Legacy Recordings, the catalogue division of Sony Music Entertainment, will release the new studio album from Willie Nelson, Oh What A Beautiful World in all configurations on Friday, April 25. Released just in time for his 92nd birthday, the album will be available digitally, on CD and in two single LP vinyl formats (black vinyl widely and white vinyl exclusively through Willie’s D2C store) and may be pre-ordered HERE
Oh What A Beautiful World (his 154th album, according to Texas Monthly’s interactive All Willie Nelson Albums Ranked list and 77th solo studio album) premieres Willie’s new interpretations of 12 classic songs written or cowritten by Rodney Crowell, the latest in Nelson’s storied history of focusing entire albums on a single songwriter’s work. The two Texas singer-songwriters’ careers have often intersected, beginning with Crowell first hearing Nelson’s earliest songs on the radio and seeing his shows in Houston in the mid 1960s. Willie first recorded a Rodney Crowell song in 1983 and last did so 40 years later for 2024’s The Border.
The first single is also the album’s title track “Oh What A Beautiful World” – featuring special guest Rodney Crowell himself in a duet with Nelson – and is available now. LISTEN HERE
Originally appearing as the closing track on Crowell’s 2014 opus Tarpaper Sky, “Oh What A Beautiful World” evokes the poignancy of passing time while Rodney and Willie’s new interpretation of the song shares a fresh sense of the deep human need to appreciate the beauty in each moment life has to offer.
Twelve of Crowell’s compositions from the last 50 years were handpicked for the album. Nelson’s new performances include early tracks like 1976’s “Banks Of The Old Bandera” (recorded by Jerry Jeff Walker) and 1981’s “Shame On The Moon” (a hit for Bob Seger), 90s tracks like “What Kind Of Love,“ (co-written by Will Jennings based on a Roy Orbison melody) and “Stuff That Works” (co-written with Guy Clark), early 2000’s cuts written for hit albums by Keith Urban and Tim McGraw, four cuts from Crowell’s beloved 2010s albums and a cut released as recently as 2021.
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