We sat down with the lovely Crystal Gayle at her Nashville office this past March during CRS week for an in-depth interview on the exciting highlights and various topics from her storied career. Since our visit with Crystal, she has received the great honor of being a part of music history by having her own star placed on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in California. We couldn’t be anymore grateful to Crystal, her husband Bill, Darrell Beatty and Webster PR for this wonderful opportunity to catch up with the music icon herself. We hope that you’ll enjoy this interview as much as we did doing it. With that said, we are proud to dedicate the entire month of October to Crystal Gayle by placing her on the cover of our publication!! God Bless

(CSC) 1. Thanks for taking the time to chat with us again. It’s great to be here with you. How has 2009 been treating you so far and what’s the latest in the world of Crystal Gayle!?

(Crystal Gayle)

It’s been pretty good! It’s starting out cold here in Nashville. (Laughs) The weather has been crazy. We’re just starting to get back on the road. We’re going to be doing rehearsals with the guys and doing some more recording; that’s what I’m most excited about. I’ve been listening to a lot of songs that so many writers have been sending in to me. I’ve got a big tub of songs to listen to and nowadays they send them out via email; I’m not really used to that! (Laughs) You know if I could just get on the computer I’m happy! I have to let someone else do all that other work for me which I greatly appreciate them doing. (Laughs) 

(CSC) 2. You’re going to be receiving a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame on October 2nd. Congratulations to you for this great honor in your career!! How do you plan to celebrate this occasion and what does it mean to you personally?

(Crystal Gayle)

It is very special being able to have the Hollywood Star, and the ceremony is just going to be extra special. I’m excited, I’m nervous, I’m everything! When I went on my first trip to California, I stayed actually in Hollywood and that was the first thing I did when I went out of the hotel room was to go walk around the walk and see all these wonderful stars. It’s accepting; it’s really hard to put into words how I really feel.

Follow up from Crystal after the ceremony:

(Crystal Gayle)

Receiving my star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame was truly and honor. Having Tanya Tucker and Wink Martindale speak at the ceremony was very special. I was surrounded by family, friends and past business associates at the ceremony and afterwards during a wonderful reception. It was a magical day that I will never forget.

(CSC) 3. It has been awhile since you’ve released an album of new material. Do you have plans to release one anytime soon, and if so what can listeners expect to hear from it?

(Crystal Gayle)

I’m actually working on a couple of different projects right now. The one that will come out first will be more mainstream, more of what I use to do in the past. You know I love going back and singing the old songs. There are so many great songs that have been written through the years, which I’d like to do that on a record as well. I want to do a little more of an acoustic album too; it’s really getting into place. I’ve started recording and done some different things. I just love to sing and be able to be in the studio. We’ve got great musicians here in town and my band’s great. In our studio here we have wonderful microphones, which mean a lot, and some great engineers. My son Chris, he is going to Belmont University and he’s taking the Engineering and Music Engineering there as well as Accounting and Business and all that. A real job! (Laughs) He loves it, he loves the studio and we’ve actually gotten in with him and I have introduced him to some wonderful engineers that I’ve known through the years that can actually get him good advice on the things that you need in the studio. You definitely need to have an ear. You have to have that musical ability within you to be a good engineer. You have to know when the take if it sounds right, where the instruments are off, or all the things that go with it. It’s so computerized now that you can do anything in the studio. You can make a singer sound like a singer that can sing! (Laughs) I mean it’s incredible what you can do in there! 

(CSC) 4. Last year (May 2008) you traveled all the way to South Korea to perform at the “Flower Power Peace Festival” with some of the greatest names in folk and pop music. What was that experience like for you, and how did you adjust to the culture there?

(Crystal Gayle)

It was really a special trip. Of course being there with Melanie, she is one of my idols, I just love her and the wonderful Judy Collins. These are people that I just respect in the business. I mean there was so many there; Don McLean, Blood Sweat & Tears, as you know, the lineup was fantastic. Just being there with them and being there in South Korea was a real treat. We got to go to the DMZ, we got to go north, right at the border. They were asking us, “Do you feel threatened, or do you feel scared?” but I didn’t because of all the wonderful people around us. I don’t live there. I don’t know but I’m sure it’s very scary all the time. I’m very thankful I live in America; it’s a great country but just the turmoil is upsetting. We’re lucky here, we don’t have what’s going on all over the world; a lot of sad things. No matter what kind of problems we have here that we’re going through with the economy, we can pull through it. We’ll get by. We just all have to come back a little and accept a way of life that was a few years back. I’ve always wondered you know because it seemed like things are growing so fast and growing so fast and you know the prices of things and everything, and it’s like wow! I don’t think it was coming, I don’t think it went with the pay people were getting. I think we weren’t all ready. I don’t think what people were getting paid went with what things were being sold for, so it has to come back in a way.

