Emmylou Harris

Speaker 10:00

Hello, I'm Kirsty Young, and this is a podcast from the Desert Island Discs Archive. For rights reasons, we've had to shorten the music.

Speaker 10:08

The programme was originally broadcast in two thousand and three, and the presenter was Sue Lawley.

Presenter0:29

My castaway this week is a musician. Over the past thirty years she's matured from hippie chick through cowboy booted country diva to mature Southern Belle, and throughout it all, her semi acoustic guitar strapped around her, her voice has captured the infinite sadness that all great country singers evoke.

Presenter0:48

She was born in Birmingham, Alabama, dropped out of drama school, got married, had a child, and, very grown up at twenty four, teamed up with the singer Graham Parsons. Two years and two successful albums later, Parsons was dead. But she became the custodian of his legacy, developing his brand of country rock into her own unique contribution.

Presenter1:09

Many awards and successful collaborations later, with Johnny Cash, Dolly Parton and Bob Dylan, to name only three, she says, The songs speak of timeless issues. There's nothing really clever about them. It's just life laid out on a plate for you. She is Emmelou Harris. It it has to touch people. Is that what it is for, country music? Is it a kind of licence to wallow in emotion, Emmelou?

Emmylou Harris1:35

It's a good thing to wallow in the emotions, to visit those emotions.

Emmylou Harris1:39

I mean, what else is there if we don't feel?

Emmylou Harris1:42

Good music, um a good song, uh good words.

Emmylou Harris1:46

I think brings you in touch with things that you were feeling.

Emmylou Harris1:49

It connects you.

Emmylou Harris1:51

with yourself and and with everyone else who is

Emmylou Harris1:54

experiencing those things.

Presenter1:55

There's a kind of universality about it.

Emmylou Harris1:58

Especially in country music, you deal with very simple stories and very simple, direct approach to the emotions.

Presenter2:06

I suppose that's how it began, really, isn't it? People sitting on the back porch and the different songs singing to each other about their drama.

Emmylou Harris2:09

Yeah, well I think singing to each other. You know the the folk songs from the I think country probably comes from the traditions of the English, Irish, Scottish folk songs where the people came and and settled in the United States and um in the hills, you know, and a lot of that that music uh came from being kind of isolated. And uh then it it met up with the black culture, the blues.

Emmylou Harris2:31

All those different combinations come to came to make a a a pretty unique form of music, I think.

Presenter2:36

But there's not very often any joy in it, I suppose, is what one feels about it. It is always the sorrows, the worries, the longing, the loss, isn't it?

Emmylou Harris2:46

Uh

Presenter2:46

Death

Emmylou Harris2:47

Well, yes, but you're not going to get away from those issues.

Emmylou Harris2:50

And I think it's better to just face up to it.

Emmylou Harris2:55

And sing about it because it is a kind of form of prayer in a way. It is a celebration, even if you are singing about dark things, at least you have the ability to sing. And myself as a because I am a singer, but I am a music fan, music nourishes me and

Emmylou Harris3:10

and gives me strength.

Presenter3:11

Yeah.

Emmylou Harris3:12

Yeah.

Presenter3:13

Also.

Emmylou Harris3:13

Yeah.

Presenter3:13

But if, by definition, if it if it's about suffering in life, then the older you get, the better you get at seeing about it, because the more you've suffered, I presume.

Emmylou Harris3:23

Well, if your voice holds up.

Emmylou Harris3:25

Uh, you have more to sing about. But, you know, the whole premise of the show is, you know, what what eight albums, not what eight books or eight movies or eight paintings. So obviously music is

Emmylou Harris3:37

Right up there with food and water, I think, for people. I think it touches them in a place that is very primal.

Emmylou Harris3:44

Let's hear your first record then. What's it to be? Well, it's an album called Dreaming My Dreams by Wayland Jennings. And it's about loss and longing, but I think it's also about celeb the celebration of isn't it better to have felt something even if it brings you pain?

Emmylou Harris4:00

Isn't it the fact that we've actually connected with someone or many people that isn't that what makes us alive and makes us who we are?

Speaker 34:09

To those that I

Speaker 34:12

This daughter

Speaker 34:19

Today I'll get old.

Speaker 34:24

Um

Speaker 34:26

Leve to see it all.

Speaker 34:30

But I'll always please

Speaker 34:33

Dreaming my

Presenter4:34

Dreaming Mind

Speaker 34:36

Yeah.

