Conway Twitty‘s forethought allowed him to meet Loretta Lynn for the first time at producer Owen Bradley’s recording studio in 1967. Conway was a resident of Oklahoma City at the time, but he made a habit of traveling to Nashville early for his sessions to hang out at “Bradley’s Barn,” a cutting-edge studio Owen had constructed in rural Mt. Juliet, Tennessee, after he sold his Quonset Hut facility to Columbia Records in 1962. Twitty felt that by making an early arrival, he might meet the musicians and recording artists who were concluding a session before his.
Conway once walked into the recording studio as Loretta Lynn was finishing up her session in silence. When Lynn told Bradley that she wanted to see Twitty, the producer pulled Conway up behind her without Loretta’s knowledge. Owen urged her to turn around after reminding her of the discussions concerning Conway. As Twitty put it, Lynn was so surprised that she leaped “like a cartoon character.”
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Loretta was a huge fan of Conway’s at the time, but he was unaware of this. Although she wasn’t a fan of rock and roll, she adored Twitty’s 1958 #1 rock smash “It’s Only Make Believe.” Even before she entered the music industry, Loretta hung a Conway Twitty poster at her house.
Three years later, when Loretta and Conway decided to record together, they encountered unexpected pushback. Associates were concerned that an ego conflict in the studio would ruin their growing connection because they had seen how other artists had worked together in the past.
Conway told Wilbur Cross and Michael Kosser, the writers of “The Conway Twitty Story,” “It made sense to us and Mooney (Loretta’s husband), but not to anybody else.” He said, “Everybody else fought us on it. Naturally, I was my own boss and I was unwavering. When it came to Loretta, she ultimately had to say, ‘Hey, we’re doing it, and that’s the way it is.’”
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Conway and Loretta’s intuitions won out, and on September 15, 1973, their duet album “Louisiana Woman, Mississippi Man” debuted at number one. The title track had already become their third chart-topping single, on August 18th, four weeks earlier. The song’s potential was first recognized by Lynn’s husband Mooney. One day as he was working in Loretta’s office, one of the co-writers stopped by and played the tape for him.
Jim Owen co-wrote “Louisiana Woman, Mississippi Man” with Becki Bluefield, although at the time, he was most known for his solo tribute performances to Hank Williams. Mooney liked the demo after hearing it. Allow me to have this song, he said to Jim. I’ll try to persuade Conway and Loretta to help. That proved to be of no real concern.
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