Patty was part of the CMA Songwriters Series, which was making a return to the Library of Congress’ Coolidge Auditorium for the popular free show that features Nashville tunesmiths talking about and performing their hits. Joining her were Clint Black, Tim Nichols and host Bob DiPiero.

One of the songs Patty performed, ‘Drive,’ was written expressly for the COPD campaign, to make people aware of the disease. The singer has worked tirelessly to help further the word about COPD over the past few years.

“The Library of Congress is a great place to do this songwriter series,” Patty tells The Boot. “It houses some great works of art, and what better place to perform these songs that we write and sing.”

Patty, whose long list of hits include ‘How Can I Help You Say Goodbye,’ ‘Chains’ and ‘Blame It on Your Heart,’ says she wishes there had been an organization around to help her family learn about COPD when her sister was stricken with the disease. At the time, they didn’t understand what emphysema was or how Dottie could be helped.

“Dottie inspired me to sing and do what I do,” Patty says. “She had dreams of doing this. I think of her and her energy and how much drive she used to have. She was full of spunk and pretty sassy too, but when this disease started to take over her body she was not able to continue. She didn’t have the energy to walk from the bedroom to the kitchen for a cup of coffee. She had to hold on to walls to get there. Before all that happened, she would win awards for dancing, and I’m sure she could have given them a hard run on ‘Dancing With the Stars’ if she were here today.

Patty urges people to go to the website drive4copd.com and answer the five question screener to see if they might be at risk for COPD. “I didn’t know what COPD was when I got involved in this, and a lot of people don’t know,” she cautions. “There may be 24 million Americans with COPD and not know it.

“In the past two years since this campaign was launched, we have screened two million people, and 20 percent of them were at risk for COPD. Catching this disease in its early stages is so important, because once you lose capacity in your lungs, you don’t get it back. There is treatment out there, and if you find you are at risk, then you go to your personal physician and get help.”

In addition to emphysema, chronic bronchitis is another form of COPD, which is the fourth leading killer in America, killing more people than breast cancer and diabetes combined.

“I have had people walk up to me and tell me about their experiences now that I am involved in this campaign,” Patty says. “I remember in Atlanta, we were doing screenings there, and a mother walked up with her 10-year-old son, who had chronic bronchitis. I remember thinking how young he was, but COPD doesn’t discriminate by age.

“I’ve also had a lot of people say it’s so wonderful that I am a part of this and helping get word out, because one of their close relatives had died of the disease and they wished they had known more when they were going through the illness. People need to take control of their health and be aware of the signs of COPD. Sometimes you get older and you think you have shortness of breath going up and down stairs because of your age, when it might be something else. Others think it’s just a smoker’s disease, but it can affect others as well.”

Patty took the last year off from recording and touring to stay with her husband and producer, Emory Gordy, Jr., who had knee replacement surgery. She reports he is now doing very well, and she’s thinking of going back into the studio sometime next year to start a new project.

“I’m still in the process of deciding what I’m going to do as far as the music goes,” she reports. “I will also continue to get the word out about COPD. Lungs are so important to those of us who are singers, and also to speakers and people who enjoy the simple activities of walking, hiking or running. I am going to always feel a part of the COPD family, and continue to push on about getting spreading the word about the disease.”

- The Boot

Patty Loveless and Clint Black may have been the most famous names on stage at the Country Music Association Songwriters Series event Wednesday night, but the two musicians on either side of them — songwriters Bob DiPiero and Tim Nichols — stole the show.

“I’m a world-famous songwriter, which means you don’t know who . . . I am,” DiPiero announced to kick off the evening at the Coolidge Auditorium in the Library of Congress.

The night was billed as a way to bring a little Nashville to Washington and get behind the scenes of Music City. Both DiPiero and Nichols traded lightning-fast banter during the nearly two-hour concert and gave an illuminating, self-deprecating look into what it’s like to pen songs for a living.

Nichols, known for co-writing Tim McGraw’s smash “Live Like You Were Dying,” along with Chris Young’s “The Man I Want to Be” and Lee Ann Womack’s “I’ll Think of a Reason Later,” told jokes:

What’s the difference between a songwriter and a large pizza? A pizza can feed a family of four. What do you call a songwriter in a three-piece suit? A defendant. Etc.

