Willie Nelson Born: Outlaw Country's Red-Headed Rebel

Born in Abbott, Texas, on April 29, 1933, Willie Nelson broke free from Nashville's polished production to pioneer the outlaw country movement with raw, jazz-inflected vocals and his battered nylon-string classical guitar, Trigger. He moved to Nashville in the 1960s and wrote songs that other artists turned into hits: "Crazy" for Patsy Cline, "Hello Walls" for Faron Young, "Funny How Time Slips Away" for Billy Walker. His own recordings, produced in Nashville's slick studio style, failed to capture the conversational intimacy of his voice. He returned to Texas in 1972, grew his hair long, and reinvented himself as the leader of the outlaw country movement alongside Waylon Jennings, Kris Kristofferson, and Johnny Cash. Red Headed Stranger in 1975, a spare concept album recorded for less than $20,000, proved that country music could thrive outside the studio system. The album sold over two million copies and established Nelson as an artist who operated on his own terms. Stardust in 1978, an album of pop standards that Nashville predicted would fail, sold over five million copies. His Farm Aid concerts, co-organized with Neil Young and John Mellencamp beginning in 1985, raised over sixty million dollars for struggling American farmers and drew attention to the agricultural crisis that was destroying rural communities across the Midwest. Nelson's personal life included three divorces, a decades-long relationship with marijuana that he championed with unapologetic enthusiasm, and a $16.7 million tax debt that the IRS settled by seizing his assets and releasing a tongue-in-cheek album called The IRS Tapes: Who'll Buy My Memories? He continued touring and recording into his nineties.