Emmylou with Buddy and Julie Miller at Austin City Limits Festival 2002

Q: By the time your next album, "Luxury Liner," came out at the end of 1976, you had sung with many of your influences, folks who were soon to become peers. On "Luxury Liner", Dolly Parton sang on When I Stop Dreaming. You recorded Dolly's Coat of Many Colors, as we mentioned earlier. And you later formed Trio with Dolly and Linda Ronstadt. How did your friendship with Dolly begin from that picture that you put up in the house to inspire you?

A: After the record came out and, I think, at that point, maybe If I Could Only Win Your Love was making some noise. So, I come to Nashville. I can't remember if I was doing a show or what the reason was. But, you know, the doors were kind of opened to me at that point. And I had made a request that I wanted to meet Dolly. I wanted to meet Dolly, I wanted to meet George Jones. So I was able to go to a studio on Music Row. I can't remember which one it was, where Dolly was -- she was either producing somebody or producing her own record. But she was definitely in charge. And so I got to meet her.

But it was a very cursory kind of meeting. Very friendly. She always is. But there wasn't any real, you know, soul sister thing going on. But later on, we invited her to come to Lania Lane, which is where we had the studio, the mobile truck, because, obviously, I had recorded her song so that there was that thing of sort of courtesy. But the hope that we would be able to, I don't know, become friends or whatever. So the invitation was issued and she was coming over to Lania Lane.

Now, Linda Ronstadt and I had met while I was on the one tour that I did with Gram. And she was opening for Neil Young. And this was in Houston, Texas. And the first thing we said to each other when we met was to ask each other who our favorite girl singer was. And we both said Dolly Parton. And Linda, to go back a little bit. I mean, Linda and I had become very close friends. In fact, she was an extraordinary friend to me after Gram died and had a lot to do, I think, with me getting a record contract, because she spoke of me in interviews. And she even brought me out to sing with her in clubs and on gigs. And we had actually, really become very close friends.

And so I called her and I said, "Guess who's coming over to my house? Dolly Parton." So she said, "I"ll be right there." And that was the first time the three of us sang together. You know, I think we might have done When I Stop Dreaming. I think we just picked a song that we all knew. And the sound was out of this world.

Q: So you're singing with Dolly Parton, who was your sort of guardian angel at the beginning with her picture. And then you mentioned that you grew up listening to Bob Dylan's works on the radio. And around this time, in '76, you sang on what's considered one of Bob Dylan's best records, "Desire." Didn't it make you a little nervous to share microphones with people you grew up listening to? And also, I'm sure you've told this story countless times before, but tell us about the "Desire" sessions and how ultimately it worked out for you.

A: Well, I believe that Dylan was just looking for a female voice. I mean, I assumed when I got the call that he was a fan. But he had never heard me. Which actually kind of took the pressure off. And there was no time to feel nervous or pressured. I mean, he just got right down to business. You know, we sat right next to each other with two microphones very close. The lyrics were on the page in front of both of us and he would just kind of nudge me, like, to sing. He wanted me to sing on almost everything, all the time. And it was the first time I would have heard the song, for the most part. I mean, there might have been a little more. There was no preparation time, I guess is what I'm saying. I didn't have an advance copy, because he's creating -- he's like throwing paint up on a canvas. And, you know, readjusting and maneuvering and creating all at the same time. You just don't have time to think about what's going on. And -- which is good. And after the fact, you listen to it and you say, "Yeah, I guess I was there. That's me."

Q: One of the few songwriters who can hold a candle to Dylan and still be seen in his light is Townes Van Zandt. "Luxury Liner" has what a lot of us think as the definitive version of Pancho and Lefty, which Townes wrote. What made you choose that song to record?

A: I wish I could say it was actually all my idea, because I'm a huge fan of Townes. And I was aware of a lot of his material. But it was really Rodney. We were out on the road and one of the things we discovered about each other early on was that we were both huge fans of Townes Van Zandt. And Rodney said, "We should do that song Pancho and Lefty." And I said, "Well, you do it. Do you know the words?" We knew the chorus. So we would sit and we would sing that chorus over and over again. And we couldn't wait to get off the road and go and record it. I mean, we just knew that it was something we wanted to do. I can't remember if we actually worked it out with the band. No, I think we actually -- we worked it up in the studio and recorded it, but we immediately went right back out and before the record was ever out, we were playing that song. It's still one of the pivotal songs in my repertoire.

Q: And Emmylou since we're coming full circle with you today, I gaze upon these albums and their covers. They graced many a music lover's records stack in the '70s and a few of us guys growing up maybe thought about those pictures one or twice ... as guys (laughs). But they're so naturally beautiful. You mentioned Tom Wilkes took the "Elite Hotel" photo. Did being an attractive woman in charge of her own fate in the music business in the not-quite liberated mid '70s ever pose a challenge to you?