Sitting in a row, each singer told a story of a song and then played the tune onstage. With just the sounds of voices and acoustic guitar, the whole evening took on an intimate feel, with the tone of a giant group hug. The four performers helped one another out, providing harmonies and extra strings as each took a turn. When Black sang “When I Said I Do,” normally a duet with his wife, Lisa Hartman Black, Loveless filled in flawlessly.

Between performances, which included 15 songs and ended in a group singalong of the aforementioned “Live Like You Were Dying,” the crowd learned some fun facts. Nichols came up with the idea for Jo Dee Messina’s “Heads Carolina, Tails California” after hearing a similar phrase while listening to a terrible audiobook. DiPiero got the term “Blue Clear Sky” from a line in “Forrest Gump” and had to persuade George Strait not to switch the words around when he recorded the song. It served them both well — Strait wound up using it as the title of his 1996 album, which sold millions.

Loveless and Black, who may have known they were the evening’s main draws, good-naturedly played along with all the riffing.

“I don’t have any wisecracks. I’m a little on the serious side,” Loveless said before belting out the aching scorned-lover ballad “Here I Am.”

“As they say, never follow circus acts, little kids or Patty Loveless,” DiPiero said after the several hundred in the crowd burst out of riveted silence into thunderous applause.

Loveless, 54, revealed to ITK that she “would love” to sing a song with the first lady. The country-music star pondered some other political possibilities before choosing Mrs. Obama, wondering aloud, “Now, I know he can play saxophone —maybe Bill Clinton? He just seems like he would be a great hang to be around and to talk with. And I really look up to him. Or I think maybe President Obama.”

But the “Blame It on Your Heart” singer contends her Democratic duet choices aren’t necessarily indicative of how she votes. Unlike other musical acts such as the Dixie Chicks and Big & Rich, whose members are vocal about their political views, Loveless says you won’t hear her pushing for any particular presidential candidate: “It’s a very personal issue for me. It’s kind of like whatever I do behind closed doors with my husband.”

But back to that potential pairing with the president’s wife —unfortunately for Loveless, she might have thought of a reason Michelle Obama wouldn’t go for the duet. She explains that the first lady is already pretty tight with another musician who has worked with Obama on her “Let’s Move!” campaign: “Beyonce’s already got her!”

A longtime smoker, Dottie struggled with emphysema but wasn’t diagnosed until the disease was in its late stages. “It took the life right out of her,” says Loveless. “She even had a hard time just walking from her bedroom to the kitchen.” That’s why Loveless has spent the last year as a spokesperson for Drive4COPD, a national campaign to heighten awareness of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. COPD includes emphysema and chronic bronchitis and is the nation’s fourth-leading cause of death (and the only one of the top ten that’s on the rise). She even wrote the campaign’s first theme song—the upbeat, feel-good “Drive!”—with husband Emory Gordy Jr., a session musician (and Georgia Music HOF inductee years before Loveless) who has worked with Atlanta impresario Bill Lowery and played with the likes of Elvis and Barbra Streisand.

In January—just weeks before her Mountain Soul II won a Grammy for Best Bluegrass Album—Loveless traveled to Midtown’s Doppler Studios to put out a call to aspiring songwriters: Submit an original song at drive4copd.com before April 15, and she and a few others, including fellow spokesperson Billy Ray Cyrus, would pick the next campaign tune. Bonus: The victor will have the opportunity to perform at Nashville’s CMA Music Festival this June.

“Billy Ray and myself, I don’t think we’re too bad at picking songs,” Loveless says, chuckling. “I’m probably going to be a little critical; I’m always critical of my own songwriting.”

Loveless—the “Honky-Tonk Angel” who has stuck to country and bluegrass since her self-titled debut in 1987—may soon have a surprise for fans. “My next project, it’s going to be different,” she says. “I don’t want to give it away. But I’m going to dabble in some other forms of music.”

-Atlanta Magazine

“Molly was an artist my mother listened to many, many years ago,” Loveless, 54, said. “There was this one particular song of hers called The Drunken Driver (cut by O’Day in 1947) that I recall my mother going around the house singing. She loved Molly’s music.”

On Thursday, two generations of Pike Country-born country musicians will take their places in the Kentucky Music Hall of Fame with the inductions of Loveless, who was born in Pikeville and grew up in Elkhorn City, and the late O’Day, a native of McVeigh.

Outside of their Kentucky heritage, however, the singers’ careers have little in common.

