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Harlan Howard (right) with Travis Tritt One single from Evans’ album did crack By the Top 40 country charts, but almost five months after the album’s release, it has yet John MerOn e! to get airplay in major radio markets-the critical factor in the success of a record. Having sold slightly more than 20,000 copies, she is still a long-. way from the ara Evans is hoping three is a charm. For the third time in her 26 80,000 industry experts say is necessary to break even in today’s business. years, this Missouri farm girl has come here chasing her dream: to But Evans remains doggedly opti- mistic. “God put me on this earth to be a become a country music star. Evans is one of thousands seek- singer. It’s what I love to do more than anything, and I’m going to make it.” She ing just part of a business worth more than $2.5 billion a year, and and her six brothers and sisters grew up on a farm outside New Franklin, Mis- her struggle to make it as a singer of traditional country music-a distinc- souri, where the family raised corn, beans, tobacco, and livestock for a living. tive sound rich with lyrics about love and romance, loss and hurt-tells a “We were a very poor farm family.” From an early age, Evans’ grandfather taught story about the state of the music itself, and the town that has been its her all about Nashville’s “Grand Ole Opry,” the longest-running live musical home since the mid- 1920s. radio program in the world, and the leg- ends who decorated its stage. In this era when Garth Brooks has be- Evans has in fact come a long way to- By the time she was four, Evans and come the most successful solo artist in ward her dream. In late 1996, she landed her brothers would travel on weekends history, many on Music Row-the few a deal with RCA Records-the prestigious and during the summers as the Evans blocks of bungalows and low-slung of- label that was once a launching pad and Family Band, performing gospel and fices that a.re home to Nashville’s music home for country giants such as Eddy bluegrass music at festivals and church publishing companies, recording studios, Arnold, Jim Reeves, Willie Nelson, and revivals. Renamed the Sara Evans Show and record labels-seem to be grappling Dolly Parton-and her debut album, once the talent of its youngest member like never before with the question that Three Chords and the Truth, was released became evident, they were eventually has vexed this industry for years: how to to critical acclaim last fall. pulling in $50 per performer each night. broaden the market for country music Newsweek called her a “new Patsy This augmented a rural family income without abandoning its classic style. It Cline”with a “distinctivesassiness.” Enter- so paltry that Evans’ mother once traded seems as though the answer to this ques- tainment Weekly ranked her in the same firewood for Levi’s so her children would tion will determine both the success of league with Loretta Lynn and Patty Love- have Christmas presents. artists such as Sara Evans, as well as the less. Billboard called her a “considerable Evans first traveled to Nashville when larger issue of what role Nashville plays country talent” who “invites favorable she was 11. Her father accompanied her in the entertainment industry. comparisons to the best country divas.” so she could record a single, “What Does THEAMERICAN ENTERPRISE LICENSED TO UNZ.ORG ELECTRONIC REPRODUCTION PROHIBITED Garth Brooks. Traditional country- characterized by fiddles, mandolins, and rhythm instruments like an acoustic gui- tar and bass-had begun to take a back seat to a more neutral, almost pop music sound that used rock-and-roll produc- tion elements. It had certainly come a long way from the early 1960s, when Willie Nelson was trying to break into the business as a songwriter. “If a song had more than three chords in it, there was a good chance it wouldn’t be called country, and there was no way you could make a record in Nashville that wasn’t called country at that time,” he once said. “I had problems with my song ‘Crazy’ because it had four or five chords in it. Not that ‘Crazy’ is real complicated; it just wasn’t your basic three-chord coun- try hillbilly song.” And the artists were changing, too. Mary-Chapin Carpenter seemed to repre- sent this new trend in progressive female country artists. The daughter of a pub- lishing executive, Carpenter was raised in Princeton, New Jersey, and Washington, D.C., and sported an Ivy League educa- tion. Then there was k.d. lang, who also broke