The Unique Patsy Cline

One of the darlings of the musical landscape of the late-1950s and early-1960s, 2013 marks the 50th year since Patsy Cline’s death in a jet crash. For those who have not yet discovered the power of a superb voice of American country music, this set of 25 of her best tracks is a decent place to start.

Born in Virginia in 1932 as Virginia Hensley, she sang in the local church choir then in radio shows around Virginia cultivating her voice, before starting an all-too-brief recording career which brought many hits. ‘Walkin’ After Midnight’ was a Country Chart Number 2 hit in 1957, with its B-side ‘A Poor Man’s Roses (or a Rich Man’s Gold)’ also charting in its own right. For the latter, the universal truism about what sort of man to love (a “callous and cold” rich man or “memories of paradise” of the rose-bearing pauper) is a recipe for a thousand Hollywood screenplays. The cinematic quality of the former is evident in Patsy walking miles devotionally looking for her man, looking on at weeping willows and hearing a lonely wind. This hugely evocative song also has an optimistic melody and a divine slide-guitar part also heard on ‘I’ve Loved and Lost Again’.

Other period details from the 1950s include the oom-chuck-oom-chuck of ‘Honky Tonk Merry Go Round’, sumptuous doo-wop vocals of ‘Walking Dream’ and the harmonies that The Carpenters would later borrow in ‘Just Out Of Reach (Of My Two Open Arms)’, where poor Patsy wakes up from her dreams of ‘memories time cannot erase’. The equally-devastating image of a third person in a relationship akin to a third cigarette (‘Three Cigarettes in an Ashtray’) leads to her voice being etched in pain.

The pain remains, this time with a pretty electric guitar solo as relief, in ‘Hungry for Love’. Elsewhere, despite tears, in ‘Then You’ll Know’, Patsy tells her man to find someone else, while in ‘Stop The World (And Let Me Off)’ “round-and-around” backing vocals underscore Patsy’s lament in the game of love, with a heart “shattered”. Though her poor heart is full of scars, sometimes she has no regrets (‘Never No More’) and even puts her foot down on ‘Turn The Cards Slowly’, a hiccuping vocal style and scraping fiddles straight from the Grand Ol Opry helping to carry across the message: “Please don’t double deal to win my heart.”

Finally, ‘If I Could See The World (Through The Eyes Of A Child)’ has her dreaming of “just a big happy life with a bluebird in every tree”, while other songs satisfy the core Patsy Cline market of Lord-fearing Christians in the South of America. In ‘Dear God’ the vow-breaking Patsy speaks for millions in being “not worthy but I need you so” in three-four time, a sort of penitent’s waltz while ‘That Wonderful Someone invokes the man whom “If you call, he’ll be there”, the same one who “paints every sunset” and builds mountains.

Speaking about love, religion and hope, Patsy Cline is an essential singer, and these 25 tracks are a fine introduction to her melodic voice.