Loveless has charted hit singles for more than 25 years and maintained strong connections among country, bluegrass and Appalachia-inspired roots music. Her career as a country artist stems from early contemporary hits for the MCA label in the late ’80s and sleeker songs for Epic in the ’90s, and a series of subsequent recordings addressed her Appalachian roots. She won her most recent Grammy Award in February for the folk-flavored album Mountain Soul II.

O’Day’s recording career was mostly limited to a five-year stretch. She recorded 36 songs for Columbia Records from 1946 to 1951. Her hits included The Tramp on the Street, Don’t Sell Daddy Any More Whiskey and Hank Williams’ The Singing Waterfall. O’Day, born Lois LaVerne Williamson, was barely 29 when she retreated from public life. In her later years, she dismissed any lasting impact her songs had on country music and devoted her life to the Church of God. The New York Times critic Robert Shelton called O’Day, who died in 1987, “one of the greatest, if not the greatest” female singers in country music.

She has been cited as a prime vocal inspiration by Dolly Parton, among others. Earl Scruggs claimed that O’Day once beat him in a banjo competition at Renfro Valley.

“It is so cool to enter the Hall of Fame alongside Molly,” Loveless said. “Here’s a lady that was around long before I was — before I was even born, even. In fact, my mother was probably listening to her when she was carrying me.

“You know, they say your child absorbs the music you listen to when you’re pregnant. I have a great belief in that.”

-Lexgo.com

I had high hopes for Patty Loveless’s show at the Casino Regina last night and I’m happy to report that she didn’t disappoint. Taking the stage at 8:30 p.m. on the nose, Loveless wasted little time showing she still had the singing chops. As I tweeted last night, it took only to the first chorus of the opening song for the soldout crowd to realize Loveless could still sing like an angel. So how do you describe her voice? Well, it’s smooth, it’s silky, it’s sultry. Best of all, it appears totally effortless for the 53-year-old Loveless.

Loveless can handle the up-tempo songs but her specialty are the emotional and gut-wrenching ballads. When Loveless sang “You Don”t Even Know Who I Am,” the crowd was hanging on her every word. It was a goose-bump moment. She closed her 90-minute set with “Too Many Memories” and received a well-deserved standing ovation.

Her songs touched base in tradtional country, new country and mountain soul and Loveless shined in all the genres. I especially enjoyed when she took a walk down memory lane with “Crazy Arms” and “Why Baby Why.” The mountain soul tunes, powered by two fiddles, a mandolin, a banjo, a dobro and a steel guitar was stunning. It’s a pity that none of these songs are “radio friendly” — music fans need to hear these sublime songs.

If you have the opportunity to see Loveless, grab it and enjoy the ride.

-Leader Post

After spending a week touring Switzerland, one of the things that Patty Loveless learned is that the Swiss country music fans know how to applaud.

And applaud and applaud and applaud.

“It was kind of like I was very fresh to them,” said Loveless in a telephone interview last week, a few days after returning to the states from Gstaad, Switzerland, after a nine-hour plane ride.

“You hate to disrupt the applause, but as far as the time, the song would be three to five minutes and the applause would be probably five minutes. It ended up being a 10-minute song,” she said. “If there is anything in an artist’s career, it’s when they get response from an audience like that. It just shoots you sky high. That was a wonderful thing.

“There were some of the language barriers there, but I think when it comes to music, people understand,” she said. “They can feel music, no matter what language it’s in.”

Local Loveless fans will get a chance to do the Swiss one better and see how they stack up on the applause-o-meter when the country superstar comes to the Sellersville Theater 1894 for two shows at 3 and 7:30 p.m. Sunday, Sept. 26.

It’s not her first time at ST94, one of the many venues where Loveless has appeared over her 22-year recording career.

“I find that the audience in a smaller venue, if it’s a theater, they’re a little more reluctant to get rowdy because they’re sitting next to their neighbor maybe or someone that knows them well,” she said. “I find that sometimes I have to encourage them to let themselves go if they want to and enjoy themselves.”

Loveless- noted for such chart-topping hits as “Timber I’m Falling in Love,” “Chains,” “Blame It on Your Heart” as well as fan favorites such as “I Try to Think about Elvis,” “How Can I Help You Say Goodbye,” “I’m That Kind of Girl” and “You Don’t Even Know Who I Am” – was named the County Music Association’s Female Vocalist of the Year in 1996. Her “Fallen Angels Fly” was the CMA Album of the Year in 1995 and she has been a member of the legendary Grand Ole Opry since 1988.