into the country scene during this period. lang was different. She became known as much for her duets with Roy Orbison, Loretta Lynn, and Kitty Wells as Sara Evans she did for denouncing meat-eating and publicly declaring herself a lesbian. These a Nice Girl Do in the Meantime?”and on musician from Oregon and now her women were definite departures from its flip side, “I’m Going to Be the Only husband. “He was a room service waiter, someone such as that “First Lady of Female Fiddle Player in Charlie Daniels’ in town with his brothers, trying to do Country Music,’’ Tammy Wynette, who Band.” It didn’t exactly crack the Bill- the same thing. We started dating, fell in before stardom in the late 1960s, had board charts. But her dream never died, love, and he asked me to go to Oregon worked as a cotton picker, hairdresser, and her next foray to town, after high with him and sing in his band.” and waitress. For many Americans, school and a short try at college, was part Evans spent the next three years with Wynette and her classics “Stand By Your of a more calculated plan to break into them in the Pacific Northwest, opening Man” and “D-I-V-0-R-C-E,”with conser- the business. “I skipped college, and had for the likes of Willie Nelson, Tim Mc- vative, anti-feminist themes, symbolized no other aspirations but to sing,” Evans Graw, and Clay Walker. But even though the material coming out of Nashville. By says. “So I came here with my older she was performing six nights a week, the time of Evans’ return in late 1995, brother, started waiting tables at the Hol- and making good money, Evans still felt more than the sound and the major play- iday Inn on Briley Parkway, and tried to she was a million miles away from the ers had changed. The business had also meet whomever I could.” only place her dream could happen. She become much more profitable. The person who made the most last- had matured, and longed to return to Country music had finally surpassed ing impression was Craig Schleske, a Nashville, determined to finally break both pop and urban contemporary for- into the music business. mats as the number-one music choice m m Johri Meroney, whose great-uncle was the During Evans’ absence, Nashville had behind rock. Between 1994 and 1995,the 2 legendary bluegrass fiddler Chubby Wise, continued in its on-again, off-again Recording Industry Association of writes regularly on culture for The American transition from traditional country to America certified that close to 300 al- Enterprise. pop, accelerated by the 1990 debut of bums had sold enough copies to qualify LICENSED TO UNZ.ORG THEAMERICAN ENTERPRISE 53 ELECTRONIC REPRODUCTION PROHIBITED as either gold (500,000) or platinum help, Evans and the Van Meters were Owen Bradley’s Quonset Hut studio. (1,000,000) records, the highest num- confident enough. to approach RCA Although born in Kentucky, Howard, bers this town had ever seen. Revenues Records about Evans finally having her now 69, came to Nashville from Los An- had exceeded the $1 billion mark, up own career. Joe Galante, the president, geles, where he had been working in a from $724 million in 1990. made Evans an offer the same day she factory and driving a forklift. Writing in Sara Evans had always preferred the auditioned for him. his spare time, he mailed his songs to traditional country style, and in fact once Sara Evans was now officially part of Nashville. One afternoon Ray Price tele- said she had grown to “detest country what is a booming business, one that phoned him on the factory floor, request- pop” but was nevertheless encouraged by goes far beyond WSM Radio’s Saturday ing more. Howard sent him one inspired the changes in Nashville. She returned night “Grand Ole Opry” broadcast. As of by his Army experience. “From the time just when it seemed as though an artist December, 81 record labels, 289 music we got up until we went to bed, we were cut from the fabric of traditional country publishing companies, 174 recording always doing things numerically. So I music might again have a shot at taking studios, and 80 video production compa- thought about a song that used numbers. hold. “It was like, Oh! A country singer! nies were based here. And it isn’t home I started with ‘Heartache number one No one was used to that:’ says Evans. just to country, either. Nashville is be- was when you left’ and just continued Wasting no time, she sought out coming a music industry Mecca where all from there.” The tune-“Heartaches by entertainment lawyer Brenner Van Meter formats want a place at the table.