Yesterday (October 4), country music icon Loretta Lynn died at 90 years old. Since then, she has been remembered by the many artists she worked with or otherwise touched during her 60-year career, including Jack White.
White produced Lynn’s 2004 album Van Lear Rose and it was a big success, being nominated for five Grammys (and winning two of them) and being widely considered one of the year’s best releases. Now, White has taken a moment to honor his former collaborator.
In a video shared on Instagram yesterday, White started, “What a sad day today is: We lost one of the greats, Loretta Lynn. I said when I was first asked about her what I thought, and I said years ago that I thought she was the greatest female singer-songwriter of the 20th century. I still believe that.”
He also said of collaborating with Lynn, “I learned so much from her working together on this album, Van Lear Rose, together, and there was times where I just had to sort of take a pause and step outside because she was just so brilliant; I couldn’t believe what I was witnessing and hearing. I almost felt like she didn’t even realize it.”
White concluded, “She was like a mother figure to me and also a very good friend at times and told me some amazing things that I’ll never tell anybody. Rest in peace, Loretta. God bless you.”
Watch the video above and read White’s full statement below.
“What a sad day today is: We lost one of the greats, Loretta Lynn. I said when I was first asked about her what I thought, and I said years ago that I thought she was the greatest female singer-songwriter of the 20th century. I still believe that.
Loretta used to say to make it in the business, you had to either be great, different, or first, and she thought that she was just different and that’s how she made it, but I think she was all three of those things, and there’s plenty of evidence to back that up, too.
She was such an incredible presence and such a brilliant genius in ways that I think only people who got to work with her might know about. What she did for feminism, women’s rights in a time period and in a genre of music that was the hardest to do it in, is just outstanding and will live on for a long time. She broke down a lot of barriers for people that came after her.
I learned so much from her working together on this album, Van Lear Rose, together, and there was times where I just had to sort of take a pause and step outside because she was just so brilliant; I couldn’t believe what I was witnessing and hearing. I almost felt like she didn’t even realize it, you know. But she was just a genius and just brilliant at what she did and we were lucky to have her, and people can learn from her example, the rags to riches part of it and the beautiful natural voice part of it. She was like a mother figure to me and also a very good friend at times and told me some amazing things that I’ll never tell anybody. Rest in peace, Loretta. God bless you.”