(CSC)

It must have been a long flight to Korea!!

(Crystal Gayle)

Yes it was a long flight to Korea. Of course the airlines were so good. It was a long flight going there but they were just so special to us. They took very good care of us. We didn’t have a whole lot of walk time but we did, we got to do a little sight seeing and the crowds were exceptional. What song do you think would have been my biggest over there?

(CSC)

Well my first guess would be “Don’t it Make My Brown Eyes Blue.”

(Crystal Gayle)

“When I Dream” and when I sang that song, they were using some type of lights. I don’t know if it was their phones or if they had flashlights but there were lights every where! I was like wow;   I just didn’t realize that how incredible this song was over there. We actually performed two nights while we were there. We were only going to do one originally because that’s what we had been asked to do but I think a couple people didn’t make it through customs or whatever it is, or they may have had passport problems so they asked us to perform on the last night so we did. You’re there to help people as well; when you do concerts you want to make everything right. You’re not there to make problems. I’ve always been amazed that when we’ll play different theaters and someone’s been in there and they’ll say, “We’ve have such a hard time” and you think, “They’re there to make music and have fun, why give everybody a hard time before you hit the stage?” I mean they give them a hard time over the color of a towel or the food wasn’t quite right.  

(CSC) 5.  You've been gracing the stage of the Grand Ole Opry quite frequently in the past few months. What would it mean to you to become a member of that legendary cast?

(Crystal Gayle)

You know it’s a time now, I don’t know if as far as being an Opry member, you know I grew up in a time that you had to be there so many Saturdays a year. That’s not easy to do when you are working and that’s really the prime time when concerts are. So it was not a thing that not that many people could give their time up to as a Saturday deal of how many they wanted you there. I would perform; I never thought about asking to be on you know, it was just one of those things that of course I’d hear my sister complain about this and that and I’d say okay! (Laughs) Maybe I shouldn’t; but I suppose that is in everything I’m sure!!

(CSC) 6. The Grand Ole Opry is obviously a huge part of your big sister Loretta Lynn’s heart and soul, what can you recall from witnessing her many performances on that iconic stage?

(Crystal Gayle)

Looking back that was just a highlight; I was running around the backstage at the Opry with other kids. I would come into town with maybe her daughter Sissy, and we ran around a lot together. We’d just go backstage and talk to all the artists that were getting ready to come on. It was just memories of being a part of everything. I mean Jim Reeves; I remember Roy Rogers and Dale Evans, they were there performing once. It’s just that you look back at all these neat things from being a part of that and of course being backstage too. You’re part of Loretta there and that’s a different feel I’m sure than if you’re just coming through the door and sitting in the audience. My first time to perform on the Opry, Loretta was sick and she talked them into letting me perform in her spot. I remember singing “Ribbon of Darkness Over Me” in my little shiny dress my mother made me. You know the little dress that came up to here; a mini dress. (Laughs) They probably looked at me and thought, “What is wrong with her.” I was probably about fifteen or sixteen. I don’t know how she talked them into it but they let me go on.                                                                                                                                                                 

(CSC) 7. Tell me about the rare appearance that you shared with Loretta and Peggy Sue on the Crook & Chase show last year! What’s it like for the three of you ladies when you have the chance to get together and visit?

(Crystal Gayle)

We laugh a lot, and gossip; we have a lot of fun together. It’s getting time to go back down to the ranch and spend the night. We spent several nights actually last year with Loretta; Peggy and I did. It’s our pajama weekend as I call it! We just have fun. We’ll go out and collect rocks; it’s just beautiful down there. There’s a beautiful museum and the house is incredible. It’s very peaceful. We were there before it actually opened. We went down to the river where the theater is, the outdoor pavilion. The river’s on down and you can go down there. It’s not a big, big river at that part. It’s just peaceful. I use to go there as a kid when we first got it and I’d spend some time there during the summer with Ernie, Sissy and Jack Benny. Benny was already out of the house at that time.

(CSC) 8. Did you ever experience any odd events at the house yourself being that it was told to be haunted by spirits?

