Shirley Collie Nelson
Shirley Collie Nelson
Before she became the wife of country singer Willie Nelson, Shirley Collie Nelson hoped to be an actress. She started out on the ABC television show Ozark Jubilee in the 1950s, but soon transitioned into a career in radio.
She charted three singles, including a duet with Willie Nelson. Their song, “Willingly,” was their first chart hit.
She was a country singer
Shirley Collie Nelson was a country singer who was born on March 16, 1931 in Missouri. She was known professionally within country music circles as Shirley Caddell (1955-1958) or Shirley Collie (1959-1963).
After her marriage to show promoter/hillbilly singer Biff Collie in 1958, she went on to tour with the Philip Morris Country Music Show. She was signed to Liberty Records and had a number of hits, including “Dime A Dozen,” which reached the top 40 and became a staple of West Coast country shows.
Her first marriage ended in divorce, and she later married Nelson. She wrote several songs and duets with her husband, including the number ten hit “Willingly,” which she recorded in 1962.
She toured with her husband for many years, but in 1971 she separated from him. She continued her career as a recording artist, releasing several songs and albums over the course of her career. She died in 2010 at the age of 78.
She was married to Willie Nelson
Shirley Collie Nelson was the second wife of renowned country singer Willie Nelson. They married in 1963 and divorced a decade later.
She was born on 16th March 1931 in Chillicothe, Missouri and passed away on 27th Jan 2010 at the age of 78.
In the late 1950s, she began her career as a country music singer and appeared on ABC’s Ozark Jubilee. She charted three singles, “Dime a Dozen” and “Why Baby Why” (with Warren Smith), plus the duet “Willingly” with Nelson.
Her marriage to Nelson lasted a decade and they had three children together. However, their relationship was not always happy.
They quarreled a lot and she even tied up Willie in a blanket and beat him with a broomstick, according to Sunset Blvd Records.
After their divorce, she moved to Texas and started a family. She has two daughters, Paula and Amy, as well as a son Lukas. She is also a popular country music singer and activist.
She was an actress
Before Shirley Collie Nelson partnered up with her country superstar husband Willie Nelson, she hoped to be an actress. But when she appeared on ABC’s Ozark Jubilee variety show in the 1950s, she changed her mind and focused instead on becoming a country music star.
She released three singles with Liberty Records in the early 1960s, including a duet with Nelson, “Willingly,” that took him to the Billboard country charts for the first time. It was the first of many successful hits that the duo would record together.
Nelson also wrote many songs that would become hits for other country stars of the time, such as Faron Young (“Hello Walls”) and Ray Price (“Night Life”). He had a hard drinking, brawling lifestyle in Nashville, but his songwriting and singing careers took off.
She was an activist
Nelson, a country musician, has worked as an activist for farm policy reform, marijuana legalization, LGBT equality and animal rights. In 1985 he and John Mellencamp organized the first Farm Aid concert, which raised tens of millions of dollars for family farmers.
He also helped support Dennis Kucinich’s campaign for the 2004 Democratic presidential primaries, raising money, appearing at events and composing a song (“Whatever Happened to Peace on Earth?”). In January 2008, Nelson filed a suit against the Texas Democratic Party, alleging that it violated the First and Fourteenth Amendments by refusing to allow co-plaintiff Kucinich to appear on the primary ballot because he scratched out part of his loyalty oath.
In 2007, he founded the Willie Nelson Peace Research Institute, a non-profit organization that advocates for peace and justice in the world. He is an honorary trustee of the Dayton International Peace Museum.
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