Presenter4:36

Sweet Uh

Presenter4:39

Whelon Jennings Dreaming My Dreams. That's put us in deathly mode, has it yet?

Presenter4:45

It's a wonderful sound though.

Emmylou Harris4:46

Oh yeah, what a voice, wonderful voice. No one, no one ever sounded like Wayland, nobody even comes close.

Presenter4:52

You didn't start out as a country singer though, did you? No, you sang folk. I mean, that was your first love.

Emmylou Harris4:55

No, you sang

Emmylou Harris4:58

Yeah. Yeah. I s I discovered music really in my teens. I was about sixteen.

Emmylou Harris5:03

And there was a resurgence of folk music that happened in the United States. There was this song, you know, A Blowing in the Wind, and I thought, Who is this guy, Bob Dylan? and

Speaker 15:10

The method

Emmylou Harris5:12

And of course I discovered him and discovered uh Joan Baez and for a long time I just wanted to be Joan Baez. I got a guitar for my sixteenth Christmas, I think, and um

Emmylou Harris5:23

That my grandfather bought in a pawn shop for thirty dollars in Birmingham, Alabama. Oh, yes. I had nobody nobody in my family was musical and I didn't really have any

Speaker 15:23

Bye.

Presenter5:26

We're making MLM.

Emmylou Harris5:32

Friends who are into music or making music. I had a f a book called Uh Introduction to Folk Music Part Volumes One and Two.

Emmylou Harris5:41

And I would listen to the records and just as long as it was three chords and maybe a minor, I could kind of figure it out.

Speaker 35:47

Hmm.

Emmylou Harris5:48

Yeah.

Presenter5:48

So that was that was the fashion. That was why you went to. But there was a deeper reason, wasn't there, for not uh liking country. There was something.

Emmylou Harris5:56

Oh well

Presenter5:58

Yeah.

Emmylou Harris5:58

Somehow it was a politically incorrect. It was like anti-integration, it was anti-all the things that kind of folk music.

Emmylou Harris6:06

represented, which was kind of odd because really when you think about the South and the and the unions and the poverty and all that stuff, there if you go back to like Woody Guthrie and stuff, it it's all about

Emmylou Harris6:17

But somehow

Presenter6:20

But somehow country music was connected, wasn't it, with that very conservative deep south? Yeah, it was racial prejudice really, as well as the

Emmylou Harris6:23

Conservative deep south. That was associated with it. And plus I just didn't get it. It sounded hokey to me. When Joan Byers was singing these chillingly beautiful crystalline songs, you know, about

Emmylou Harris6:40

I don't know, murder and it's a youthful

Presenter6:42

What country music was kind of Hicksville, did you yeah.

Emmylou Harris6:43

Yeah, and and it didn't interest me at all. And obviously there was that

Emmylou Harris6:48

stigma, because we were right in the throes of a huge change in the United States, you know, in racial relations.

Presenter6:54

But you were born, as we said, in Birmingham, Alabama. You must have seen that kind of racial prejudice of the world. Well, it's interesting.

Emmylou Harris6:54

Yeah.

Emmylou Harris6:57

Yeah

Emmylou Harris7:01

Well, it's interesting. I I left Birmingham when I was six. My father was in the Marine Corps and we were transferred out and even though we still lived in the south in North Carolina

Emmylou Harris7:11

And we lived in off base housing. It was o off base housing for people from all over. So it was a cultureless kind of existence. So there was integration, it really? Yeah, there was and there wasn't. I mean, I'm sure there was still a lot of prejudice, but basically, at least on the surface, there was integration.

Emmylou Harris7:27

And it was only when I would go back and visit my relatives in the in the Deep South and I would see the water fountains that would say col you know, colored and the w the restrooms and the restaurants. And I would think to myself, That's very odd. Tell me about your second record. I chose the staple singers, and when they s sing together, it is a sound.

Emmylou Harris7:48

one of the most righteous, beautiful sounds that has ever been created. And yet there's an incredible simplicity to their records. So this is a very popular gospel song, but their arrangement I think is pretty extraordinary. It's called Uncloudy Day.

Speaker 38:12

Win on.

Speaker 18:13

Win.

Speaker 38:19

God in day. Well

Speaker 38:24

Well, yes, so yes, they tell me.

Presenter8:30

The staple singers, an uncloudy day. Um we mentioned, Emma Lou Harris, that um hardship informs the work of folk and indeed of cut country music. You had in fact uh quite an eventful childhood. Your father was a prisoner of war at one point, wasn't he?

