Lynn Anderson ~ Rose Garden 1970 Disco Purrfection Version

On Sunday mornings as a kid, my parents were awake first and the kids were woken up a bit later by the stereo when my mom or dad would put on some Sunday morning music, something mellow. After a light breakfast it was time to clean up and get ready for church. The music would still be playing when we left and when we got back.

I did not know what I was going to wake up to, sometimes its was "La Traviata " featuring Victoria De Los Angeles other times it was the Polish polka music or country music my mom favored. One thing they agreed on was the lush country sound of Lynn Anderson particularly her 1970 "Rose Garden" album. That is when I learned to love country music and followed it as it grew more popular throughout the 80's and into the 90's ( I really liked Rascal Flatts "Me & My Gang" )

Coming back to Lynn, the common wisdom of the lyrics of "Rose Garden" belied the relentlessly upbeat music track with its fiddly string section that fills the air like strings in the best disco songs. This was 1971 so I all I can say is that it is country pop, and damn good pop too!

Lynn Rene Anderson was born the daughter of a country singer on September 26, 1947 in Grand Forks, North Dakota. Inspired by her mother, she began her recording career early and by the mid-60's she was regularly placing singles in the Top 10 Country survey.

She married her producer/songwriter husband Glen Sutton who brought her the Joe South written song "Rose Garden" and they recorded it with a live string section. The results were sonically impressive gaining her a million selling pop album and #1 country single with "Rose Garden", taking home the Grammy for Best Vocal Country Performance, Female and Country Music Association's "Female Vocalist Of The Year" awards.

In an interview she explained what the song was about; "It was perfectly timed, we were just coming out of the Vietnam years and a lot of people were trying to recover. The song's message was that you can make something out of nothing. You can take it and (move) ahead." Which is exactly what she did after she divorced Sutton then married Harold Stream III, retiring from music to concentrate on her equine skills. She had become quite the proficient equestrian earning 100 trophies and over 600 ribbons over four years when her marriage to Stream ended.

She returned to her singing career in 1983 appearing in a "Starsky & Hutch" and NBC TV Movie of the week "Country Mile". She proclaimed herself the Annette Funicello of country music, name checking the most famous ex-Mickey Mouse club charter member. Annette had a run of pop hits in the mid 60's with songs like "Tall Paul" and "Pineapple Princess" and was known for her self confidence and clean image for her entire acting career. It would have been interesting to hear Lynn do a cover of Annette's "Jo Jo The Dog Faced Boy".