Merle Haggard
Best known for
Guitar
Songwriter
Merle Haggard was a California-born country singer-songwriter whose Bakersfield-sound classics, dust-bowl-Okie songwriting, and 2007 album "The Bluegrass Sessions" placed him at the lasting overlap between mainstream country and the bluegrass repertoire — "Mama's Hungry Eyes" remains a bluegrass-jam standard.
- Born April 6, 1937 in Oildale, California to Oklahoma migrant parents; died April 6, 2016 (his 79th birthday) in Palo Cedro, California from pneumonia complications.
- Wrote and recorded "Hungry Eyes" (often called "Mama's Hungry Eyes"), a 1969 #1 country hit framed as a tribute to his mother and to Dust Bowl Okies in California labor camps; the song has become a bluegrass-jam standard.
- Released "The Bluegrass Sessions" in 2007 on Del McCoury's McCoury Music label, his first full bluegrass album, with Marty Stuart, Carl Jackson, Aubrey Haynie, and a duet with Alison Krauss on "Mama's Hungry Eyes."
- Recorded Bill Monroe's signature "Mule Skinner Blues (Blue Yodel No. 8)," reinforcing his ties to the bluegrass-orbit repertoire.
- Cited Hank Williams, Lefty Frizzell, and Bob Wills as core influences; his father, James Francis Haggard, was a fiddler.
- Co-architect of the Bakersfield sound with Buck Owens; the Telecaster-driven, twin-fiddle Strangers gave him a string-band-adjacent backing that frequently crossed into bluegrass territory.
- Inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame in 1994 and received the Kennedy Center Honors in 2010.
- "Mama's Hungry Eyes" was the title cut of a 1994 multi-artist tribute album that drew heavily on country and bluegrass-orbit performers.
-
Merle Haggard and the StrangersPlayed on recordings with Merle Haggard and the Strangers
-
Merle HaggardPlayed on recordings with Merle Haggard
-
Merle Haggard and Willie NelsonPlayed on recording with Merle Haggard and Willie Nelson