Her most recent album, the bluegrass-tinged “Mountain Soul II,” released in the fall of 2009, picks up where her 2001 “Mountain Soul” left off and is the follow-up to “Sleepless Nights,” her Grammy Award-nominated debut album for Saguaro Road Records.

Loveless is still on the road quite a bit these days, something that she, like many artists, considers a challenge.

“As I’m looking at my career, I know that eventually as far as the road, I hope that I can last as long as Tina Turner or Aretha Franklin,” she said. “The traveling I don’t love as much as the performance. The performance I love, and if there was a way that I could wiggle my nose like ‘Bewitched’ and get myself there, I would absolutely stay on and on and on and continue to do what I’m doing. It’s important to get the music in front of the people. It’s important for people to hear music live.”

Last fall, a Loveless show was a more acoustic show. But on this tour, she said she has incorporated the drums back into the show and is going back to her MCA days and including some of those songs into the set list.

Although she isn’t crazy about doing two shows in the same day – like the Sellersville gig – she understands the reasons that it sometimes has to happen.

“It’s like during the first show, once I start, don’t stop me,” she said. “But I understand when a theater is small, like this one, they’ve got to do two shows to cover their overhead.”

As far as today’s young female country music stars, Loveless said she likes Miranda Lambert – with whom she worked on the Switzerland trip – and Carrie Underwood.

“I hope that maybe I’ll write a song that someday one of them will record,” she said.

“But I don’t want the music that I’ve recorded over the past 22 years to be forgotten. I hope that I’m doing music that will be remembered, even 100 years from now.”

-Montgomery News

Miranda Lambert and Patty Loveless fans who attended their concert on September 11 – which also included Craig Morgan- had a special treat when the pair performed two duets. Miranda invited Patty to join her on ‘The House That Built Me,’ and then joined Patty when she sang her song ‘Halfway Down.’

“I wasn’t sure I should sing it with her. It’s so personal,” Patty tells The Boot about singing ‘The House That Built Me.’ “[But Miranda said], ‘No, come on!”

Patty’s love of Miranda’s singing really kicked in last year after the two met at the 2009 ACM Honors and Miranda gave Patty a copy of her then-unreleased album ‘Revolution.’

“I put the CD in my car stereo when I was driving [home to Georgia from Nashville] and listened,” says Patty. “I emailed her and said the whole record is great but ‘The House That Built Me’ – well, that’s the song. That’s the kind of song I would love to write and hear somebody like her or Carrie Underwood record in the future.”

Patty is obviously a huge Miranda fan, and she offers special praise to Miranda and Carrie.

“Carrie, she rocks out and Miranda does too,” says Patty. “They can take a country song and really play it. Carrie did a Randy Travis song – ‘I Told You So’ – and she nailed it. I know she made Randy proud. He said, ‘I’m never going to sing that song again!’ Miranda takes Patsy Cline’s song ‘Crazy’ and really makes it her own.”

Patty and Miranda are so musically in-sync that after the September 11 concert, they went back to Patty’s room – joined by their bands and Craig and his band – and “hung out and sang songs together” for hours, says Patty.

-The Boot

Patty Loveless will unearth some of her eastern Kentucky bluegrass roots when she plays Saturday night at the Alabama Theatre in North Myrtle Beach.

Honored as Female Vocalist of the Year in the mid-1990s by the Country Music Assocation and the Academy of Country Music, Loveless had started cracking the top 10 in 1988 with “If My Heart Had Windows,” and later with a string of hits such as “Timber, I’m Falling in Love,” “Blue Side ofTown,”"Chains,” “How Can I Help You Say Goodbye?” “Here I Am,” “I Try to Think About Elvis” and “Blue Side of Town.”

A distant cousin of Loretta Lynn and Crystal Gayle, this coal miner’s daughter, who was inducted in 1988 to the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville, said she developed her own style of music starting at age 12 by singing in church.

During a phone interview Tuesday from her home near Atlanta, a day after returning from a European tour that included Switzerland and Norway, Loveless spoke about enduring in a business for more than 20 years. Her longtime husband, Emory Gordy Jr., has produced many of her albums. Now 53, she was happy to answer questions and look back at how real life has shaped her approach to music.

Question | You’re among country ladies, like Trisha Yearwood and Lee Ann Womack, with a distinguished, expressive voice that no one else matches. Does conveying such true feelings in a song come easily? Is that natural skill honed from experiences in life?