A: You know, I don't think so. And I would harken back to one of my earlier responses about this amazing, protected, but nurturing place I found myself. And when I say, "place" I mean the people that were around me, guiding me, encouraging me, protecting me to an extent, I suppose. It was like I was in my own little bubble. And I was able to take that bubble out on the road and then come back to its resting place.

I think, also, the fact that Brian and I became romantically involved and eventually married and had a child together, there was something very safe about that. It was just that that was my life. It was my marriage. It was also my work and my family and all the people on the road with me and the people making the records. We kind of became a family. So that I kind of had everything that I needed in a small sphere. But that sphere was also able to go worldwide, if that makes any sense.

Q: No, it makes a lot of sense. I was going to ask you if your marriage to your producer, Brian Ahern, changed your working relationship. It sounds like it was your working relationship.

A: Yeah, it definitely was. And so I think that it just helped me to feel comfortable and natural. I think that probably our romance grew out of this incredibly intense respect for each others' work and creativity. That was part of it.

Q: The last song we heard, Pancho and Lefty, both Albert Lee and Ricky Scaggs are playing. They're now both members of The Hot Band, right?

A: Right, yeah.

Q: So players are coming and going. It's an amazing sort of nurturing environment. And so the same environment that was nurturing you was nurturing these players. Albert, in fact, plays piano and electric guitar on the song Delbert McClinton wrote called Two More Bottles of Wine. And it appears on the fourth of these five reissues, "Quarter Moon in a Ten Cent Town".

For many folks, this is their favorite album of yours, but I understand it's not your favorite. How come?

A: I love the songs on this record. Brian and I both felt that after it was finished that maybe we had lost some of the magic of the rough mixes. And that had to do with me thinking I knew more about mixing and going for perfection rather than groove. And Brian, I think, let me get away with that a little bit. Because he had always the one to encourage me and let me sort of, take some chances always. In this instance, I don't know whether it really worked out.

No, I think it's an excellent album, don't get me wrong. But because I still had those memories of those rawer, warmer, rough mixes that are more like the preceding albums. In retrospect, though, the album ends up having a kind of a sonic feel that's almost like the austerity of the album cover. It's almost like it's under glass. There's nothing wrong with that. There is definitely a sonic thread. It's just a different kind of sonic thread.

Q: Emmylou, although Rodney Crowell left to work with Rosanne Cash before "Quarter Moon in a Ten Cent Town" came out, he left you with a couple of his best songs: Ain't Living Long Like This and Leaving Louisiana in the Broad Daylight.

We haven't talked much about your voice, but that is your primary instrument. I don't know how to describe what I feel is a force of nature. But on Rodney's two tracks and on a lot of "Quarter Moon in a Ten Cent Town", (it) seems like your voice got a little grittier and a little tougher. Do you agree with that?

A: Well, yes. I mean, first of all, the nature of the song, especially Ain't Living Long kind of required a certain going into the world of rock and roll, which -- I knew that I was not a rock singer. But Rodney's songs are so good and the melodies are so kind of strong and it's territory that I can feel comfortable with at that point, even if I was stretching a little bit. It was also kind of a vehicle for the band. And also, as a person who is kind of morbidly obsessed with the really sad, depressing, slow ballads, a girl needs an up-tempo song once in a while! And the thing about an up-tempo song is, even if it's an unhappy subject, it still gets people's toes tapping. So it kind of can fill that niche that you need once in a while. I mean, you just can't do slow songs all the time. I suppose you could, but -- anyway. It was great to have that as a song, not only for the album -- I thought it fit the rest of the material lyrically on "Quarter Moon...", -- but also it was a great song to do live.

Q: And on this album, you also explored some other writers' work. Two from Jesse Winchester, a song that Susanna Clark and Carlene Carter wrote together, Utah Phillips. And the first one of your albums without one of Gram Parsons' songs. Was your song compass leading you to different places at this point?

A: Oh, yeah. I mean, it was just what I had heard that I really liked. You've got to understand that some of the songs I probably still had in my material stack from earlier albums. I just hadn't gotten around to recording them. I can't remember how any of the songs came to me. I know that, for example, Green Rolling Hills, I got that version, Hazel and Alice's version of that from the same album that that I got Hello Stranger from. But Hello Stranger was on "Luxury Liner". And we recorded Green Rolling Hills that ended up on the next album.

It was a constant stream of you're always looking for songs. You're always listening to records. People in your family, your sphere are always turning you on to different things. And it doesn't hurt to have one of the great premiere contemporary songwriters at the time, Rodney Crowell. He wasn't in the band anymore, but he was certainly still in my periphery.

with Bruce Cockburn and Patty Griffin and a benefit against landmines

Q: The final album of these five reissues that we're talking about today, "Blue Kentucky Girl", took you to a very pure country place, even though the stream was still flowing. And you had such great commercial success with the first four albums which were rather eclectic. What made you focus "Blue Kentucky Girl" in a country fashion?

