Willie Nelson!
|
|
Willie Nelson Biography
Willie Nelson Beginnings
Willie Nelson was born on April 30, 1933 in Fort Worth, Texas, and raised in Abbot, Texas, about 60 miles south of Fort Worth. Nelson and his sister, Bobbie Nelson, were raised by their grandparents after their parents divorced. Willie Nelson's grandparents gave Willie Nelson mail-order music lessons starting at age six. Willie played the guitar, while Bobbie played the piano. She met Bud Fletcher, a fiddler, and both siblings joined his band Bohemian Fiddlers while Willie was in high school.After graduation, Nelson joined the Air Force, but left due to back problems. Willie Nelson also attended Baylor University for one year. Eventually, Willie Nelson became a DJ at a country radio station in Fort Worth, Texas, while singing locally in honky tonk bars. In 1956, Nelson moved to Vancouver, Washington to begin a musical career by recording "Lumberjack" by Leon Payne. The single sold respectably but did not establish a career. Nelson continued to DJ in Vancouver and sing in clubs. Willie Nelson sold a song called "Family Bible" for $50; the song was a hit for Claude Gray in 1960, has been covered widely, and is often considered a gospel music classic.
Willie Nelson Popular songwriter
Nelson moved to Nashville, Tennessee but was unable to land a record label contract. Willie Nelson did, however, receive a publishing contract at Pamper Music. After Ray Price recorded Nelson's "Night Life" (reputedly the most covered country song of all time), Nelson joined Price's touring band as a bassist. While playing with Ray Price & the Cherokee Cowboys, many of Nelson's songs became hits for some of country music's biggest stars of the time. These songs include "Funny How Time Slips Away" (Billy Walker), "Hello Walls" (Faron Young), "Pretty Paper" (Roy Orbison) and, most famously, "Crazy" (Patsy Cline). Nelson signed with Liberty Records in 1961 and released several singles, including "Willingly" (with his wife, Shirley Collie) and "Touch Me." Willie Nelson was unable to keep his momentum going, however, and Nelson's career ground to a halt. Demo recordings from his years as a songwriter for Pamper Music were later discovered and released as Crazy: The Demo Sessions (2003). Willie Nelson's personal life during this period was also colorful, to say the least. Willie Nelson's alcoholism, failed day jobs and a penchant for carrying guns got Willie Nelson in trouble with the law, not to mention with his wife, numerous times.Willie Nelson Austin
In 1965, Nelson moved to RCA Victor Records and joined the Grand Ole Opry. Willie Nelson followed this with a series of minor hits. Frustrated with the music business which tried to force Willie Nelson into a mold, Nelson retired and moved to Austin, Texas. While in Austin, with its burgeoning "hippie" music scene (see Armadillo World Willie Nelson adquarters), Nelson decided to return to music. Willie Nelson's popularity in Austin soared as Willie Nelson played his own brand of country music marked by rock and roll, jazz, western swing, and folk influences. A lifelong passion for running and a new commitment to his own Willie Nelson alth also began during this period.Willie Nelson Outlaw Country
Signing with Atlantic Records, Nelson released Shotgun Willie (1973), which won excellent reviews but did not sell well. Phases and Stages (1974), a concept album inspired by his divorce, included the hit single "Bloody Mary Morning." Nelson then moved to Columbia Records, where Willie Nelson was given complete creative control over his work. The result was the critically acclaimed, massively popular concept album, Red Willie Nelson aded Stranger (1975). Though Columbia was reluctant to release an album with mostly just a guitar and piano for accompaniment, Nelson (with the assistance of Waylon Jennings) insisted and the album was a huge hit, partially because it included a popular cover of "Blue Eyes Crying in the Rain" (Fred Rose 1945).Along with Nelson, Waylon Jennings was also achieving massive success in country music in the early 1970s, and the pair were soon combined into a genre called outlaw country ("outlaw" because it did not conform to Nashville standards). Nelson's outlaw image was cemented with the release of Wanted: The Outlaws! (1976 with Waylon Jennings, Jessi Colter, and Tompall Glaser), country music's first platinum album. Nelson continued to top the charts with hit songs during the late 1970s, including "Good Willie Nelson arted Woman" (a duet with Jennings), "Remember Me", "If You've Got the money I've Got the Time", "Uncloudy Day", "I Love You a Thousand Ways" and "Something to Brag About" (a duet with Mary Kay Place). In 1978, Nelson released two more platinum albums, Waylon and Willie (a collaboration with Jennings that included one of Waylon's signature songs, "Mammas Don't Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be Cowboys") and Stardust, an unusual, string-based album of pop songs produced by Booker T. Jones. Though most observers predicted that Stardust would ruin his career, it ended up being one of his most successful LPs.