Emmylou Harris8:48

Yes, my father was in the Korean conflict, as they call it, and uh he left when I was five, but he was shot down and there was a

Emmylou Harris8:58

A period of time when we did not know.

Emmylou Harris9:00

Whether he was dead or alive, he was, as they call, missing in action. One of my clearest memories is standing next to my mother when she got the phone call.

Emmylou Harris9:08

And it's in the days, you know, when they had the one telephone and it was in a hallway with a little telephone table.

Emmylou Harris9:14

And I don't know why I was standing next to her when she got that uh call.

Emmylou Harris9:18

But I could tell something was wrong and I said, You know, what is it? and she said,

Emmylou Harris9:23

Uh your father isn't missing in action.

Emmylou Harris9:26

And of course I

Emmylou Harris9:28

I didn't know what that meant, but I knew that I might never see him again.

Emmylou Harris9:31

And so it was um it was imprinted on me like a brand.

Presenter9:35

Hm. How long was he gone anyway?

Emmylou Harris9:37

I I think it was a total of sixteen months. I'm a bit hazy on the details.

Emmylou Harris9:43

But because he was a senior officer in the camp, they had put him in in the l the box.

Emmylou Harris9:48

for to torture him, to get him to to talk and give information.

Emmylou Harris9:53

And it was a a small box where you couldn't stand up, and he was in total isolation.

Emmylou Harris9:58

And uh for a a long time. I think he went down to about a hundred and twenty pounds. And uh he was a tall man. But he apparently had a little square of cloth about the size of a quarter of a handkerchief. And I guess he must have h had a needle and a thread. And he did needlework.

Emmylou Harris10:18

on this piece of cloth, and he told me that it really kept him.

Emmylou Harris10:23

you know, kept him from you know, helped him a lot.

Emmylou Harris10:27

In that complete isolation. And after mine, you're going to be out there. There was no, he didn't know whether he was going to be killed. And I think also not knowing what what your breaking point is. So you think your desert island's gonna be a bit like that, do you? Oh.

Presenter10:41

Yeah.

Emmylou Harris10:41

Of course.

Presenter10:43

Thanks.

Emmylou Harris10:43

So

Presenter10:43

Uh

Presenter10:44

I do have the impression that that you kind of kept yourself to yourself, rather, that even though you were quite a beauty, I really are quite a beauty.

Emmylou Harris10:44

Died.

Emmylou Harris10:54

Well, I

Emmylou Harris10:55

Thank you. We're on radio, so I won't deny.

Presenter10:56

We're in radios.

Presenter10:59

But th there you were, you know, quite a looker, could have, you know, had all kinds of guidelines.

Emmylou Harris11:02

I never could navigate those waters. I never could.

Emmylou Harris11:07

Understand the social strata of high school. I had some good friends.

Emmylou Harris11:12

Audling of one of them was like the most popular girl in school.

Emmylou Harris11:16

She was a beauty queen and she was very sought after and she lived down the street from me and we were very close. And so I was the w girl that guys would call to find out how they could get in good with Carol. And I would say, Forget it, you've already blown it.

Emmylou Harris11:33

So you need to

Presenter11:33

I think so. Uh

Emmylou Harris11:34

Needy.

Presenter11:35

You sat home playing your guitar or listening to your radio. But in the middle of all of this, you wrote to Pete Seeger. I don't know if you can. Yeah, I wrote to Pete Seeger. See, I.

Emmylou Harris11:42

Yeah, I wrote a pet sigma.

Emmylou Harris11:45

I also have a lot of money.

Presenter11:45

I want to do it.

Emmylou Harris11:49

I mean, how did you know that's what you wanted to do? Well, the more I got into music, the more it seemed to.

Emmylou Harris11:55

It seemed to resonate for me, but I thought, how can I? I have no experience. I've never had any hardship.

Emmylou Harris12:02

I've never had anybody make me, you know, get out of a seat and move to the back of the bus, you know. I've so I thought, Well, I don't have any credibility. I don't understand any of that.

Presenter12:11

So was it a long letter you wrote?

Emmylou Harris12:13

Oh, it was long, front and back, handwritten.

Emmylou Harris12:17

Just so just pouring my heart out to him.

Presenter12:21

And did he reply?

Emmylou Harris12:21

He did reply. Yes, he did. God bless him. I met him years later. He remembered the letter.

Emmylou Harris12:27

Thanks.

Presenter12:28

That's pretty young.

