A babysitter's overheard conversation launched Emmylou Harris into country music
In 1971 Emmylou Harris was a broke single mother who had, in her words, quit the music business for good. One night at a Washington club she sang a country song half as a joke. Some Flying Burrito Brothers heard her, her daughter's babysitter overheard them talking, and Gram Parsons phoned the next day.
Harris was born in Birmingham, Alabama, on April 2, 1947, the daughter of a Marine officer who was held as a prisoner of war in Korea and never spoke about it. The family moved with his postings and settled in Woodbridge, Virginia, where she was a straight-A student, cheerleader, marching-band saxophonist and valedictorian. The folk revival hooked her: Joan Baez, Bob Dylan and Buffy Sainte-Marie, on a guitar from her grandfather. A drama scholarship took her to Greensboro, but by 1967 she had dropped out, first there and then at Boston University, to sing folk full time.
Greenwich Village came next. She played clubs such as The Bitter End, waited tables, lived at a YWCA with her husband and baby, and in 1970 released a debut, Gliding Bird, under the spelling Emmy Lou. The label went bankrupt almost immediately. A move to Nashville ended in divorce, food stamps and Medicaid, and she retreated to her parents' home in Maryland, working as a hostess and singing in local clubs without much faith in a future.
Parsons, formerly of the Byrds and the Burritos, wanted a harmony singer. After hearing her, he flew her to Los Angeles in 1972 to sing on his album GP, and in 1973 she toured with his band and recorded Grievous Angel. He taught her classic country, and she credited him with showing her where she belonged. Weeks after those sessions he died of an overdose near Joshua Tree.
She chose to carry his country rock forward. Pieces of the Sky in 1975 was a hit with critics and buyers, and by 1980 she had five country number ones. Trio, with Dolly Parton and Linda Ronstadt, went platinum in 1987, and Wrecking Ball in 1995 took her somewhere new again. Estimates put her sales above 15 million, alongside 13 Grammys and a 2008 place in the Country Music Hall of Fame, and she runs a dog rescue called Bonaparte's Retreat.
Source: Emmylou Harris