(Crystal Gayle)

When I look back, you know I bet we did we just didn’t know or didn’t think about them. I think we were just having too much of a good time. Jack Benny would get the horse whip and make us mind. (Laughs) Ernie and I fought, and I don’t mean a little fight; we really did. I learned to fight just with him because you had to. You had to get through that family. Those kids were rough and tough living out there in the country. I had to hold my own. (Laughs) It was fun, we went everywhere. I’m sure there were some strange things though. I just don’t remember any because growing up my mother was very psychic. She would read tea leaves or coffee grounds. She never wanted to do it for us. One time I got her to look at it once for me and she said “I see many suitcases.” I’ve bought many suitcases! (Laughs) She wouldn’t. She didn’t want to see, she didn’t want to know anything about us. I think she just wanted to see something that, (During the interview an Indian Drum in Crystal’s glass case fell down) I think that’s mom right there! (Laughs) That was the Indian drum. She was a very smart woman even though I always look back and think if she had the chance to have a college education, she could have been a lawyer or a doctor; she went to the eighth grade I believe.

Actually she made the trip from Kentucky when the mines closed because Dad couldn’t find work. She took the trip, found work, found a place to stay, got it going and then sent for us. She also took a mail order class of nursing. She went into nursing at a nursing home and then a home for children. We call her the healer. I mean she would heal things that doctor’s couldn’t. She was healing the bed sores. You know with all this fancy medicine that they had, I’m sure somebody made some money off of her because they had her show them what to do. She had doctors come there and people would come to the home for children but they were her children; all of them. It takes a special person to be a nurse and be able to do that. She definitely was a healer.

In the movie “Coal Mine’s Daughter” I don’t know why they had, I mean I’m not saying anything wrong with the acting because I thought she acted fine other than they had her more docile. I mean because my mother the redder the lipstick, the better! I mean she was outgoing; she would not have stood in the corner. She would have been right out there. The way they had her portrayed, no that was not mom. She’d tell you what she thought. She was not mean, I don’t mean that. She was just fun like I said, the redder the lipstick, the better.

When I was getting ready for all the little Opry’s and things as I was growing up, pretty much everywhere I could sing, I’d be trying to dress up and finally I’d have to give in and wear the red dress! (Laughs) I’d put the red lipstick on because I’d be trying to be more subdued. I think though as I look back, I was very shy as a child and I think that was her way of trying to pull me out of that shell that I put myself in. It was after dad died, so I was eight years old; I think that was part of it.                 

(CSC) 9. Your sister Peggy Sue has been a big part of your life personally and professionally… what sort of trouble do the two of you find yourselves in and where does she get her classic sense of humor from; your mother or your father?

(Crystal Gayle)

Both; Peggy is more the comedian even more than Loretta. Loretta can talk a lot. I’m the quiet one in the group because they got all the words. (Laughs) Peggy is just great; she can be up all the time. I’m sure there are times that she has the hidden pain but she never shows it. I don’t see her angry and I ‘m sure she has that too but she is always up. She wants people to be up with her too. She pulls me out of my bad days, you know I’ll get going and she’ll start saying stuff. It brings me out of where I’m going. You know she’s not had it easy in different ways. She lost her daughter a few years back and she’s had a lot of things to go through, that she’s a special person. I look and I wish that her recording career had been able to take off. It’s just hit and miss. I feel very lucky to have had the success I’ve had. I mean there’s so many singer/songwriters, so many people pounding the pavement right now and better than anyone that’s on radio that you’ll never hear; they’re there. You know I’m listening to songs now for my project and I’m saying, “That’s a great singer” and a talent that’s always been through the years that I always say, “I wonder why they’re not recording this particular song and putting out as a single.” It’s not an easy career. That’s why I look back at being very lucky to have very special people behind me.  

(CSC) 10. Music has been an influential part of your family. Your nieces The Lynn’s were signed to your former label; Warner Brothers several years after you had been signed. What was that like being able to see them pursue their dreams in the business?

(Crystal Gayle)

Well I think it’s great and they’re wonderful singers, wonderful girls. They have evolved into really good songwriters and great people. They both do their own thing. Patsy as you probably know handles Loretta, in essence of not managing but managing and doing things that a manager would and taking care of a lot of things for her mother business wise. Peggy does her own gardening; organic gardening. That would be a nice thing to interview her about. She does all different things and she sells them. I think Martha Stewart had a show with her on it. I wanted to see it, but I missed it. I’m not real good at finding the times when everything comes on.

(CSC) 11. I hear that the same man that stole your tour bus has struck again?!?

