First Lady Of Country Music Tammy Wynette born May 5, 1942 today's celebrity birthday spotlight

Tammy Wynette

Virginia Wynette Pugh was born in the cotton farming country of Mississippi. When she was only nine months old, her farmer/musician father, Hollice Pugh died of a brain tumor. She was subsequently raised by her maternal grandparents on the farm where she was born where she worked the cotton fields like so many others of her generation. According to her 1979 autobiography, Stand By Your Man, young Tammy Wynette, as she would later be called, escaped the rigors of farm life early on through country music. She sited Hank Williams Sr., Skeeter Davis, Patsy Cline and future husband George Jones as her idol and recalled playing them over and over on the little children's record player she owned. Even at such an early age, she dreamed of one day being a star herself.

She married her first husband days before graduating from high school, and took odd jobs as a waitress, secretary, barmaid and factory worker to help make ends meet. She enrolled in beauty school in 1963 to become a hairdresser--it's widely known that she would continue to renew her cosmetology license annually for the rest of her life. She left her husband before their third child was born, moving herself and her girls to Alabama. She found herself on her own with three babies, the youngest of which developed spinal meningitis. To offset mounting doctor bills, Tammy began singing in local clubs at night. It was an appearance of Birmingham's local Country Boy Eddie Show that really paved the way for her rise to stardom. That appearance lead to a few gigs with Porter Wagoner and in 1966 she made the now inevitable move to Music City.

After a few failed meetings on music row, she met with producer Billy Sherrill. Sherrill initially wasn't going to sign her, but needing a singer for a song titled Apartment No. 9. After he heard her sing the track, he changed his mind and signed her to Epic Records. According to her autobiography, when she met Sherrill, she had her long blonde hair pulled back into a ponytail and Sherrill said she reminded him of Debbie Reynolds in the film Tammy and the Bachelor, so at Sherrill's suggestion Virginia Wynette Pugh became Tammy Wynette.

When her recording of Apartment No. 9 was released in late 66, it fell just short of the top 40. Her followup, Your Good Girl's Gonna Go Bad, however became a breakout hit and peaked at #3. During the remaining years of the 60s, with the exception of only three misfires, each song she released became a Top Ten hit. She achieved her first number one in 1967 on a duet with David Houston called My Elusive Dreams. Her next hit, I Don't Wanna Play House not only reached number one, but garnered the singer her first Grammy as Best Female Country Vocal Performance. Her biggest songs of her career followed, as Take Me To Your World, D-I-V-O-R-C-E, Stand By Your Man--a song she co-wrote with Billy Sherrill, which would win her a second Grammy as Best Female Country Vocal--Singing My Song and The Ways to Love a Man all landed in the #1 position.

Stand By Your Man performed by Tammy Wynette on Hee Haw

Interestingly enough, she officially got a D-I-V-O-R-C-E in 1968 and began to Stand By Her Man when she married one of her teen idols, George Jones the following year.The 70s brought continued stardom, as RIAA certified Tammy's Greatest Hits a gold record, an industry certification for recordings selling more than 500,000 copies. 1970 also saw her songs reach a wider audience as director Bob Rafelson included several of her songs on the soundtrack of the film Five Easy Pieces.

Another astounding string of #1s parlayed her to super-stardom with He Love Me All the Way, Run Woman, Run, The Wonders You Perform, Good Lovin (Makes it Right), Bedtime Story, My Man (Understands) Till I Get It Right and Kids Say it Right. In addition to these solo efforts, she also broke the Top Ten with duets from he real-life duet partner, George Jones including The Ceremony, We're Gonna Hold On and 1975's Golden Ring--another interesting note, 1975 also marked the end of their marriage with a very public divorce. They couple also produced my favorite project during their union, when in 1970 Tammy gave birth to Tamala Georgette Jones. Over the past few years, I've had the pleasure of getting to know Georgette and she is indeed their best collaboration!

Not one to sit idly by, Tammy released the prophetically titled Till I Can Make It on My Own the year after she divorced George and once again, she had a #1 hit. She finished out the 70s with still more hits racking up an impressive twenty one #1's (three of those were duets with Jones, and one with Houston).

