Earlier this week, I borrowed a homemade compilation of Willie Nelson songs which I have been listening to on each car ride ever since. On it he sings everything from Paul Simon's 'Graceland' to Danial Lanois' 'The Maker' to Kermit the Frog's 'Rainbow Connection'. And on each of these songs as well as the 17 other tracks, I cannot get over how perfectly imperfect (or is it imperfectly perfect) Willie's singing is. He falls into a long line of other favorite singers of mine who have have far from what would be considered innate singing talent. This list includes Bob Dylan, Tom Petty, Neil Young, Rick Danko, and most recently Warren Zevon. They each have a way of conveying emotion through their voices, which I find so much more poignant than the singing of many others with far superior vocal talent. Maybe the true appeal of these singers for me, and others, is that they sound real. That it's the emotion and the feeling that you get when you listen to them which makes them so attractive. Willie Nelson just has that intangible 'something' about his voice which connects with me every time.
Having decided to share a favorite song from this disc, I called upon YouTube to see what I could find. I had the great fortune to find Willie Nelson performing onstage with Paul Simon on the aforementioned "Graceland". The video features a nice pictorial tribute to Willie over the first minute.
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