![\"M-32-Crying\"](\"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/06\/M-32-Crying.jpg\")
<\/h1>\n<\/h1>\nRoy Orbison\u2019s ultimate aria of love and loss had its roots in a real-life episode.\u00a0\u201cI was dating this girl and we broke up,\u201d the singer recalled. \u201cTwo or three years later, I went to the barber shop to get a haircut and looked across the street, and there was the girl I had split up with. I wanted to go over and say, \u2018Let\u2019s forget about what happened and carry on.\u2019 But I was very stubborn. So I got in the car and drove down the street and said, \u2018Boy, you really made a mistake. You didn\u2019t play that right at all.\u2019 I would say that I had tears in my eyes\u2014I\u2019ll go that far\u2014but whether I was physically crying or just crying inside, it\u2019s the same thing.\u201d<\/p>\n
As with many of his early hits, Orbison refined the tune with his friend and collaborator Joe Melson. The pair had originally intended it for another singer. \u201cIt was a song that we were working on for Don Gibson,\u201d said Melson. \u201cThen we decided halfway through maybe it was better for Roy.\u201d<\/p>\n
Producer Fred Foster recalled when Orbison brought him the finished version. \u201cI think we changed every one of Roy\u2019s songs a little bit\u2014except \u2018Crying.\u2019 I thought it was a classic the first time I heard it, maybe as perfect a piece of writing as I\u2019d ever heard.\u201d<\/p>\n
But it was a classic not easily captured on tape. Two initial recording sessions yielded nothing. Orbison\u2019s publisher Wesley Rose told Foster \u201cto give it up, that perhaps the song just didn\u2019t have what it takes to be a single.\u201d<\/p>\n
For the third session, a determined Foster hired three different arrangers. He recalls, \u201cI went to the men\u2019s room at the studio and pulled a couple straws out of a broom that was in there and broke them into different lengths, and the three arrangers\u2014who knew what the deal was\u2014each drew a straw. Jim Hall drew the short straw. When the intro of his arrangement kicked off, I thought, \u2018Good Lord, this may be the one.\u2019 He had these mallets on the snare and a Stromberg guitar (renowned for its warm tone). So when we cut it, I said to the other two arrangers, \u2018You\u2019ll be paid, but there\u2019s no sense cutting this again.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
As for the big, operatic held note at the end of the song, Foster reveals that Orbison had a trick he often used in the studio. \u201cRoy always had his Coke with him out there at the mic. He would take a swig before he sang.\u201d<\/p>\n
The rock bolero feel of \u201cCrying\u201d and Orbison\u2019s magnificent vocal lifted the song to No. 2 on the Billboard charts (it was kept out of the top spot by Bobby Lewis\u2019 \u201cTossin\u2019 and Turnin\u2019\u201d). The song went on to be covered by many artists, including Waylon Jennings, Del Shannon, Dottie West, B.J. Thomas and Don McLean. In 1987, Orbison recut it as a duet with k.d. lang (it went Top 20 in the U.K.). In 2002, the song was honored with a Grammy Hall of Fame Award, and in 2004, Rolling Stone<\/i> ranked it as No. 69 on their list of the 500 Greatest Songs of All Time.<\/p>\n
Towards the end of his life, Roy Orbison\u2014who died in 1988\u2014said, \u201cI always had a dream of making music I personally wanted to express. \u2018Crying\u2019 was written when the whole age was macho. Not only did guys not talk about it, but you weren\u2019t even meant to cry. But the record sold in the millions, so I must have touched them somehow.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u2013Bill DeMain<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
\u201cCrying\u201d \u00a0 ROY ORBISON\u00a0 Roy Orbison\u2019s ultimate aria of love and loss had its roots in a real-life episode.\u00a0\u201cI was dating this girl and we broke up,\u201d the singer recalled. \u201cTwo or three years later, I went to the barber shop to get a haircut and looked across the street, and there was the girl […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[5264],"tags":[7426,7403,1911],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12410"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12410"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12410\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12412,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12410\/revisions\/12412"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12410"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12410"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12410"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}