Miranda Lambert
main stage
friday 10:30
MirandaLambert.com
It wasn’t until the age of 16 that she picked up a guitar,
asking her dad, who played, to teach her the basics. Her
beginnings were humble – home was Lindale, a small town
in East Texas. Dad Rick was a police officer-turned-private
investigator, assisted by Mom Bev in his work. Theirs was
– and still is – a tight-knit family of four, rounded out by
Miranda’s brother, Luke.
By 2003, Miranda found herself in Nashville, part of the
inaugural cast of a reality and talent show called Nashville Star.
The charisma she displayed in reaching third place earned her
a record deal. Miranda’s debut album, Kerosene, opened at
#1 on the country charts.
“Fans are the ones that keep me going. When I see them
singing along…and someone comes up to me and explains
how a specific song helped them through a time in their life,
it’s like, ‘Okay – this is what it’s about.’”
Miranda’s debut earned her a Horizon Award nomination at
the 2005 CMA Awards…and that nomination gave her those
two-minutes-and-thirty-seconds that catapulted her into the
spotlight.
“It just took a while for people to understand who I was
and for radio to embrace somebody a little left of center, I
guess.”
All of the elements that had ignited around her as a result
of that two-minute-thirty-second performance of “Kerosene”
seemed to coalesce into a sort of barely-contained blaze on
songs like the title track, “Gunpowder & Lead” and “Getting
Ready.” But here, too, was pure story-telling and displays of
vulnerability.
“Whether it hurts or whether it’s angry or whether it’s
happy or sad – I just try to tell the truth about where I’m at
as a person. I’m a normal, everyday, average country girl. I
just happen to have a job that lets me make people feel like
they’re not alone in that emotion.”
Revolution (2009) found Miranda truly taking control of the
creative spirit that burns within her. Here was joy, pain, humor,
anger and truth taken from her own life story. Here, too, was
the song that would spend a solid month at the top of the
charts, a song she didn’t write but performed in a voice that
convinced everyone she’d lived it. It also earned Miranda her
very first Grammy Award.
“Up until ‘The House That Built Me,’ I sort of had this image
of ‘I’m guns ablazin’…lightin’ fires…a badass.’ So when I did
‘The House That Built Me,’…people sort of went, ‘Well, okay –
there’s more to her than just all of that.’”
“Seven-time ACM and six-time CMA Female Vocalist” – that
is Miranda Lambert’s title. Miranda – in the record books –
reigns supreme in her own right, having earned the honor
more times than any of the female legends at the CMA Awards
and matching McEntire’s long-standing tally.
Platinum (2014) racked up Album of the Year honors at
the CMA and ACM Awards and earned Miranda her second
Grammy.
“The funniest part about it is that I feel like I’m just getting
started. And I don’t feel like I’ve even scratched the surface of
everything I want to say and do and be. I’m still hungry for it,
and I love it so much. There’s nothing else in life that I want
to do.”
“My biggest goal is to just become a better songwriter. I’m
in this headspace of letting life happen and letting the music
come. And that’s a little scary. But I’m ready to just take the
leap and let whatever life has to offer find me – as a person,
as an artist and as a songwriter.”
Much has been made of Miranda’s ties to “fire” ever since
that two-minute-thirty-second show-stopping CMA Awards
performance of “Kerosene” in 2005. Licks of flame have crept
into reviews and recaps of her music and her performances
ever since. She’s “fiery”…a “spitfire”…a “firebrand”…“ignites”
a crowd – we’ve heard them all, and she’s earned each
one. The intensity may rise or fall, the light may brighten or
soften…but that spark is always there. “I feel that way. But it
doesn’t have to burn on 11 all the time, you know?”
“The hunger to learn and grow is the same as it always has
been…if not more. I’m still the same exact person…I keep
my feet on the ground like I always did.”
Think about it – honesty pervades everything she’s
written, everything she sings, everything she does. It fuels
her stories, her music, her performances. There is nothing
contrived, nothing manufactured, nothing artificial about her.
For Miranda Lambert, there is no doubt that has been – and
always will be – the case.
Hit Songs
• “Tin Man”
• “The House That Built
Me”
• “Over You”
• “Gunpowder & Lead”
• “Famous in a Small
Town”
• “Baggage Claim”
• “Little Red Wagon”
• “White Liar”
• “Kerosene”
• “More Like Her”
WinstockFestival.com | 25 Years of Country Music
25