“I Wish You Knew” was written by Ira and Charlie Louvin, Alabama-born brothers who recorded as the Louvin Brothers; the publisher was Acuff-Rose. They cut it for Capitol on 7 May 1957 at Bradley Film and Recording Studio, 804 16th Avenue South, Nashville, with Ken Nelson producing. Charlie played guitar and Ira mandolin, with Paul Yandell and Smiley Wilson on guitars, Lightnin’ Chance on bass and Buddy Harman on drums. The same session produced “Call Me,” which became the other side of the single: Capitol F3804, “I Wish You Knew” / “Call Me,” issued around October 1957. A radio performance of the song from 30 November 1957 survives as well, and the studio recording was later placed on the Louvins’ Capitol LP My Baby’s Gone (T-1385, 1960).
The singer is talking to a woman who has left him for another man. He wishes she knew how hard he has tried to get her off his mind and to sleep at night, and he answers what she has said about him: that his kiss at their parting was forced, and his tears too. He knows she pictures him in someone else’s arms, when in fact he cries for her every night.
Jim and Jesse McReynolds took the song into bluegrass. They recorded it at the Columbia studio in Nashville on 22 June 1962, with Jim on guitar, Jesse on mandolin, Don McHan on second guitar, Allen Shelton on banjo, Jimmy Buchanan on fiddle, David Sutherland on bass and Douglas Kirkham on drums, and it came out in February 1963 on their Epic album Bluegrass Special. The brothers kept it in their stage show: it was recorded at Bill Monroe’s seventh annual festival at Bean Blossom, Indiana, in June 1973 for MCA’s Bean Blossom album, and again at Sugino Hall in Tokyo on 2 May 1975. Country Gazette recorded it for A Traitor in Our Midst (United Artists, 1972), with Herb Pedersen, Kenny Wertz and Byron Berline singing, and Nothin’ Fancy included it on Album #7 (Pinecastle, 2006), with Mike Andes singing lead.