Emmylou Harris12:28

Uh

Presenter12:28

Yeah. Big.

Emmylou Harris12:29

And uh he was basically said

Presenter12:29

And uh he was basically

Emmylou Harris12:32

that life was gonna come to me whether I wanted it to or not. Just gave me a few little things, I think, just to keep me busy.

Emmylou Harris12:40

We better do something with this girl before she implodes.

Emmylou Harris12:44

Record number three. All right. I picked the band by the band and uh I just love this track. It it it makes me happy. It's called Up on Cripple Creek.

Speaker 312:57

I fke up all of my winnings and I gave my little Bessie hay.

Speaker 313:04

And she tore it up and threw it in my face, but just for a lag.

Speaker 313:10

There's one thing in the whole wide world I sure would like to see.

Speaker 313:17

That's when I get in love with mine. Dips a no nut in my tea.

Speaker 313:23

I'm on crypt.

Presenter13:26

That's the band and up on Cripple Creek. So, Emilou Harris, you went to drama school, but you dropped out and you headed as the kind of folk singing wannabe that you were to where else but to Greenwich Village.

Presenter13:38

You were about twenty by then and you got a break'cause you went to see a record company, didn't you? And and you talked their kind of audition.

Presenter13:49

What did they

Emmylou Harris13:50

So, uh they gave me some uh records of uh one of their artists, uh, a a very young, pretty uh singer who was had some popularity at the time. But I couldn't follow that formula and once again I was s

Emmylou Harris14:05

blissfully ignorant and really felt that I could follow my own path.

Emmylou Harris14:10

Yeah.

Presenter14:10

But at that point it just seemed to be slipping away, didn't it? And you you mean you were still singing, but you you you got married, you

Emmylou Harris14:16

Well, it it did. At that point, as Pete Seeger said, life came.

Presenter14:16

Well, it it did at that

Emmylou Harris14:21

tracked me down and I found myself pretty soon a single mother.

Emmylou Harris14:26

So, I think it felt a little bit more.

Presenter14:27

It must have felt a bit like the end of the world. It did. It did. It was like my last.

Emmylou Harris14:29

It did. It did. It was like, my life is over. I'm 23, and my life is over. I've had my shot.

Presenter14:31

Over, I'm twenty-three.

Emmylou Harris14:35

And now I have to hunker down, raise my child and give up singing because obviously I can't make a living at it.

Emmylou Harris14:41

But oddly enough, Washington DC was a very good area area for

Emmylou Harris14:47

people to do their own music and plus I had

Emmylou Harris14:50

these wonderful two people with in my parents that were twenty five miles away that were

Emmylou Harris14:54

were there as kind of surrogate parents to my daughter.

Emmylou Harris14:57

My big break really came.

Emmylou Harris15:00

with meeting Graham Parsons.

Emmylou Harris15:02

But I would have never hooked up with Graham Parsons if it hadn't been.

Emmylou Harris15:06

For my daughter.

Emmylou Harris15:08

Because I was working in a club in DC

Emmylou Harris15:11

and some people that were in a group called the Flying Burrito Brothers.

Emmylou Harris15:15

came in and heard me.

Emmylou Harris15:17

and they went off to do a show in the next town about fifty miles away.

Emmylou Harris15:21

at which Graham Parsons, who had been an original member of that band, showed up just to to hang out and visit.

Emmylou Harris15:28

He told them I'm gonna do a solo record and I'm looking for a girl to sing.

Emmylou Harris15:33

duets with him. They said, Well, we just heard this girl in DC, but she's fifty miles back up the river. Yeah, but we don't we don't know how to get in touch with her.

Presenter15:36

Do miles back up the river.

Emmylou Harris15:39

My

Emmylou Harris15:40

Babysitter was a big music fan and she went to all the big rock shows and she always got backstage. She overheard the conversation.

Emmylou Harris15:47

This is a true story.

Emmylou Harris15:50

And she went up to them.

Emmylou Harris15:51

She says, I know how to get in touch with her. I have her phone number. And the next day I got a call from Graham Parsons and the rest is history.

Presenter15:58

This is history. I want to hear some more of the history, but let's pause for record number four. What's that?

Emmylou Harris16:03

Record number four is by two women who

Emmylou Harris16:07

From the first time I heard their voices and their first record, they moved me in a way that.

Emmylou Harris16:13

I just never heard anything quite as lovely and dark and light at the same time. It is absolutely

Emmylou Harris16:21

so stunning in its beauty of melody and lyric.

