heart break, shatter, and then gather itself in order to move on, forever looking back. When she sings, "Well you really got me this time/And the hardest part is knowing I'll survive/I've come to listen for the sound of the trucks as they move down out on 95/And pretending it's the ocean, comin' down to wash me clean/Baby, do you know what I mean?," the entire world opens in the grain of her voice and bathes the listener in grief, longing, and resolve. [On the 2004 remastered and expanded version of the album Rhino added a pair of Dallas Frazier tracks from the same sessions: there's the hard-singing honky tonk of "Hank and Lefty" and the standard "California Cottonfields." While nothing needed be added to this masterpiece, these cuts following Silverstein's (original) closer do not at all detract from it." -avaxhome
Boulder to Birmingham....for Gram....just beautiful.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lTry1yKvxZM
Before Believing....
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_GRh_QauiyA
....
I highly recommend Emmylou's brilliant album...."Pieces Of Sky"
Interview with Gram about "GP" with Emmy
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_mVKggDKrGE
In My Hour Of Darkness
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sbw0yFuE ... re=related
The serendipitous pairing of Emmylou Harris & Gram Parsons, through introductions by Chris Hillman, cannot be more important. Gram's two solo albums are unmistakably intertwined with his musical and emotional relationship with Emmylou.
....Harris soon returned to performing as part of a trio with Gerry Mule and Tom Guidera. One night in 1971, members of the country rock group The Flying Burrito Brothers happened to be in the audience. Former Byrds member Chris Hillman, who had taken over the band after the departure of its founder Gram Parsons, was so impressed by Harris that he briefly considered asking her to join the band. Instead, Hillman ended up recommending her to Parsons, who was looking for a female vocalist to work with on his first solo album, GP. Harris toured as a member of Parsons' band, The Fallen Angels, in 1973, and the couple shone during vocal harmonies and duets. Harris was quite pleased, and invested a lot emotionally in their relationship. Later that year, Parsons and Harris worked on a studio album, Grievous Angel. Parsons died in his motel room near what is now Joshua Tree National Park on September 19, 1973, from an accidental overdose of drugs and alcohol. Parsons's Grievous Angel was released posthumously in 1974, and three more tracks from his last sessions with Harris were included on another posthumous Parsons album, Sleepless Nights, in 1976. There was one more album of recorded material from that period of time that was packaged with the name, Live 1973, but was not released until 1982.
The working relationship between Harris and Parsons is of great importance in country and country-rock music history. Parsons offered Harris a study in true country music, introducing her to artists like The Louvin Brothers, and provided her with a musical identity; Harris's harmony and duet vocals, on the other hand, were lauded by those who heard them, and helped inspire Parsons' performances. His death left her devastated at an emotional and musical crossroads. She eventually carried on with her own version of Parsons' musical vision, and was instrumental in bringing attention to his achievements. Harris's earliest signature song, and arguably her most personal one, "Boulder to Birmingham", written shortly after Gram's death, showed the depth of her shock and pain at losing Parsons. It was, according to her best friend Linda Ronstadt, the beginning of a "lifetime effort to process what had happened", and was just the first of many songs written and/or performed by Harris about her life with (and without) Parsons.
I would rock my soul in the bosom of Abraham
I would hold my life in his saving grace.
I would walk all the way from Boulder to Birmingham
If I thought I could see, I could see your face.
—"Boulder to Birmingham"
lyrics by Emmylou Harris
-wiki
"Emmylou Harris' Pieces of the Sky is one of the more welcome entries in her catalog. Before the auspicious and provocative Elite Hotel, issued later in 1975, Pieces of the Sky was the kind of record that became Harris' signature style for most of her time at Warner Brothers, and is one of the most auspicious debut recordings in the history of country music. Accompanied by the Hot Band featuring James Burton, Rodney Crowell, Brian Ahern, Rick Cunha, Glen D. Hardin, Linda Ronstadt, Amos Garrett, Mike Auldridge, and a slew of others, Harris offers a palette of songs that range from traditional country music, including her understated yet deeply moving read of Billy Sherrill's "Too Far Gone," Dolly Parton's "Coat of Many Colors," Merle Haggard's "(Tonight) The Bottle Let Me Down," the Louvin Brothers' "If I Could Only Win Your Love," and the Bryants' "Sleepless Nights" (a staple of Harris when she played with the late Gram Parsons). From the then-current crop of country songwriters, she opened the album with Crowell's "Bluebird Wine" and Shel Silverstein's "Queen of the Silver Dollar." There's also another Lennon-McCartney selection included, with "For No One." But the most moving track on the set is "Boulder to Birmingham," a Harris original and her tribute to the memory of Parsons. In her voice one can hear the human heart break, shatter, and then gather itself in order to move on, forever looking back. When she sings, "Well you really got me this time/And the hardest part is knowing I'll survive/I've come to listen for the sound of the trucks as they move down out on 95/And pretending it's the ocean, comin' down to wash me clean/Baby, do you know what I mean?," the entire world opens in the grain of her voice and bathes the listener in grief, longing, and resolve. [On the 2004 remastered and expanded version of the album Rhino added a pair of Dallas Frazier tracks from the same sessions: there's the hard-singing honky tonk of "Hank and Lefty" and the standard "California Cottonfields." While nothing needed be added to this masterpiece, these cuts following Silverstein's (original) closer do not at all detract from it." -avaxhome
Boulder to Birmingham....for Gram....just beautiful.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lTry1yKvxZM
Before Believing....
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_GRh_QauiyA
....
I highly recommend Emmylou's brilliant album...."Pieces Of Sky"