50th Anniversary of Merle Haggard’s “Okie From Muskogee” to be Recognized
On October 10th, 1969, Merle Haggard and his famous backing band The Strangers rolled into Muskogee, Oklahoma to play the Muskogee Civic Center for a packed house. Just two weeks previous, on September 25th, Haggard had officially released the song “Okie From Muskogee” as a single. Little did anyone know at the time what a massive hit the song would become, and how it would grow into Merle’s signature tune.
The show at the Muskogee Civic Center was supposed to be one of five shows Merle Haggard was going to record as part of a live album tentatively planned to be called Six Nights on the Road. But technical difficulties resulted in just the Muskogee stop making it on tape. As the song “Okie From Muskogee” shot up the charts, the 20 tracks of the live album album Okie From Muskogee were rushed to press to take advantage of the surge in interest, and the album was in stores by December. Okie From Muskogee would go on to become the #1 album in country, and win both the ACM and CMA Album of the Year.
“We didn’t even have speakers to know if we were going onto the tape,” Haggard recalled in a later interview for a re-release of Okie From Muskogee years later. “Fuzzy [Owens] told me that night in Muskogee, he said ‘If you’ve got this on tape, I’m not sure whether we did or not, Hag, but if you did, it’s a million seller.’”
To commemorate that historic night on October 10th, the Greater Muskogee Area Chamber of Commerce and Tourism is throwing a 50th Anniversary celebration at the Muskogee Civic Center where the album was first recorded. Headlining the event will be Merle’s sons Ben and Noel Haggard, and the surviving members of The Strangers. Tickets will only be $3.00, $3.50, and $4.00 respectively, just like they were in 1969 (with some VIP packages too). Oklahoma-based country band Ricochet has also been announced for the event, with further talent and details for the commemoration coming.
“This album is known as one of the greatest albums of all time featuring one of the greatest songs of all time,” says current Tourism Director for Muskogee, Justin O’Neal. “There have been many times we meet tourists from overseas who don’t speak much English, but they can say ‘Okie From Muskogee’ which lets us know just how wide the impact of this goes. What we are looking to accomplish with this event is to celebrate a legacy and continue to draw on the attention the song has provided to our town.”
Tickets go on sale August 8th at 10 a.m. Muskogee time at www.visitmuskogee.com .
July 13, 2019 @ 11:09 am
Merle’s is THE. BEST. EVER. Miss him.
July 13, 2019 @ 11:37 am
“O From M” was certainly a big hit, but it quickly became a spoof of itself. The Grateful Dead would sing it. When I would go to see Merle, in concert, would stand and mug with some long-haired member of his band when he sang “We don’t let our hair grow long and shaggy/ Like the hippies out in San Francisco do.” Now, I saw Hag in the ’90s a couple of times in NYC. Maybe he played it straighter in the South or in the Plains.
I don’t know what’s going on in Muskogee nowadays, but I suspect that most people who are doing things there now have moved beyond that song and view it as a relic.
July 13, 2019 @ 12:14 pm
When I saw him with Kristofferson in LA back in 2011, they did a duet of it and used a verse from Kris’ satirical version he would sing live back in the 70’s.
July 15, 2019 @ 12:34 pm
We don’t smoke our draft cards in Muskogee
All we ever drops are BVD’s
We don’t known no hippies, queers or commies
‘Cause we like livin’ right and bein’ free
And I’m proud to be an okie from Muskogee
A place where even squares can have a ball
We still wave old glory down at the courthouse
And white lightnin’s still the biggest thrill of all
We do lots of lovin’ in Muskogee
We ain’t never heard of pitchin’ woo
We don’t shoot that deadly marijuana
We get drunk like God wants us to do
And I’m proud to be an okie from Muskogee
A place where even squares can have a ball
We still wave old glory down at the courthouse
And white ligthnin’s still the biggest thrill of all
July 13, 2019 @ 2:41 pm
The thing is, I have always heard it was never supposed to be endorsing the perspective of the song. It was always meant to be flippant towards it, but people with that similar values as the song adopted it as straight laced.
From a Telegraph.co.uk site article: Merle Haggard: ‘Sometimes I wish I hadn’t written Okie from Muskogee’
Haggard tells a reporter that Okie from Muskogee started out as a joke, saying: “We wrote it to be satirical originally. But then people latched on to it, and it really turned into this song that looked into the mindset of people so opposite of who and where we were.”
July 13, 2019 @ 6:50 pm
On this live album, Merle can be heard downplaying the integrity or at least having a little fun at the expense of the lyrics. Okie from Muskogee described a place, not Merle’s feelings.
This event sounds neat and for a minute I thought road trip, but I’d rather give the money to the living.
July 13, 2019 @ 6:09 pm
No matter what it was written to be it was always fun when Merle sang it in concert.
There will never be another like Merle.
July 13, 2019 @ 7:55 pm
Whether “Okie From Muskogee” was serious or satirical sort of became a moot question when Merle offered his follow-up: “Fightin’ Side of Me.” It was pretty hard to dismiss the message in that one as not serious or as just a spoof.
July 14, 2019 @ 11:42 am
My sense it was what’s known as a novelty song, closer to satire. And as several posters have pointed out was the song was appropriated and embraced by everybody from Willie Nelson to Jerry Garcia. Even more ironic, years later Haggard said that during those Muskogee days he and the band were toking up on the bus. Muskogee did so well that his label practically forced on him “The Fightin Side of Me,” which he was apparently not too fond of, but they do not call it the music business for nothing. Dan
July 14, 2019 @ 4:05 pm
I predict SJW’s hear the song try to get the celebration boycotted
July 15, 2019 @ 10:42 am
Have any of you ever seen or heard his son Scott Haggard ? He looks and sounds more like Merle than any of them. Although all of Merle’s children have one trait or another of their dad.
July 17, 2019 @ 12:35 pm
Love to go. Seen Ben and Noel in Cherokee casino Siloam Springs been quite awhile but they sound like their daddy sure do miss this music