“Grandma Harp”
Merle Haggard and the Strangers
Written by Merle Haggard
Billboard
#1 (2 weeks)
May 13 – May 20, 1972
“Grandma Harp” might not be the most remembered of Merle Haggard’s hits, but it’s representative of why he’s the greatest male country artist of all time.
Like his female counterpart Dolly Parton, his genius flowed through his songwriting pen, and his empathy through who he chose to write about. “Grandma Harp” is fundamentally a declaration of Haggard’s family values. His grandmother’s story is worth telling because it’s not that eventful. She did what she felt she was supposed to do as a mother and a wife, and she did it well.
“There’s ninety years to tell in a few short lines,” Haggard sings, and by the end of those lines, we are so deeply grateful for Grandma Harp, much like we fell in love with Dolly’s mom as she weaved the coat of many colors.
This is such a beautiful reminder of what country music is when it’s at its best. It’s so powerful when it helps us to truly see and understand those with lives and experiences so different from our own.
A great moment for Merle Haggard as a songwriter and even better one for him as a grandson.
“Grandma Harp” gets an A.
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Grade “B”. A good song from Haggard but far from his best. Almost sounds like a Tom T. Hall song. No doubt that Haggard was a musical genius but like George Strait, it seems fans will overly compliment even his more generic output.
LET ME TELL YOU ABOUT A SONG was Haggard’s most diverse album from the Capitol years. The album is held together by Hag’s introductory narrations concerning each song. While I don’t regard any of Hag’s composition as being among his greatest, the album itself is far more than the sum of its parts and I usually listen to the entire album at one sitting. I would call “Grandma Harp” a B+
01. Daddy Frank [The Guitar Man]
02. They’re Tearin’ the Labor Camps Down
03. Man Who Picked the Wildwood Flower (writer:Tommy Collins)
04. Recitation: Proudest Fiddle in the World [Maiden’s Prayer](writer:Bob Wills)
05. Bill Woods from Bakersfield (writer:Joe Simpson)
06. Old Doc Brown (writer:Red Foley)
07. Grandma Harp
08. Turnin’ Off a Memory
09. Irma Jackson
10. The Funeral (writer: Tommy Collins)
11. Bring It on Down to My House, Honey (writer:Bob Wills)