Meredith Lawrence is a contributor to GRAMMY.com.
A little over a year ago, Canadian singer/songwriter Noeline Hofmann was only a few months into making a full-time go at her music career, networking and playing small local shows around her hometown in rural Alberta. Armed with a powerful, husky voice and a remarkable clarity and acuity in her songwriting, Hofmann quickly proved that her music resonated well beyond…
When country singer/songwriter Jaime Wyatt announced she was queer with the release of her second album, 2020's Neon Cross, she was convinced doing so would destroy her career. Instead, something shifted — not only was she more free to be herself and to date women openly, but many fans reacted positively, too. "Several times on the road I've had fans…
Charles Wesley Godwin never intended to play for audiences when he picked up a guitar for the first time in college. Now, the 30-year-old Godwin is a full-blown country star, playing stadium shows and prestigious music festivals as one of the genre's fastest rising talents. Godwin's musical power and allure lie in the ability to inhabit both a superstar persona…
When Beyoncé announced her upcoming album, Cowboy Carter, with the drop of two distinctly country tracks, she broke both genre and barriers. Not only did Queen Bey continue to prove she can do just about anything, but she joined a long tradition of country music crossover albums. Country music is, like all genres, a construct, designed by marketing companies around…
Growing up in Van Zandt county, Texas, it would be easy to say country singer/songwriter Vincent Neil Emerson was bound to follow in Townes Van Zandt’s footsteps, after whose family the county is named. But to Emerson, it never felt like a sure thing. It still doesn’t. "I don't think I really had a defining moment of that feeling like,…
When he made his Opry debut this April, William Beckmann followed "Bourbon Whiskey" — a smoky, straight country track — with a soaring rendition of mariachi classic "Volver, Volver." Nashville's a long way from Beckmann's home in South Texas, and singing Spanish on that stage felt vulnerable and daunting, but his rendition lifted the crowd to their feet, welcoming his…
Singer/songwriter Tommy Prine’s debut album is joyful, introspective and angry — just the emotional mix you might expect from someone who’s lost his father and best friend, toured internationally, and released an album, all before turning 30. Losing a parent is a profound, painful experience, doubly so when your dad is the musical inspiration John Prine. Filling those shoes would…
When Jelly Roll first attended church with his daughter, Bailee, he wasn't looking for salvation. But while sitting in a church pew, he realized the story of his own relationship to redemption and religion was one he needed to share. "Outside of religion, the idea of being able to be redeemed is just a great idea. The idea that who…
In 2015, radio consultant Keith Hill provoked outrage by saying out loud what had long been an unwritten rule for much of country music radio: Women are like the tomatoes in a lettuce salad, they should be sprinkled in sparsely. Despite Hill’s comments and the country music industry's often restrictive and prescriptive attitudes, women are essential to the genre and…
For a guy who was on active duty in the Navy until late 2021, Zach Bryan has already established quite the musical career for himself. While enlisted, he wrote music in his spare time, self-recording and releasing it on YouTube and social media. And just three years after his first viral success, Bryan is one of country music's most popular…
Brandi Carlile's soaring performance of her song "The Joke" at the 2019 GRAMMY Awards didn't necessarily make her a superstar, but it showed the world that she is one. And judging by her own reaction, she knew it, too: Carlile ended the performance with a flourish, throwing her head back to drive the final notes even higher, grinning and jumping…
As a child, Melissa Carper liked to listen to vinyl records by lying on the living room floor with her head under the family record console. Above her, Patsy Cline, Hank Williams, Sr. and Loretta Lynn spun country standards and stories of love and loss. She liked the sad love songs best, fixating on the longing in Williams' "Wedding Bells"…
Listening to Willi Carlisle’s sophomore album, Peculiar, Missouri, is like speeding through a folk music history exhibit curated to critique contemporary culture. Peculiar honors not only traditions, but also characters who don’t quite fit in because of their economic status, sexual identity or profession, letting the listener know: It's okay if you're a little weird; Carlisle is too. Out July…
In April, country singer/songwriter Joshua Ray Walker made his Grand Ole Opry debut with "Sexy After Dark," a rollicking anthem celebrating the giddy freedom of anonymity, alcohol and proximity of a packed bar late at night. Switching tone, he followed his first song with “Voices,” a dulcet, brooding first-person reflection on a moment of acute mental pain. While the playful…