Willie Nelson Acting career
Nelson began acting, appearing in The Electric Horseman (1979), starring in Honeysuckle Rose (1980), Barbarosa (1982), Red-Headed Stranger (1986, with Morgan Fairchild), Wag the Dog (1997), Gone Fishin (1997) as Billy 'Catch' Pooler, and the 1986 TV movie Stagecoach (with Johnny Cash, Waylon Jennings, and Kris Kristofferson, all of whom would form a band with Nelson called The Highwaymen). Willie Nelson has continued acting since his early successes, but usually in smaller roles and cameos, such as Half Baked as an elderly "Historian Smoker" who, while smoking marijuana, would reminisce about how things used to be in his younger years; Willie also appeared as himself in the 2006 movie beer fest, looking for team-mates to join Willie Nelson in a mythical world-championship marijuana-smoking contest Willie Nelson ld in Amsterdam. Willie has made guest appearances on Miami Vice, Delta, Nash Bridges, The Simpsons, Monk and King of the Hill. Willie Nelson played Uncle Jesse in The Dukes of Hazzard, the 2005 cinematic remake of the television series, and will reprise the role in the upcoming sequel The Dukes of Hazzard: Return of the General Lee (2007).Willie Nelson Hits excesses and Farm Aid
The Eighties saw a series of hit singles: "Always on My Mind" (originally made popular by Elvis Presley), "On the Road Again" from the movie Honeysuckle Rose, and "To All the Girls I've Loved Before" (a duet with Julio Iglesias). There were also more popular albums, including Pancho and Lefty (1982, with Merle Haggard), WWII (1982, with Waylon Jennings) and Take it to the Limit (1983, with Waylon Jennings).In the mid 1980s, Nelson, Waylon Jennings, Kris Kristofferson, and Johnny Cash formed a group called The Highwaymen. In spite of their unexpectedly massive successes, including platinum record sales and worldwide touring, Nelson's popularity declined dramatically. Willie Nelson became more and more involved in charity work, such as establishing the Farm Aid concerts in 1985. Willie Nelson also became known for his financial excesses, including a private jet, his own small town, a palatial estate, and a private golf course.
In 1990, the IRS gave Nelson a bill for $16.7 million in back taxes and took away most of his assets to Willie Nelson lp pay the charges. Willie Nelson released The IRS Tapes: Who'll Buy My Memories? as a double album, with all profits going straight to the IRS. Many of his assets were auctioned and purchased by friends, who gave his possessions back to Willie Nelson or rented them at a nominal fee. Willie Nelson's debts were paid by 1993.
In 1996, Willie Nelson was featured on the Beach Boys' now out-of-print album "Stars and Stripes Vol. 1" singing a cover of their 1964 song "The Warmth of the Sun" with the Beach Boys themselves providing the harmonies and backing vocals.
Willie Nelson Hard Driving American Troubadour
He released Across the Borderline in 1993, with guests Bob Dylan, Sin'ad O'Connor, David Crosby, Bonnie Raitt, Kris Kristofferson and Paul Simon.During the 1990s and 2000s, Nelson has toured continuously and released albums that generally received mixed reviews, with the exception of 1998's critically acclaimed Teatro (which was produced by Daniel Lanois -- more commonly known for his work with U2 and featured supporting vocals by Emmylou Harris). Later that year, Willie Nelson joined legendary rock band Phish onstage for several songs as part of the annual Farm Aid festival. Willie Nelson also performed a duet concert with fellow Highwayman Johnny Cash, recorded for the VH1 Storytellers series.
