Albums by Merle Haggard
ALBUMDjango and JimmieWillie Nelson & Merle Haggard
ALBUMWorking In TennesseeMerle Haggard
ALBUMI Am What I AmMerle Haggard
ALBUMThe Bluegrass SessionsMerle Haggard
ALBUMHag's ChristmasMerle Haggard
ALBUMLast of the BreedWillie Nelson, Merle Haggard & Ray Price
ALBUMKickin' Out the Footlights... Again: Jones Sings Haggard, Haggard Sings JonesGeorge Jones & Merle Haggard
ALBUMChicago WindMerle Haggard
ALBUMUnforgettable Merle HaggardMerle Haggard
ALBUMRoots Vol. 1Merle Haggard
Merle Haggard's Popular Music Videos
It's All Going to Pot
Willie Nelson & Merle Haggard
Are the Good Times Really Over (I Wish a Buck Was Still Silver)
Merle Haggard
Pancho and Lefty (Video)
Merle Haggard & Willie Nelson
Kern River
Merle Haggard
Missing Ol' Johnny Cash (Digital Video)
Willie Nelson & Merle Haggard
Natural High (Video)
Merle Haggard & Janie Fricke
Don't Think Twice, It's Alright
Willie Nelson & Merle Haggard
Unfair Weather Friend (In the Studio)
Willie Nelson & Merle Haggard
Alice In Hulaland
Willie Nelson & Merle Haggard
Working with Willie and Merle
Willie Nelson & Merle Haggard
Artist Playlists
Merle Haggard Essentials
Tales of life on the edge from a legendary country music maverick.
Merle Haggard: Deep Cuts
Meet the most multifaceted country kingpin of his generation.
Inspired by Merle Haggard
“Mighty” Merle's influence is all over these diverse country cuts.
Merle Haggard: The Songwriters
The outlaw's legendary tunes made anew.
Merle Haggard: Influences
Merle took his cues from these country, blues, rock 'n' roll, and Dust Bowl singers.
Merle Haggard: The Songwriters
Artist Biography
Raised in Bakersfield, CA, in 1937 by migrant parents from Dust Bowl-era Oklahoma, Merle Haggard became arguably the most important country singer to surface in the 1960s, scoring an astonishing 38 No. 1 country hits between 1966 and 1987 while changing the genre’s sound and exerting profound influence over the emergence of country rock. Haggard spent his youth committing minor offenses and enduring spells in juvenile detention, winding up at San Quentin in 1958 after attempting to escape from Bakersfield Jail, where he’d been imprisoned for attempted robbery. Upon his parole in 1960, he chipped away at the local circuit, which had made stars of Buck Owens and Wynn Stewart, and gained attention for a hardcore honky-tonk sound that stood in opposition to the increasingly slick sound of Nashville. In the mid-’60s he began scoring hits, and as he became a star, he turned his attention to writing his own songs, drawing heavily and poetically from his checkered past with unflinching sobriety. He made tribute records to his heroes Jimmie Rodgers and Western swing star Bob Wills—sparking a revival of the latter’s style—and his 1969 hit “Okie from Muskogee” wryly mocked the counterculture at the height of the Vietnam War, establishing a contrarian if sometimes fluid mindset, a quality artificially stoked by his label’s decision to follow the single’s release with another reactionary tune, “The Fightin’ Side of Me.” Haggard’s sound expanded to incorporate elements of jazz, blues, and folk, and his lyrics resonated with blue-collar listeners who recognized their own struggles in his narratives in “Workin’ Man Blues” and “If We Make It Through December.” At the turn of the century, he reached a new audience with stripped-down recordings—especially If I Could Only Fly in 2000—that summoned his vintage sound, and he continued working until his death in April 2016.
Hometown
Oildale, CA, United States
Genre
Country