Pieces of the Sky

Pieces of the Sky
Studio album by Emmylou Harris
Released February 1975
Studio Enactron Truck, Los Angeles, California; Track Recorders, Silver Spring, Maryland
Genre Country
Length 38:40 (1975 release)
43:17 (2004 reissue)
Label Reprise
Producer Brian Ahern
Emmylou Harris chronology
Gliding Bird
(1969)Gliding Bird1969		 Pieces of the Sky
(1975)		 Elite Hotel
(1975)Elite Hotel1975
Professional ratings
Review scores
SourceRating
Allmusic [1]
The Guardian[2]
Robert ChristgauC+[3]

Pieces of the Sky is the second studio album by American country music artist Emmylou Harris, released in February 1975 through Reprise.

Although she had released the obscure folk-styled Gliding Bird five years earlier, Pieces of the Sky became the album that launched Harris' career and is widely considered to be her début. In those intervening years she had forged a musical relationship with Gram Parsons that would alter the musical direction that her career would take. The album includes Harris' first high-charting Billboard country hit, the #4 "If I Could Only Win Your Love", and the relatively low-charting #73 "Too Far Gone" (originally a 1967 hit for Tammy Wynette). The overall song selection was varied and showed early on how eclectic Harris' musical tastes were. In addition to her own "Boulder to Birmingham" (written for former singing partner Parsons, who had died the previous year), she included the Merle Haggard classic "The Bottle Let Me Down", the Beatles' "For No One", and Dolly Parton's "Coat of Many Colors". (Parton, in turn, covered "Boulder to Birmingham" on her 1976 album All I Can Do.) On Shel Silverstein's "Queen Of The Silver Dollar", her friend and occasional collaborator Linda Ronstadt sings harmony.

The album rose as far as the #7 spot in the Billboard country albums chart.

The album was included in Robert Dimery's 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die.

Track listing

No.TitleWriter(s)Length
1."Bluebird Wine"Rodney Crowell3:18
2."Too Far Gone"Billy Sherrill4:05
3."If I Could Only Win Your Love"Charlie Louvin, Ira Louvin2:36
4."Boulder to Birmingham"Emmylou Harris, Bill Danoff3:33
5."Before Believing"Danny Flowers4:44
6."The Bottle Let Me Down"Merle Haggard3:16
7."Sleepless Nights"Felice and Boudleaux Bryant3:25
8."Coat of Many Colors"Dolly Parton3:42
9."For No One"John Lennon, Paul McCartney3:40
10."Queen of the Silver Dollar"Shel Silverstein5:14

Bonus tracks

A 2004 CD reissue added two previously unissued bonus tracks:

  1. "Hank and Lefty" (Dallas Frazier, Doodle Owens) – 2:50
  2. "California Cottonfields" (Dallas Frazier, Earl Montgomery) – 2:47

Personnel

Technical personnel

References

  1. ↑ Ankeny, Jason. Pieces of the Sky at AllMusic
  2. ↑ Sweeting, Adam (9 April 2004). "Emmylou Harris, Pieces of the Sky". The Guardian. Retrieved 24 January 2016.
  3. ↑ Christgau, Adam. "Pieces of the Sky [Reprise, 1974]". Robert Christgau. Retrieved 24 January 2016.
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