(Crystal Gayle)

Yes! I had the news on the other night and Peggy calls me up and she said, “You have to watch the ten o’clock news on channel 5.” I watched it and Christopher Gay was on it, he’s the guy who stole my bus. They were transporting him to Tennessee to stand trial here. They stopped at a place to eat; he went to the bathroom and escaped. Same thing he did, how he got out, when he took the Walmart truck and got on my bus. (Laughs) I’m waiting for him to show up on my steps! That’s funny; I mean he is so good.  He’s so good at all these things. This is not the second time. This is probably the fourth time that he’s escaped. It was not the first time when he got on my bus. It’s like if he could channel all that that he can do, you don’t know what he could do in this life. I’m going to hate that he did this because now it’s going to add more to his years of imprisonment and how long they’ll keep him. Now it’s going to be more when they eventually find him. I feel sorry for him, you know? He’s married and he has kids. The last time he wanted to se his mother and she did die before he got to see her.

(CSC) 12. At this point and time in your career, what are you enjoying most about your success as a legendary artist?

(Crystal Gayle)

What I can enjoy is just that if I want to sit back I can. You know I look at a lot of the new artists coming and I know everything that is going on in their mind and thinking about all those things, because I was there at the time and I know all of what they’re going through mentally. I like being able to relax if I want to, do certain things and then fine if I don’t. I love being able to perform and I love that I still am able to go out there and do concerts; I’ve made so many good friends out on the road.

(CSC) 13. What are THREE things you can’t live without when you’re travelling on the road?

(Crystal Gayle)

Make-up! You’ve got to have your make-up! (Laughs) Well you know that’s a hard question because if you mean in touring that would be where the make-up would come in and of course you have to have your costumes. Looking back at travelling, there are certain things that I’ll take with me; it might be a piece of my quartz crystals that I carry with me that I want with me. I will trade those out. I love rocks, I love the quartz, I love the amethyst stones and I don’t mean jewelry wise I mean just the rocks. I know I have some around here somewhere. I have the crystal up front; I mean I have the big clusters. You go to some of these rock shops and they have gorgeous things. I love all that. I like to take them with me. I like reading and taking books with me on the road. I like doing Sudoku puzzles, those are fun. You can do those on the airplane and Peggy does those too; we have fun with that.

I really like having family on the road and that’s where Peggy comes in and my husband Bill will travel too, but not all the time. It’s just nice to have very special people that travel with you. All our guys are wonderful. Darrell, he’s an exceptional guy, a good guy; he takes care of things. He’s not just someone that will say, “I’m only going to do this because this is what I’m supposed to do.” I love it that he’ll do anything in the sense because that’s what he wants to do. If it means picking up something because it needed to be done and somebody couldn’t do it at that moment, he’s going to go do it. I think that’s a great trait in him. That‘s what I like, if the floor needs mopping I’ll mop it, you know I have no problem with that! (Laughs) I don’t feel like any of us should be on the high and mighty list that we can’t treat people or do things where we’re putting ourselves in something that we can’t do because we feel like we’re better; that’s crazy.     

(CSC) 14. After all these years of constant touring and performing, what is it that motivates you?!?

(Crystal Gayle)  

My grandson Elijah reminds me that I need to get back into exercising more, so I can run with him! (Laughs) He’s incredible! I think what motivates me is I enjoy what I do. I love singing. I love being able to take in a little bit of what I’ve been blessed with. I love doing charity work and doing the things I can help with; whatever I can do at this point in my career or in my life. There is going to be a time when I won’t want to hit the road anymore; I’ll just stay home. Maybe that’s the time I’ll cut my hair. I’ve always had that thing of where my kids will say, “I won’t be Crystal Gayle!” When I wash it, it goes everywhere. It’s a lot of work but I’m use to it in the sense of through the years, it’s like I tell myself “Okay now is it time to be able to style it?”

(CSC)

Like you want to break free?

(Crystal Gayle)

Break free! That’s good, I like that! That’s what I should do, cut some of my hair, do an album and call it “Breaking Free.” I could change my name, cut my hair, do a whole different style and see what would happen. (Laughs) I do realize the music industry has changed in the sense that I’ve got over eighteen number ones. I’ve got all these songs that radio can go back and play and it’s hard for them to want to have new material. As you see, I mean Dolly can have albums but they’re not going to play the singles, not really because they have all these songs from all of us but you still enjoy recording and people do want your music. It could still go beyond radio; there is just so much out there. You can play music on your site; I mean people can turn that on. It’s everything, it’s like television. It’s like wow, where do you begin? You turn it on and I know I miss a lot of things because I only know certain places to go when I want to watch something. I’m sure there are a lot of things I miss because there are so many channels out there!   

For more on Crystal, please visit her official website here: http://www.CrystalGayle.com

After our interview with Crystal at her office in Nashville, TN: