Norah Jones, Bob Dylan and Others Collaborate on ‘The Lost Notebooks of Hank Williams’ [VIDEO]
Bob Dylan, Alan Jackson, Merle Haggard, Norah Jones, Jack White and Sheryl Crow are just some of the performers who’ve recorded tracks for a new project entitled ‘The Lost Notebooks of Hank Williams.’
All were tasked with fleshing out and setting music to the words Williams wrote in old notebooks he carried with him — notebooks that sat in a vault for decades after the country legend’s death in 1953.
After producer Mary Martin, who came up with the idea for the album, approached Dylan several years ago, he enlisted others to help with the effort and released it this month on his label, Columbia Records imprint Egyptian Records.
“To say you wrote a song with Hank Williams, yeah, that’s pretty cool,” Gill said. “You wouldn’t think there’s a bunch of unfinished [Williams'] songs laying around and they’re going to be giving them [to] some folks who are kind of eccentric and talented, and have them finish them up.”
Williams’ son, Hank Jr., who performed a track with daughter Holly, seemed less enthused. “I wasn’t really contacted about it at all,” he said. “Let me tell you, if you don’t need me, go ahead, rock on, brother… Some of it’s OK, some of it’s not. It’s all right.”
But Holly feels the project will introduce a whole new generation of fans to her grandfather’s work, saying, “I feel like [the album] is just going to open a door where people say, if Jack White or Norah Jones or Lucinda love this, maybe I should check it out.”
Watch a video about the making of the album below.
[CBS News]