Answer | For the most part, I try to express myself in the music as much as possible, but at the same time, I try to express conversations I’ve had with others. With my music, I feel there’s a lot of people that can relate to it.

Q. | At what point in your career did you read your own innate signal that you no longer have to fulfill commercial demands and can go full throttle on expanding your own creativity at your own pace and choosing? Such as with the bluegrass-powered “Mountain Soul,” from 2001, and the more diverse, heartfelt “Mountain Soul II,” released last year?

A. | It probably did start there, with “Mountain Soul.” It was just sort of an addition to the music I was doing. It kind of gave people some music that I had been performing on stage. I would bring five or six band members and do an acoustic thing and bring the band to the center of the stage in a circle, and do it the way you used to in the old bluegrass days, maybe get around two microphones. It was more intimate that way. … When I went to the label, which was Sony/Epic at the time, it was just a side project, and there wasn’t a lot of money put into it. … Honestly, I’ve had my time in the limelight, with the award shows and everything

Q. | On “Mountain Soul II,” some parts sprinkled in among the bluegrass remind me of sitting in a church service, with a sacred aura to it, with help from artists such as Vince Gill, Rebecca Lynn Howard, Del McCoury and Emmylou Harris.

A. | “Diamond in My Crown”: I remember hearing that on an Emmylou Harris album. “Half Over You”: I recorded that on my very first album for MCA. With “(We Are All) Children of Abraham,” I wanted it to feel like we were in a church. I come from an upbringing of old, primitive Baptists. I remember the singing moved me to tears. It shook you inside. … I enjoyed making “Mountain Soul II,” especially with the roster of artists who were there. Everything was live. … We had performed together on stage. It was kind of like we were taking the stage and bringing it into the studio and having fun.

Q. | What other memories get stoked after more than two decades in the industry?

A. | In 1986, I started recording, and it took me about three good records for the music to really get exposed, with recognition. Recently, I did a show with Miranda Lambert. I love what she does. She kind of reminds me of myself a little bit. I was a little country, a little edgy. She’s turned out to be be more hillbilly rock ‘n’ roll, and a mix of real country. That’s what I like hearing. Her nine CMA nominations are well deserved. This is her third album. It’s kind of a slow process. It’s not an overnight thing. When I look back on it, my third album – “Honky Tonk Angel” – was the one that got a lot of recognition. … There were five singles from that album.

Q. | How has marketing of music changed since your breakthrough?

A. | With the Internet today, there are so many other ways to hear one’s music. You’re not depending on CDs or the radio. The Internet has opened up a whole new world. It’s a good vehicle for the new artists coming along. … It amazes me how fast things are happening.

Q. | On George Strait’s “Troubadour” CD from 2008, how did the “House of Cash” duet come together? Was it closure in addition to being a tribute to Johnny and June Carter Cash?

A. | In the early stages of my career, I had worked for George Strait, opening for him in concerts. I always wanted to do something with George. … Thank goodness for the Internet that I can do some of my own parts at home. It feels good to be home.

Q. | All those duets, with people such as Gill, George Jones and Ricky Scaggs: Do you discover new channels of creativity in such projects, which have garnered numerous music awards?

A. The real big awards to me are just that the people like the music and like what I do, and like what we’re doing together.

Patty Loveless, 53, took center stage as one of country music’s leading ladies in the late 80s and 90s. Back then, the award-winning singer churned out hits on the Billboard Hot Country Songs chart, including five No. 1s.

These days, the Grand Ole Opry member is singing a different tune. She’s rediscovering her bluegrass roots and raising awareness for chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), which includes emphysema and chronic bronchitis. In both disorders, the lungs can’t expel air, making breathing difficult.

More than 12 million people in the U.S. have COPD. Another 12 million go undiagnosed, mainly because they don’t know the risk factors (smoking and toxin exposure are most common) or don’t recognize symptoms: shortness of breath, persistent cough and lots of mucous.

Lung disease hits close to home for Loveless. She lost an elder sister – who inspired her to become a singer – to emphysema. Her father, a Kentucky coal miner, died of black lung disease. (Breathing in coal dust is a common cause.)

His illness forced the family to move from rural Kentucky to Louisville for medical care when Loveless was a preteen.

