“If That’s the Way You Feel” (the original single adds “A Life of Sorrow” in parentheses) is credited to Ralph Stanley and Peggy Stanley. The Stanley Brothers and the Clinch Mountain Boys recorded it in Nashville on 15 November 1957, and Mercury-Starday issued it on 15 January 1958 (Mercury-Starday 71258), backed with “I’d Rather Be Forgotten.” Carter Stanley sang lead, Ralph Stanley the tenor and Curley Lambert the baritone. Bill Napier played mandolin, Benny Martin and Howdy Forrester fiddled, Roy Wiggins played steel guitar, and Ralph played banjo.
The words are those of a man giving up a woman he still wants. He says he does not blame her for wanting someone else and that he still needs her, and he will go on caring and hide his feelings. He had always known he would lose her once lies about him came out, and he can see that she believes them. Each verse ends by saying it is all right if that is how she feels.
Bluegrass bands took it up in the 1960s and 1970s. The Country Gentlemen recorded it in Washington, D.C., on 19 March 1961 for Starday, with John Duffey singing lead. Red Allen and the Kentuckians recorded it in New York in September 1966 for County, and Larry Sparks recorded it at Lemco Studio in Lexington, Kentucky, in 1975 for You Could Have Called (King Bluegrass, 1976). The Seldom Scene, with John Duffey and John Starling sharing the vocals, put it on The New Seldom Scene Album (Rebel, 1976). Ralph Stanley returned to it for Clinch Mountain Country (Rebel, 1998), with Vince Gill on lead and Patty Loveless on tenor.