Emmylou Harris16:26

that I just wanted to share it with your listeners.

Speaker 316:29

Never had the blues from whence I came But in my heart stayed a car

Speaker 316:41

Talk to me of mendic my eyes, I hear the sea.

Speaker 316:54

Dieway.

Presenter16:55

Uh

Speaker 316:56

Must I fall?

Presenter16:59

That's Kate and Anna McGarrigal and talk to me of Mendocino and that's gonna kill you on your desert island.

Emmylou Harris17:03

Yes, it is. I'm still recovering.

Emmylou Harris17:06

Every time I hear it it sort of melts me down to nothing.

Presenter17:10

So Graham Parsons, Graham Parsons, came into your life. I mean, recognised today as the the progenitor of of of country rock, he'd sung with the birds and the flying burrito brothers and so on. You said he gave me voice. I mean

Presenter17:24

How can you characterize his influence in your career? It's everything, isn't it?

Emmylou Harris17:28

Well, it is. I mean, I had a pretty voice. I could sing songs by a lot of different women singers. But I think there was just something missing. Uh uh the only word I can think of is maybe a focus.

Emmylou Harris17:41

Somehow singing along with Graham seasoned my voice.

Presenter17:44

Boys and honed it.

Emmylou Harris17:45

Hmm.

Presenter17:45

But he was trying to create something different, wasn't he? He was trying to create country rock without a kind of fusion, without hurting either one.

Emmylou Harris17:50

Is a kind of fusion

Emmylou Harris17:52

He didn't like that term, although I don't know what else you would know. He didn't like that term. It implied something that w that was that was a fusion that was lesser down.

Presenter18:02

That it would reduce one or the other. And he wanted both to be as strong.

Emmylou Harris18:10

Being. And I think it had to do with his lyrics as much as anything. You have to read between the lines, and you can also kind of put your own.

Emmylou Harris18:18

meaning into it, which is different from traditional country music where it basically says, You broke my heart and I'm gonna go sit at this bar until I and completely everyone can y we can relate that to it also.

Presenter18:28

But on the other

Presenter18:32

But it brought you to country music, if we can call that then as shorthand. Because obviously it's a different kind of country music.

Emmylou Harris18:36

Oh yes, it's a different kind of country. But no, he also brought me to the real stuff. The the hundred proof Merle Haggard, the Leuven Brothers, the great harmonies of the Leuven Brothers. All of a sudden one day I was listening to George Jones record and then all of a sudden I heard

Emmylou Harris18:53

What the man was doing with his voice, the simplicity of it, the sound in his voice.

Presenter18:57

Why do you think it did that for you? I mean, again, we go back to your roots. I wonder if it wasn't touching something in you that instinctively you reacted to.

Emmylou Harris19:01

We go back to the

Emmylou Harris19:05

Yeah.

Emmylou Harris19:07

Possibly. It could be just just a uh I was just an incredibly late bloomer.

Emmylou Harris19:13

But the point is that it really did happen. I wasn't just mimicking. All of a sudden it happened for me, and it was as real as one of those spiritual awakenings as people when they feel like they've seen

Emmylou Harris19:26

you know, God has appeared to them. I mean, it was that

Emmylou Harris19:30

It was that dramatic for me. All of a sudden I heard with different ears.

Presenter19:36

Make code number five.

Emmylou Harris19:37

All right. Well, Neil Young has always been uh an artist that I just I can just close my eyes and pick almost any of his records when I want to listen to something.

Emmylou Harris19:47

And this is who knows why, but it's called The Emperor of Wyoming.

Presenter20:19

Neil Young and Emperor of Wyoming.

Presenter20:22

Graham Parsons, Graham Parsons was from the from the South, wasn't he? From a very well-heeled family, and he'd he developed a taste for the high life. I mean, he'd he'd done the drugs big drugs.

Emmylou Harris20:30

Well, I I think that he unfortunately is one of these people who had um ten had had money every year. His father killed himself when um Graham was ten, I believe. I might be a little off on my facts. I mean, Graham never talked about this. I really learned about it m a lot about Graham after his death and then his his mother

Emmylou Harris20:52

uh, sort of drank herself to death when he was in his teens.

Emmylou Harris20:55

I I think that it was a difficult thing for him and he was extraordinarily sane uh considering what he had gone through.

Presenter21:02

Juice

Presenter21:04

Didn't you by the time you were singing with him that that he was clean, that he'd got to be a little bit more.

