Ahern and Harris were married in January , and Ahern would helm all of Harris' next 10 albums. She recorded her second album, the top-selling Elite Hotel , with a new backup band called the Hot Band, which included two sidemen who played with Elvis Presley.
Anchored by the success of two No. Blue Kentucky Girl was Harris' sixth straight gold album. She also sang guest vocals on Bob Dylan's album Desire. Harris gave up touring while pregnant with her second child, Meghann, and instead recorded a hit Christmas album, Light of the Stable , with a title single that featured guest vocals by Dolly Parton , Neil Young and Linda Ronstadt.
The acoustic bluegrass album Roses in the Snow also went gold, as did Evangeline , a compilation of songs left off previous albums. After two less successful studio albums 's Cimarron and 's White Shoes and one live effort, 's Last Date , Harris and Ahern separated in , and she moved back to Nashville. Joining forces with the singer-songwriter Paul Kennerley, with whom she had worked before, Harris wrote and recorded a semi-autobiographical album, The Ballad of Sally Rose The album had mediocre sales, but was seen by critics as a defining moment in the evolution of Harris' unique musical style, a blend of pop, folk, gospel and blues mixed with a strong dose of pure, traditional country.
After touring together in , Harris and Kennerley were married. Harris made an auspicious beginning in the s with the release of Brand New Dance and Duets , the latter was a compilation of her earlier hits with artists such as George Jones, Willie Nelson and Gram Parsons.
With a new backup band, the Nash Ramblers, she released a second live album, At the Ryman Her marriage to Kennerley also ended that year. After the release of Cowgirl's Prayer and Songs of the West , Harris switched gears, teaming with the producer Daniel Lanois best known for his work with such artists as Dylan, U2 and Peter Gabriel to record her most experimental album to that date, Wrecking Ball More rock-oriented than Harris' previous albums, Wrecking Ball showcased Harris' throaty vocals on tracks written by, among others, Young the title track, which featured Young on backing vocals and Jimi Hendrix "May This Be Love".
That same year, she released a three-album retrospective, Portraits , including selected songs from her years with Warner Bros. She also toured with the popular all-female Lilith Fair and further strengthened her ties to a new generation of fans and performers. I had to rethink my career after that.
He instilled in me a deep love for country music. Before that I was just a Joan Baez wannabe. You can learn so much from animals. They have this wonderful quality of being in the moment, and they help you spend time there. I run a dog rescue on my property in Nashville. We see each other down at the grocery store. Dolly Parton is the funniest person. Working with her and Linda Ronstadt was the definition of fun.
I knew what I felt for him, and I just assumed that that was something that was going to happen, never thinking that we would never have the chance. When I got the call that he had died, I was just so shocked. Because that was the only way I could deal with it. I had no idea where I was going to get to, or end up, but all these extraordinary things came together in just the right way to put me in a place where I could actually realise whatever it was I was trying to do.
Mainly, I wanted to carry on with Gram's music. That was what pushed me forward. It was an uphill struggle, however, one that was compounded by the grisly antics of Phil Kaufman. Upholding a promise he had made to Parsons in the event of his death, in order to stop him being buried in New Orleans near his family home, Kaufman intercepted his body on the way to LAX airport, drove it to the desert, doused it in kerosene and set fire to it.
After the furore died down Kaufman was arrested but, since there was no law against stealing bodies, got away with a fine , a memorial service was held in New Orleans, where Parsons' ashes were interred, and from which Burrell had barred Harris on account of her suspicions about their relationship. For a long while Harris says she felt completely lost, unable to assuage her grief or find a new direction.
Then, when it was cut so short, I had to move forward on my own. It was hard, and a very bleak time for me. My daughter was with my parents and I hardly saw her. I didn't have experience making records, my education was incomplete and I'd lost my teacher, my mentor. In the end, I was very fortunate in the community of people I found — and who found me — who helped put me on the right path.
And also that they understood I was grieving and was in a very vulnerable place. Those people included Brian Ahern, who would become both her producer and husband, with whom she would have a daughter, Meghann the couple split up in but have remained good friends ; and the Hot Band, a group of backing musicians who included James Burton and Glen Hardin, both of whom also worked in Elvis Presley's Las Vegas band.
She says she also owes a debt to her friend, the singer Linda Ronstadt, whom she met while touring with Parsons, "for helping and advising me and talking me up like I was the greatest thing since sliced bread". Ronstadt recommended Harris to her record company, Warner, which duly signed her up.
In she released her second album, Pieces of the Sky, which went gold in the US. Since then there have been 23 more albums — on which she has proved herself as a gifted songwriter and a peerless interpreter of other people's songs — and a slew of awards. Not bad for a woman whose mission was take country music away from commercialism and back to its roots. There was a long period, in the late s and s, during which Harris didn't speak about Parsons.
His death was still too raw and her grief too overwhelming. Now she thinks, speaks and sings about him compulsively. That, 37 years after his death, his ghost still stalks her music suggests a life led in mourning. But this sadness has also served her well: Harris's tremulous voice was made for ballads, not belters.
Even in her twenties she sounded like an old soul. Now her singing has become deeper and tougher with age, though has retained the warmth and emotional power that can make the most wooden-hearted listener weep. When I ask if she has ever suffered from depression, she replies, "No more than anyone else. You see, I have an outlet that other people don't have. I do often wonder whether I would be so well-adjusted if I didn't have that, and these songs that articulate the darker side to life.
Ironically, I get a great joy out of singing sad songs. It's why country music works well for me. That and the fact that I only know three chords. Her only regret, besides not noticing that Parsons was in trouble, is not having seen enough of her children. I mean, they could really play the guilt card if they wanted. Harris won't ever forget Parsons, she tells me, nor will she get over his death.
It's important to acknowledge the door that you came through. For me, that door was Gram.
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