Stories and Songs, An Evening with Radney Foster & Kelly Willis

Radney Foster

Texas singer/songwriter Radney Foster first gained attention as half of the duo Foster & Lloyd (who, with “Crazy Over You” became the first duo in history to top the Country charts with their debut single), and established himself as a solo artist in the early 90’s with his critically acclaimed release Del Rio, Texas 1959.

Foster has written eight number one hit singles, including his own “Nobody Wins,” and “Crazy Over You” with duo Foster & Lloyd. His discography contains countless cuts by artists ranging anywhere from country (Keith Urban, The Chicks, Brooks and Dunn, Nitty Gritty Dirt Band) to contemporary (Marc Broussard, Hootie & The Blowfish, Kenny Loggins, Los Lonely Boys, George Benson) and his songs have sold 50 million copies worldwide. He was recently inducted into the Texas Heritage Songwriter’s Hall of Fame.

Kelly Willis

On some other plane out there in the great big multiverse, Kelly Willis could well be the biggest Nashville country music star of the last 35 years. But things panned out rather differently for her here on this Earth. The Oklahoma-born Army brat was barely into her early 20s and still cutting her teeth fronting a spunky rockabilly band in Austin when a “check-this-kid-out” tip from Texas

songwriter Nanci Griffith landed her on the radar of producer Tony Brown, who promptly signed her to MCA Records. How exactly her auspicious fireball of a debut, 1990’s Well Travelled Love, and even a plumb spot on the soundtrack to the following year’s Thelma & Louise, somehow failed to burn Willis’ name and voice into the mainstream consciousness remains a bone of bumfuzzlement for many a fan and critic to this day, but suffice it to say — Willis was still in her early 20s when MCA dropped her just two albums later.