Emmylou Harris21:09

Well, he was. I mean, uh he I know that he had stopped doing drugs, but he was drinking. I was very naive about all that stuff, and uh he seemed to be

Emmylou Harris21:21

doing really well. He'd even stopped kind of uh drinking.

Emmylou Harris21:25

Because a a lot of it was to do we just sang all the time.

Emmylou Harris21:28

And there was work and and I think work is the great balm.

Speaker 321:31

Hmm.

Emmylou Harris21:32

And you made two very successful albums, did you? You were really yeah, well they were successful on a on a I think an artistic level.

Speaker 321:34

Yeah.

Emmylou Harris21:38

And I think he could have gone on to do a lot more, but it was just not to be.

Speaker 321:38

And then I think he could

Presenter21:38

Uh

Emmylou Harris21:42

I really only knew Graham for it was actually a short period of time, probably like a year.

Presenter21:47

It's just a terrible, terrible thing, because there it is beginning to happen, and then the next minute he's dead. It was an overdose, wasn't it? It was an overdose, yeah. Yeah. I mean.

Emmylou Harris21:55

Yeah.

Presenter21:55

Yeah.

Presenter21:55

Yeah.

Emmylou Harris21:55

You must uh you must have been devastated for that. It was. It was like uh having your arm amputated.

Emmylou Harris22:01

It was so sudden. And I really

Emmylou Harris22:05

Perhaps this was naïve, but I really thought that Graham was out of the woods. I didn't know enough about

Emmylou Harris22:10

drug and alcohol abuse to realize what uh a dangerous place he was in. His body just gave out.

Presenter22:18

Yeah.

Emmylou Harris22:19

So having

Presenter22:20

You thought suddenly you were set fair for this great singing career that you really wanted to do. Exactly. Then it's all disappeared.

Emmylou Harris22:23

Oh yeah, yeah.

Speaker 122:24

Yeah.

Presenter22:29

Fans have asked ever since, of course, whether you loved him. I mean, I'm sure you did love him in a way, but were you in love with him? I mean, would something have happened?

Emmylou Harris22:33

No way.

Emmylou Harris22:35

Oh, well something has happened. We were not lovers. I mean, I've said this countless times, of course, people still prefer the other story.

Emmylou Harris22:43

I think that if he had lived we probably would have had a relationship.

Emmylou Harris22:47

Uh, but it just the timing was all wrong.

Emmylou Harris22:52

And so so there was that too, this situation where I think I was at that point I was just at the point where I was realizing just how much he meant to me and then he was gone.

Presenter22:59

And he was

Emmylou Harris23:01

It's even

Presenter23:02

It's an amazing thought. Actually, he's been dead longer than he lived, hasn't he?

Emmylou Harris23:06

I know.

Emmylou Harris23:07

Believe me, I you think about that sometimes when you get to a certain age and you think

Emmylou Harris23:11

Yeah, that's very strange to have lived uh as long as you have when you know

Emmylou Harris23:17

Yeah.

Presenter23:17

So much of the music that you recorded after he died, the music you've even recorded in recent years, has been influenced by him, hasn't it? Well

Emmylou Harris23:25

Well, of course it

Emmylou Harris23:27

Everything is influenced when you have a very powerful influence.

Emmylou Harris23:30

It's obviously going to color everything you do. I think that he'll always be a part of me. Just like anything that's happened to you or someone who's meant a lot to you, you always carry that with you. How could you ever discard that? It becomes a part of who you are. Next piece of music, no mistake.

Emmylou Harris23:48

Mm.

Emmylou Harris23:49

Bruce Springsteen album. And I just love the the uh imagery that this this conjures up. So this is called Mansion on the Hill by Bruce Springsteen.

Speaker 324:00

At night my daddy take me and we ran

Speaker 324:07

Through the streets of a town

Speaker 324:10

So silent and still

Speaker 324:15

Park on a back rule

Speaker 324:19

Highway side.

Speaker 324:22

Be good man.

Speaker 324:25

Imagine all

Presenter24:29

Mansion on the Hill from Bruce Springsteen, one of the many collaborators you've performed with over the past three decades, Emmelou Harris. But what you've done in that time is you've brought together those two sections of the audience that Graham Parsons wanted to bring together, haven't you? The the rock and the country, and they're kind of fused. You know, you can't tell the one from the other now. I mean, is that your great achievement, do you think?

Emmylou Harris24:48

You can't tell the one

Emmylou Harris24:51

I I think I've been very fortunate that I've got, uh, fans who

Emmylou Harris24:55

Don't think about categories. It seems like there are more and more people whose record collections are, what do you call it, C D collections.

