Loretta Lynn was a Kentucky coal miner’s daughter, but her message also resonated with North Texans.
Lynn was a frequent performer at North Texas venues during her career, covering her classics and controversial hits.
Lynn died Tuesday at her home in Hurricane Mills, Tenn. She was 90.
In a 2001 interview with The News, she discussed the defiant, tough-woman message in her hits that included “You Ain’t Woman Enough,” “The Pill,” “Rated X” and “What Kind of Girl (Do You Think I Am?)”
“They were just life to me,” Lynn told The News’ Mario Tarradell. “Every woman I talked to was taking the pill. I don’t know why it was such a big deal for me to sing about the pill when everybody else was taking it but me.
“I wasn’t afraid to do this stuff because it was life. If it’s life, then let it be. It was something they whispered about and talked about, but they didn’t want to hear about it in a song.”
Lynn toured on the road for 57 years before she suffered a stroke in 2017 and broke her hip in 2018.
Lynn appeared several times at Billy Bob’s Texas in Fort Worth. On Tuesday, the venue issued a statement about her:
“Loretta’s first show at The World’s Largest Honky Tonk was Feb. 11, 1983 and we were blessed to have her play 10 more shows after that. Cementing her mark on the club with her handprints on June 7, 1997, she will forever be in our hearts.”
Lynn also made an appearance at the Longhorn Ballroom in 1980, performing for a television special hosted by Dennis Weaver.
Other local venues she visited include Dallas’ Winspear Opera House, Majestic Theater and House of Blues, as well as Arlington Music Hall and Bass Performance Hall in Fort Worth.
Here are a few highlights from reviews from The News’ coverage of her North Texas stops:
June 8, 1997: Billy Bob’s Texas, Fort Worth
Touring again for the first time since the death of her husband, Oliver “Mooney” Lynn, last year, Ms. Lynn hasn’t lost any of the down-home spunk that has kept her vital for more than three decades.
Feb. 19, 2001: Billy Bob’s Texas
Ms. Lynn has lost none of her spitfire soul. When she launched into You Ain’t Woman Enough, you could still hear the sass in her pipes. A one-two punch of One’s on the Way and The Pill captured the infectious realism in Ms. Lynn’s timeless artistry.
June 14, 2008: Bass Performance Hall, Fort Worth
Seeming to take cues from the audience for songs like Honky Tonk Girl (her first hit, in 1960), Ms. Lynn’s power and vitality were hard to ignore. Surrounded by family members, including son (and class clown) Ernie, she gave equally immediate readings of signature tunes like Blue Kentucky Girl and the heartbreaking Here I Am Again.
Jan. 23, 2012: Winspear Opera House, Dallas
Loretta Lynn spent much of her hour onstage sitting down. Dressed in a shimmering lavender gown — high neckline, shoulder pads, fitted sleeves — the country music legend looked like a queen perched on her throne. The crowd Sunday night at the Winspear Opera House definitely treated her like royalty. One woman approached the stage and did a we-are-not-worthy bow.
It didn’t have to be a big venue for Lynn to connect with her audience.
The night before her Bass Performance Hall show in 2008, she performed indoors in Austin at Stubb’s Bar-B-Q, which also has featured George Jones, Lady Gaga, Bob Dylan, Willie Nelson and more.
Lynn also frequented iconic western music haunts, including Gruene Hall in New Braunfels in 2015 and 2017. She performed with Maren Morris of Arlington in 2015 in Austin City Limits Live at the Moody Theater in Austin.
She also made sure she made stops at Nutty Jerry’s in Winnie in Chambers County southwest of Beaumont. It’s a concert hall that also brought in Willie Nelson, the Doobie Brothers, Trace Adkins, Blake Shelton, The Judds and Ted Nugent, among others.