George Jones and Tammy Wynette

The 80s brought about a TV movie of the week based on her autobiography and still more hits. While alluding the top spot, she managed to break the Top 20 consistently and in 1985 she reached #6 with her Mark Grey duet, Sometimes When We Touch. The singer closed out the 80s with an acting turn on the CBS soap Capitol and a few real-life occurrences that would rival anything a soap has to offer.

The 90s once again brought Tammy to spotlight and undoubtedly new audiences with three very distinct events. In 1991 she was asked by The KLF, a popular British dance music group to join them in the studio on their single Justified and Ancient (Stand by the JAMs) The song became a huge hit, reaching #1 in an unbelievable 18 countries, the US not among them, as the song peaked at #11 on the Billboard Hot 100. Nonetheless, the song and Tammy's ultra-cool appearance as Queen of the mystical Mu-Mu Land in the subsequent music video, made her the idol of club-kids the world over.

Justified and Ancient music video featuring Tammy Wynette

During a 1992 60 Minutes interview, then hopeful First Lady Hillary Clinton made a flippant comment "I'm not sitting here as some little woman standing by her man like Tammy Wynette." When Country Music's First Lady Tammy, a Clinton supporter, got word of the comment, she demanded--and recieved--and appology.

The brilliantly produced and critically and commercially successful release of 1993's Honky Tonk Angels, a trio recording featuring Tammy, Dolly and Loretta--as I often say, when you're that famous, last names aren't necessary--was a country fan's dream come true. The following year, Tammy released a collection of duets with a variety of performers including Smokey Robinson, Elton John, Wynonna and Sting. No singles were released, but the Wynonna track, Girl Thang still managed to break the Top 100 charting at #64.

Tammy continued to work throughout the 90s, appearing on a celebrity version of Wheel of Fortune, reuniting with George on a project titled One, designing a line of jewelry, voicing Hank Hill's mother on the animated series King of the Hill and laying down one of many celebrity vocal tracks for a BBC radio and television spot. The updated version of Perfect Day, originally recorded by Lou Reed in the 70s, was so popular that BBC decided to release it as a single to benefit a Children's Charity. Perfect Day featuring Tammy alongside, David Bowie, Lou Reed, Emmylou Harris, BoyZone, Bono and others reached #1 in the UK for three weeks.

Perfect Day (Tammy appears at 1 minute and 45 seconds in to the video)

Leslie Jordan & Georgette Jones in Sordid Lives

In the years before her death, my friend Del Shores wrote a play titled Sordid Lives. Leslie Jordan, best known for his work as Beverly Leslie on Will and Grace, plays Brother Boy, a mental hospital patient who is so obsessed with Tammy Wynette that he performs a drag routine dressed as the legendary lady. Tammy read the play and loved it.

More traditional tributes have also continued in the years since her controversial death on April 9, 1998. As if there was any question, Tammy's legacy as First Lady of Country Music was forever solidified just months after he death when she was elected to the Country Music Hall of Fame. A special collection of her music was released that same year and remarkably, the single Stand By Your Man managed to break the Top 50 almost 30 years after its original release. A star-studded tribute to Tammy also followed in 1998. Featured on the recording were Elton John's cover of Stand By Your Man, Take Me To Your World by George Jones, Faith Hill's Till I Can Make It on My Own and a duet of In My Room by Brian Wilson and Tammy herself.

The play Sordid Lives made its transition to the big screen in 2000 with a star studded cast including Delta Burke, Bonnie Bedelia, Jeff Bridges, Olivia Newton-John and of course Leslie Jordan as the Tammy-obsessed drag queen.

In 2001 I was among those in attendance for the debut of the musical Stand By Your Man: The Tammy Wynette Story at the Ryman. The musical, produced by Mark St. Germain was similar to Always...Patsy Cline in that it weaves together the story of the singer by way of 29 songs from her career. Stand featured Nicolette Hart as Tammy and Jim Lauderdale as George. The night of the premiere I was seated just behind Tammy's widow, George Ritchey.

2008 breathed new life into Sordid Lives' Tammy-loving-drag-queen Brother Boy as a prequel series was picked up by MTV Network's LOGO channel. Wynette and Jones' daughter Georgette was cast as her late mother and appears in several scenes with Jordan in the series. Further evidence that her talents remain a worldwide phenomenon, Sony BMG Europe released Stand By Your Man-The Best of Tammy Wynette in April of 2008 honoring the 10th anniversary of her death.

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