Writing songs helped her cope back then, and she recently wrote and recorded a song (“Drive”) for Drive4COPD, a public awareness campaign that the American Lung Association, COPD Foundation and NASCAR are a part of.

In this Lifescript exclusive, Loveless opens up about her sister’s battle with COPD and health issues that threatened to end her career:

Why are you talking publicly about COPD?
My sister Dottie died of emphysema at 48, so I want people to know that COPD is a serious progressive disease.

Although there’s no cure, it can be managed and treated if diagnosed in the early stages, before lungs become severely damaged.

When did your sister get help?
Dottie didn’t receive treatment until the later stages and had to undergo surgery for a brain aneurysm.

COPD is sometimes called a silent killer, because many people don’t realize their symptoms are related to their lungs. They think shortness of breath and fatigue are signs of getting older or being out of shape.

While this is sometimes true, they can also be early signs of COPD.

How did the disease affect Dottie’s life?
For eight years before her death, she suffered from shortness of breath. It was so severe she could barely walk from the kitchen to the bedroom in her small home.

She was always such an energetic person. It was hard to see her go downhill and be unable to do many activities that she enjoyed, like singing. She was a beautiful woman and an amazing singer. I learned so much from her.

Do you know how she got COPD?
She’d been a smoker since age 14, and she started smoking for the same reason many women do – to keep her weight down, never realizing how addictive a habit it can become.

Is smoking the only cause?
It can also be caused by exposure to indoor or outdoor pollutants.

It can even result from a rare genetic disorder that causes low levels of a protein called Alpha-1 antitrypsin.

How would an earlier diagnosis have helped Dottie?
I like to believe that she would have quit smoking and made lifestyle changes that could have helped her remain more active and slow the disease’s progression.

COPD has a gradual onset, and many people, including my sister, don’t learn they have it until they’re hospitalized.

Are you at risk?
I’ve taken the online screening test at www.drive4copd.com. [I answered the five questions] and found out I’m not.

What should people do if they think they’re at risk?
If people take the quiz and find out they’re at risk, they can print out the results and share them with their doctor.

The next step would be a medical evaluation that includes a spirometry test. Patients breathe into a handheld device called a spirometer, which measures lung function. It’s painless and easy, and you get the results right away.

How can women prevent COPD?
There’s a lot you can do: [quit smoking], get a yearly flu shot [flu symptoms make COPD worse] and avoid exposure to pollutants such as dust, smoke and strong fumes.

Also, encourage parents, spouses and siblings to take the test.

Have you had lung problems too?
I suffer from adult-onset mild asthma and seasonal allergies. Sometimes I wonder if years of performing in smoke-filled nightclubs took a toll, since secondhand smoke is a known asthma trigger.

I wear a mask whenever I use cleaning products and keep my allergies in check with medications.

You’ve also had other health issues, like your 1992 throat surgery. How did that affect your career?
I began feeling some pain in my throat when singing, and my doctor noticed a red spot on my vocal cords, an enlarged blood vessel. I was told if it wasn’t treated, I might not be able to continue singing.

I chose to have corrective throat surgery, although there was no guarantee it would fix the problem. Fortunately, it did.

But the experience was a wake-up call that I really needed to take care of my voice and body.

What changes have you made?
I work out on a treadmill and with weights. I also enjoy taking walks with my husband [musician and producer Emory Gordy, Jr.] and our two German shepherds.

I have a green thumb and love working in my garden.

I also try to eat a healthy meal three hours before going onstage. When I’m on the road and not able to cook, I snack on fruits, including pineapple, bananas and apples, and vegetables, such as carrots and broccoli.

I am a coffee drinker – that’s my one vice.

How has country music changed over the years?
I began singing back in the 1970s, when country music was considered your grandparents’ music! It has become more pop-oriented, but I also see it swinging back to its more authentic roots.

I love seeing young singers like Carrie Underwood belt out classic country songs like “Stand By Your Man” – and seeing Miranda Lambert sing a Merle Haggard song just blows me away.

I’m proud that these young women are carrying on the country music tradition and becoming Grand Ole Opry members.

What’s next in your career?
I’m touring this year to promote my new album, “Mountain Soul II,” which was released in late 2009. One of my first stops was the Music Saves Mountains concert in Nashville to bring attention to mountaintop removal coal-mining, which is destroying some of our nation’s most beautiful landscapes.

I was also honored [because] I’ll be inducted into the Kentucky Music Hall of Fame in April 2011.

-Lifescript