44 Years Ago Today, Two Country Legends Turned an Overlooked Willie Nelson Song Into a No. 1 Hit

Following a string of professional and personal setbacks, outlaw country legend Willie Nelson released the concept album Yesterday’s Wine in August 1971. With the gift of hindsight, the album’s self-penned title track is now considered among Nelson’s best work. At the time, however, it fell flat, peaking at number 62 on the Billboard country survey and forcing the frustrated singer into temporary retirement. But more than a decade later, “Yesterday’s Wine” would get its due when arguably two of country music’s best singers of all time—George Jones and Merle Haggard—released it as a duet on this day (August 7) in 1982.

Jones and Haggard’s version of “Yesterday’s Wine” spent 10 weeks on the Billboard Hot Country Songs chart, including one week at number one. The song also inspired the title of their first duets album, A Taste of Yesterday’s Wine.

The “Love Affair” Between George Jones and Merle Haggard

Both George Jones and Merle Haggard built their careers off shooting straight, flouting Nashville conventions, and just boasting two of country music’s all-time best voices.

So no one was surprised when they released an album of duets in August 1982. If anything, fans likely wondered what took them so long.

The pair’s relationship dated all the way back to 1961, when their paths first crossed at the Blackboard Café in Bakersfield, California.

Haggard recounted their first meeting in a 2013 Rolling Stone essay after Jones’ death. The “Mama Tried” singer was onstage singing Marty Robbins’ “Devil Woman” when the “He Stopped Loving Her Today” crooner arrived—intoxicated, as was his wont.

Jones “kicked the doors of the office open and said, ‘Who in the f— is that?’” Haggard recalled.

He continued, “It was one of the greatest compliments of my entire life when George Jones said I was his favorite country singer. It began a love affair between us, because we loved each other’s stuff so much.”

They Reunited Two Decades Later

George Jones and Merle Haggard wouldn’t join forces again for another 24 years. In 2006, they released their second duets album, Kickin’ Out the Footlights…Again.

Instead of an all-duet album, however, they each sang five tracks originally recorded by the other.

Then, they did full-fledged duets for the last four songs, including their first track, “Footlights.”

After twenty years of picking, we’re / Still alive and kicking down the wall, they sang on the track originally recorded by Haggard.

[RELATED: The Evolution of Willie Nelson’s “Yesterday’s Wine,” When Merle Haggard and George Jones Took it to No. 1, and its Rebirth in 2009]

Kickin’ Out the Footlights… Again marked Jones’ final album before his death on April 26, 2013, at age 81.

Haggard died three years later on April 6, 2016—his 79th birthday.

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