Emmylou Harris25:02

you will find that they listen to a great deal of different kinds of

Presenter25:06

Yeah.

Emmylou Harris25:06

Uh

Speaker 325:06

Is it

Emmylou Harris25:06

Yeah.

Emmylou Harris25:07

Yeah.

Presenter25:07

But but your local radio in Nashville and so on, I gather that the sort of stuff they play, their definition of country, has shifted, hasn't it? They moved away from you in the nineties and started playing other kind of stuff.

Presenter25:17

Oh yeah

Emmylou Harris25:17

Yeah, I'm not played on country radio at all unless it's an oldie. They they consider they they don't know whether figure I either died or I moved away.

Emmylou Harris25:27

Where I got abducted. I mean, I I tried to play the uh the good Girl Scout there for a while and I thought it w for a while I thought it was my fault.

Emmylou Harris25:36

That I wasn't making good records and that I maybe had to work a little harder. And we consciously tried to make some songs that were good country songs.

Emmylou Harris25:46

that we thought would have a chance on the radio. And didn't we do the trick to the rules?

Presenter25:50

Uh no, in fact

Emmylou Harris25:55

And so I went

Emmylou Harris25:57

Right. Okay. Well, you know, I don't need this. And and I actually the record company was very good. They said, Look,

Emmylou Harris26:04

We've we don't know what to do. We've tried everything, and it's not you. So, you know what?

Emmylou Harris26:10

You do whatever you want, work with whoever you want to work with, and we'll we'll we'll do the best we can.

Emmylou Harris26:16

And I said, Well, I actually, if it were possible, I would love to do a record with Daniel Lynwaf.

Emmylou Harris26:22

Lo and behold, as it turned out,

Emmylou Harris26:24

Once again the higher pyro than myself was at work.

Emmylou Harris26:29

And decided that that's what should happen. So this was the wrecking ball. This was wrecking ball.

Presenter26:31

And this was the wrecking book.

Presenter26:33

Yeah.

Emmylou Harris26:34

Yeah.

Presenter26:34

And so that

Emmylou Harris26:34

And so that brought me into a whole other world of sounds and rhythms.

Presenter26:38

This is m much written by yourself, a completely different kind of sound from anything you'd ever recall.

Emmylou Harris26:43

Oh yeah, completely different but and yet

Presenter26:43

Oh yeah, complete

Emmylou Harris26:46

Songs that were not alien to me, but done in a different landscape.

Emmylou Harris26:52

and brought out different things in my voice.

Emmylou Harris26:55

just took me to a different place. But I wo I didn't have to become a different singer. I just discovered a different gear. And did that do the trick? Did the audience come back for you? Oh, my audience never really left me. Radio left me. But

Presenter27:06

Hmm.

Emmylou Harris27:07

I had an audience that always zigged and zagged with me.

Emmylou Harris27:11

I'm living proof that you can be

Emmylou Harris27:14

an artist without radio, that ultimately it's the people that can't.

Emmylou Harris27:19

Number seven.

Presenter27:20

Ah, here's the man.

Emmylou Harris27:20

Yeah, well, actually, this is I didn't mean for this to be such a wonderful segue, but it is.

Emmylou Harris27:25

Because this is a cut from this album, uh this is a extraordinary song and and I think the production on it is is really brilliant.

Emmylou Harris27:33

And very soul-stirring.

Emmylou Harris27:36

And so this is The Maker by Daniel Enmore.

Emmylou Harris27:41

Mm-hmm.

Speaker 327:41

Cool.

Speaker 327:42

Like the night

Speaker 327:49

I stand with arms wide open

Speaker 327:55

I've run a twisted line

Speaker 328:00

I'm a stranger.

Presenter28:03

Uh

Speaker 328:03

Him we eyes

Presenter28:05

Of the Maker.

Presenter28:09

Daniel Lanois and the Maker. So, Emilou, you have two daughters. You've had three husbands, but now you live with now you live with your mother. She's your best friend in all of this, obviously.

Emmylou Harris28:20

She is. She's just an extraordinary person. And my my father died very suddenly ten years ago and, um

Emmylou Harris28:27

Gradually she came, you know, to live live with me and uh she has a way of nurturing and being around and taking care of things without interfering.

Emmylou Harris28:36

I think it's a quality that not a lot of people have.

Presenter28:39

And you work with a lot of men, but you've had enough of marrying them, you said.