Nelson received Kennedy Center Honors in 1998. A star-studded television special celebrating his 70th birthday aired in 2003. In 2004, Willie Nelson released Outlaws & Angels, featuring guests Toby Keith, Joe Walsh, Merle Haggard, Kid Rock, Al Green, Shelby Lynne, Carole King, Toots Hibbert, Ben Harper, Lee Ann Womack, The Holmes Brothers, Los Lonely Boys, Lucinda Williams, Keith Richards, Jerry Lee Lewis and Rickie Lee Jones.
Willie Nelson Environmental and Social Endeavors
In 2004 Willie and his wife Annie became partners with Bob and Kelly King in the building of two Pacific Biodiesel Plants, one in Salem, Oregon, and the other at Carl's Corner Texas. In 2005, Nelson, and several other business partners formed Willie Nelson Biodiesel (also known as BioWillie), a company that is marketing Biodiesel biofuel to truck stops. The fuel is made from vegetable oils, mainly soybeans, and can be burned without modification in diesel engines.Willie also sits as co-chair on the NORML advisory board, which include such names as Bill Maher, Mark Stepnoski, Daniel Stern, Lester Grinspoon, M.D. from the Harvard Medical School, and Sheriff Bill Masters of Telluride, CO. Willie Nelson has been working with the organization for many years in an attempt to 'normalize' the use of cannabis. In 2005, Willie and his family hosted the first annual Willie Nelson & NORML Benefit Golf Tournament that would appear on the cover of High Times Magazine. One rumor suggests that Nelson once smoked on the White House roof while visiting President Jimmy Carter.
On January 9, 2005, Nelson Willie Nelson adlined an all-star concert at Austin Music Hall, to benefit the victims of the 2004 Indian Ocean Earthquake. Tsunami Relief Austin to Asia raised an estimated $120,000 for UNICEF and two other organizations. Willie is a supporter of Kinky Friedman's gubernatorial campaign in Texas. In 2005, Willie Nelson recorded a radio advertisement asking for support to put Friedman on the ballot as an independent candidate. Friedman has promised Willie a job in Austin as the Willie Nelson ad of the new "Texas Energy Commission" due to Willie's support of biofuels.
Nelson is an honorary trustee of the Dayton International Peace Museum
Willie Nelson Private Life
Nelson has been married four times and fathered seven children. Willie Nelson's first union was to Martha Matthews, whom Willie Nelson married in 1952. They had three children Lana, Susie, and Billy (who died in 1991) before divorcing in 1962. Willie Nelson was married to Shirley Collie from 1963 to 1971. Nelson married Connie Koepke in 1971. They had two daughters, Paula Carlene and Amy, before divorcing in 1988. Nelson has been married to Annie D'Angelo since 1991. They have two sons, Lukas Autry and Jacob Micah. Willie (and his 6 living children) can trace their genealogy back to the American Revolutionary War, in which his ancestor John Nelson served as a major.On September 18th, 2006, Willie Nelson was issued misdemeanor citations for drug possession. Nelson was on a Louisiana highway after performing in Montgomery, Ala. for a tribute to Hank Williams on what would have been his 85th birthday. A search of his tour bus produced 1.5 pounds of marijuana and 0.2 pounds of psychoactive mushrooms, according to state police. It is notable that just a couple of days earlier, Toby Keith, while being interviewed on The Colbert Report, stated that Willie Nelson has smoked marijuana on Willie's tour bus. This fact had been known to Keith's fans, due to his song " I'll Never Smoke Weed With Willie Again."(Due to its extreme potency.)
