{"id":106065,"date":"2025-09-01T02:58:09","date_gmt":"2025-09-01T02:58:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/106065\/"},"modified":"2025-09-01T02:58:09","modified_gmt":"2025-09-01T02:58:09","slug":"on-this-day-in-1977-crystal-gayle-took-no-1-on-the-country-charts-with-her-biggest-pop-crossover-hit","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/106065\/","title":{"rendered":"On This Day in 1977, Crystal Gayle Took No. 1 on the Country Charts With Her Biggest Pop Crossover Hit"},"content":{"rendered":"

Loretta Lynn wasn\u2019t the only musical one in her family. The \u201cCoal Miner\u2019s Daughter\u201d trailblazer was the second of eight children born to Clara and Ted Webb in Butcher Hollow, Kentucky. Of those eight siblings, five pursued careers<\/a> in the music industry. In 1970, Lynn helped her youngest sister, Crystal Gayle, ink a contract with Decca Records. Struggling to break out of her elder sibling\u2019s shadow, Gayle pivoted to a more country-pop sound. And on Aug. 31, 1977, she scored the biggest hit of her career with \u201cDon\u2019t It Make My Brown Eyes Blue.\u201d<\/p>\n

When Crystal Gayle first signed with Decca Records, the label seemed interested<\/a> only in giving her \u201clittle Loretta\u201d songs. \u201cIt didn\u2019t take me long to realize I was only there because I was Loretta\u2019s sister,\u201d Gayle, now 74, said in a 2019 interview <\/a>with Forbes.<\/p>\n

Eventually, Lynn offered up some career-altering advice, \u201cwhich was quit singing her songs and don\u2019t record anything she would,\u201d Gayle said<\/a>.\u00a0\u201cWe have one Loretta Lynn and we don\u2019t need another.\u201d<\/p>\n

Taking the 14-time ACM Award winner\u2019s advice to heart, Gayle left Decca for United Artists Records in 1974. She nabbed her first Top 10 hit the next year with \u201cWrong Road Again.\u201d And in 1977, she released the crossover hit that would come to define her career.<\/p>\n

[RELATED: Keith Urban Serenades Crystal Gayle With a Masterful Cover of Her 1977 Classic Hit During \u2018Opry 100\u2019]<\/a><\/p>\n

This Crystal Gayle Crossover Hit Was Meant for Shirley Bassey<\/p>\n

Richard Leigh, the songwriter responsible for Crystal Gayle\u2019s three Top 10 hits, penned a song called \u201cDon\u2019t It Make My Brown Eyes Blue.\u201d He sang it for Allen Reynolds, Gayle\u2019s producer. Then, he mentioned that his publisher was preparing to send it to Welsh soul singer Shirley Bassey.<\/p>\n

\u201cShirley Bassey my ass,\u201d Reynolds replied. \u201cI want that song.\u201d<\/p>\n

Reynolds played the tune for Gayle. \u201cI said, \u2018Whoa!\u2019 And I just fell in love with the song,\u201d recalled the Grand Ole Opry member in 2017<\/a>.<\/p>\n

In October 1976, she recorded it at Jack\u2019s Tracks recording studio in Nashville. \u201cIt was just one of those charmed sessions,\u201d Reynolds recalled.<\/p>\n

Crystal Gayle released \u201cDon\u2019t It Make My Brown Eyes Blue\u201d as the lead single off her fourth studio album, We Must Believe in Magic. It spent three weeks at No. 2 on the Billboard Hot 100, and won the singer a Grammy Award for Best Female Country Vocal Performance.<\/p>\n

Featured image by Malcolm Clarke\/Keystone\/Getty Images<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Loretta Lynn wasn\u2019t the only musical one in her family. The \u201cCoal Miner\u2019s Daughter\u201d trailblazer was the second…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":106066,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[6491,2819,51570,96,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-106065","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-celebrities","tag-celebrities","tag-country-music","tag-crystal-gayle","tag-entertainment","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/106065","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=106065"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/106065\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/106066"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=106065"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=106065"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=106065"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}