A: It might have actually me reading my own reviews, because there was -- I do remember that there was one bit of writing that posed -- that made the assumption that the only reason that I was successful as a country artist was because I really didn't make country records. I made pop records. That the eclecticism of the albums was what sort of watered them down or made them palatable to people. Which is still not a bad thing. I mean, I still love the eclecticism. If I had to think about the kind of records I make, for the most part, most of them, I would say, are eclectic for song choice. But I still had this thing where I wanted to be a country artist when I grew up. And I thought, okay, I need to find out if that's true. And if I'm calling myself a country artist, maybe I need to make a pure country record.

And also, it was time to try something just slightly different. I mean, if you have success of any kind and there is a certain similarity, then you're in danger of a formula, which is not a bad thing but maybe sometimes you have to get away from it before you go back and revisit it, you see. So Brian and I decided that we would make a more traditional country album. That was our starting point. To borrow a phrase from Waylon Jennings, "That couldn't go pop with a mouthful of firecrackers." And of course, it was a complete disaster commercially, in the beginning. I remember that they, in preparation for the album, the anticipation of the record company, I was actually going to be one of those cardboard cutouts in the record store. Do you remember those?

Q: Yeah.

A: We took the photograph. We did everything. And when the people in the field heard the record, my cardboard cutout was recalled (laughs)!

Q: But "Blue Kentucky Girl" was a hit...

A: No, after the fact. Initially, it was met with absolute horror and -- but then it won the Grammy for best country album. And then Wesley Rose, bless his dear heart, our dear friend, who's Fred Rose's son and head of Acuff Rose (Publishing), just decided that he was going to make -- and Beneath Still Waters was going to be a No. 1 record. And I don't know what he did, but he put all his energy and reserves and heart and soul into it. And it was a huge record for its day. And all of a sudden, after the fact, everybody was saying what a classic record it was and how it was my best record. And it was sort of strange. I felt like I was in the twilight zone. I felt like, wasn't this the record that -- I remember there was one reviewer that said, "Well, she's just doing the same old thing." You know, "She doesn't have any new ideas." And you go, well -- it just was really odd. But ultimately, I mean, we succeeded on our terms of what we wanted to do. But it seemed like, maybe people weren't going to respond to it.

Q: And "Blue Kentucky Girl" was the final of the five reissues that we're talking about today. But I was listening to "Roses in the Snow" from 1980 which is a very bluegrass based record. It's almost like you took it another step after "Blue Kentucky Girl".

A: Well, I tell you what happened was when the consensus was that, well, this record isn't any different from the previous four albums. And we went, okay, we wanted to make a pure country record. I guess we're going to have to go farther out into the field. So we'll do a bluegrass record. Well, actually, that's a simplification. That's part of the thinking. But also, you know, I had Ricky (Skaggs) in the band. And even before Ricky was in the band, with Emory and Rodney and Albert, we were always doing bluegrass. We did bluegrass in the shows. I had done things like Satan's Jewel Crown on "Elite Hotel" so that there was always that element of sort of bluegrass going in and out of the records. But it hadn't been really focused on as the main event.

And everybody that I was running into at that point, when you do shows you'd be on the road, somehow bluegrass, the moon was in bluegrass. I don't know how to explain it. Actually, as an ego thing, I said, "You know what? Somebody in sort of contemporary, popular music is going to do a bluegrass record. And I want it to be me." Everybody was talking about doing it. And Brian and I, we just said, "Let's go in and do it." I mean, I had Ricky in the band. I had become really good friends with the Seldom Scene. And I knew Tony Rice and Jerry Douglas. And from being in D.C., I knew all these people. And it wasn't like I was doing something totally foreign. It was something that was a real important part of my inspiration and what I did when I wasn't on stage and sometimes when I was. So the point being, "Boy, if they didn't get "Blue Kentucky Girl", let's give them something they really don't get!"

With friends at Carnegie Hall (including Spyboy, Buddy & Julie Miller, Patty Griffin... )

Q: Well, I'd like to put a vote in for "Roses in the Snow" and the rest of your Warner Bros. albums to be reissued as well. I don't know how you feel about that.

A: Oh, I would love that, absolutely.

Q: I just want to thank you so much for sharing your memories and your thoughts on these five landmark albums. It's so wonderful that they've been re-released. It's been a pleasure.

A: Thanks. It's been a pleasure for me, too. And I really -- thanks for listening and promoting, well, my music, but also all the other people I really like (laughs). Thanks a lot.

Q: And we were coming full circle for this conversation, so I thought we'd end by talking about your version of Gram Parsons' Hickory Wind from "Blue Kentucky Girl". It seems appropriately sparse. And you harmonize with yourself on this, don't you? Did you not want anyone else to take that role at this --

A: Do you know, I don't remember the decision at the time, but it seems like if I did not make that decision, I should have made it. I should have been conscious of making that decision in retrospect. But I can't remember now why we decided. But ultimately if I was going to recreate the song that was really pivotal for me as understanding Gram as a songwriter, as a singer, as a visionary, because that, to me is still one of his most beautiful songs. There's so much of him in those lyrics and in that melody that really, it should have been just me. And I should have probably not put any harmony and just left a space for him.

(End of interview)