Emmylou Harris28:43

Um

Emmylou Harris28:44

Well, for now, I think.

Presenter28:46

I think

Presenter28:47

But if we said, Okay, look, you've you've had your chances, I mean, you've had uh your heartaches, but as you said, you've also had a lot of good fortune, and now it's time to to leave it all and cast you away on a desert island, only your memories for company. I mean h ha has your country music

Emmylou Harris29:00

Okay.

Presenter29:02

Taught you to be philosophical about life. I mean, could you cope through your music?

Presenter29:08

Yeah.

Emmylou Harris29:08

Whatever the situation, I think you have to make the best of it.

Emmylou Harris29:12

And uh if that's the situation, then uh I hope that I would be able to deal with it. That's the family stoicism.

Presenter29:19

It's his family story.

Emmylou Harris29:21

I have a family tradition to keep up. I mean, my

Presenter29:23

But it wouldn't stop you swimming for it, I'm

Emmylou Harris29:25

Sure.

Emmylou Harris29:26

Oh, swimming for mm, well, I'm not much of a swimmer.

Emmylou Harris29:30

Unfortunately, I think I'd have to try to build a raft.

Emmylou Harris29:33

Or, who knows, the heavens have

Emmylou Harris29:36

looked down on me with with such good fortune over my life.

Emmylou Harris29:41

that it would be

Emmylou Harris29:42

a bit mean of me and small of me to to just start pitching a fit then just because I didn't like where I found myself. Do you know what I mean?

Emmylou Harris29:51

Didn't someone say, Character is what you do when no one's watching?

Emmylou Harris29:57

Last piece of music.

Emmylou Harris29:59

All right, well this is a record that um

Emmylou Harris30:02

My my dear friend and uh Linda Ronstadt turned me on to

Emmylou Harris30:07

uh back in I guess it was around nineteen seventy three.

Emmylou Harris30:10

It's a women's chorus of folk music. It's called the Music of Bulgaria.

Emmylou Harris30:15

And it's the original nineteen fifty-five recording.

Emmylou Harris30:19

The sound of these women's voices, I don't know what they're saying, but it keeps me down to earth and brings me close to heaven. So um this is the musical Bulgaria.

Speaker 330:31

I'm a sample.

Speaker 330:39

Oro vetre ne doro tudoro se gali nai de da ve matu doro.

Presenter30:51

I did a baby, his mama.

Presenter30:58

That's Teodora is dozing, the music of Bulgaria, the original 1955 recording, true folk music to end on, isn't it?

Emmylou Harris31:05

Boy, that is true folk music.

Presenter31:07

Now, if you could only take one of those pieces of music we've played.

Emmylou Harris31:10

Oh god.

Presenter31:11

Uh

Emmylou Harris31:12

Oh yeah. Well, now this is hard because I've fallen in love with all of them all over again.

Emmylou Harris31:18

I think I'm gonna pick Kate Nana McGarrigo. Mm. And I'm probably just going on the fact that because I know them and they're my friends, I would feel like somehow they were there with me.

Emmylou Harris31:28

And we could be smoking a cigarette together.

Presenter31:30

Yeah.

Emmylou Harris31:32

Yeah. And what about your book? We give you the Bible, and we give you complete works of Shakespeare. One more. Now, I've thought about this, and if I could combine the two things about the luxury item and the

Presenter31:35

Yeah.

Emmylou Harris31:42

And the book. Go and try me. Okay, this is what I'd like to do. For my luxury item, I would like to have an entire library.

Emmylou Harris31:50

Because I think if I could read

Emmylou Harris31:52

and continue reading.

Emmylou Harris31:56

I could probably stay sane. And for the book.

Emmylou Harris32:01

Uh I what?

Presenter32:04

Like a blank book so that I could write. I d I you can't have a whole library. The nation will be up in arms if you have a

Emmylou Harris32:10

Well, what about the whole entire Victorian Albert Museum?

Presenter32:15

This is hideously against the rules, you know that.

Emmylou Harris32:18

Uh Well, I it was cruel of me to have to pick only eight records, so so this is where I'm gonna stand firm. I want books.

Presenter32:27

Emma Lou Harris, thanks very much indeed for letting me see your desert time.

Emmylou Harris32:29

Well, thank you so much. I I really did enjoy it. Thank you.

Speaker 132:40

You've been listening to a podcast from the Desert Island Discs Archive. For more podcasts, please visit bbc.co.uk/slash radio form.