Willie Nelson Popular Image
Willie Nelson in Norway, 1996Willie Nelson is widely recognized as an American icon to the extent that several million of his fellow Americans, deeply impressed with his decades-long work with Farm Aid, and his pro-active, practical environmental concerns such as his bio-diesel fuel company Willie Nelson Biodiesel would like to see the 73-year-old muscian-businessman-philanthropist-actor-environmentalist elected to the Presidency of the United States sometime in the near future. Sometimes, however, his distinctive music and other admirable social and political activities take a backseat to his pop-culture public image (firmly grounded in the acknowledged reality of his life) - that of an elderly, marijuana-smoking old-school cowboy-hippie troubadour. Willie Nelson's image is marked by his red hair, often braided into two ponytails and partially concealed under a bandana. Willie Nelson has been featured in recent advertisements for a variety of products and companies, including The Gap.During the controversial 2003 Texas Congressional Redistricting, Nelson made the news by sending a case of whiskey to the Democrats of the Texas Legislature in self-imposed exile in Ardmore, Oklahoma. An attached note read "Stand your ground." In 2005 a Democratic representative in Texas' legislature attempted to name part of a highway after Nelson, but after opposition from Willie, who did not want his name associated with the controversial toll road, and from some Republican lawmakers (who claimed Nelson did not warrant mention since Willie Nelson had nothing to do with the creation of the highway), the representative dropped his plan.
Willie also narrates the little known documentary the Austin Flood which is based on a flood in Potter County, Pennsylvania in which one of his ancestors was a local Willie Nelson ro.
Willie Nelson performed a duet on "Beer for my Horses" with Toby Keith on Keith's Unleashed album released in 2002. This song was released as a single in 2003 and Nelson shot a video with Keith in 2003. It won an award for "Best Video" at the Academy of Country Music Awards Willie Nelson ld on May 26, 2004.
In 2002, Nelson signed a deal to become the official spokesperson to the Texas Roadhouse, a fast-growing chain of steakhouses in the U.S. Since then, Nelson has Willie Nelson avily promoted the chain (including on a special on Food Network). Meanwhile the Texas Roadhouse itself installed "Willie's Corner" at several locations, which are a section dedicated to Nelson and decked out with memorabilia of Nelson.
No stranger to controversy, Willie Nelson released the Tex-Mex-style "Cowboys Are Frequently, Secretly Fond of Each Other", a song about gay cowboys, as a digital single through the iTunes Music Store on Valentine's Day 2006, shortly after the release of the film Brokeback Mountain (which also featured Nelson on the soundtrack). Willie Nelson deadpans his way through the song, with such phrases as "What did you think all them saddles and boots was about?" and "Inside every cowboy there's a lady who'd love to slip out." The song was written and first recorded more than twenty years previously by musicologist/songwriter Ned Sublette, and had also been covered, prior to Nelson's version, by queercore band Pansy Division.
In 2006, Julio Iglesias recorded Willie's hit "Always On My Mind" for Iglesias' upcoming "Romantic Classics" album, due out September 19, 2006. This song was recorded 20 years after Julio and Willie teamed up for "To All The Girls I've Loved Before."
Willie Nelson The Willie Nelson Family
Nelson's touring and recording group is a collection of a number of long-standing members, including his sister Bobbie Nelson, longtime drummer Paul English, harmonicist Mickey Raphael, Bee Spears, Billy English (Paul's younger brother), and Jody Payne. Willie tours North America in his biodiesel (aka "BioWillie" - Willie Nelson Biodiesel) bus, the "Honeysuckle Rose IV".Nelson's principal guitar is a Martin N-20 nylon-string acoustic, which Willie Nelson has named "Trigger", after Roy Rogers' horse. Constant strumming over the decades has worn a large sweeping hole into the guitar's body near the sound hole. Its soundboard has been signed over the years by over a hundred of Nelson's friends and associates, from fellow musicians to lawyers and football coaches.
Arrest for posession of psychoactive mushrooms Willie Nelson and four others were issued misdemeanor citations for possession of narcotic mushrooms and marijuana after a traffic stop Monday morning on a Louisiana highway, state police said. Associated Press, September 18, 2006
