Alan Jackson Tributes Loretta Lynn With Song He Wrote for His Mother [Watch]
Alan Jackson's acoustic tribute to Loretta Lynn was one of the highlights of CMT's Coal Miner's Daughter: A Celebration of the Life & Music of Loretta Lynn broadcast. His personal performance was of a song called "Where Her Heart Has Always Been" that he wrote when his mother died in 2017.
In singing the song, he shared that both his mother, Ruth, and Loretta Lynn were "outgoing, sweet and genuine and would tell you exactly what was on their minds." Jackson sat on a stool and strummed an acoustic guitar as fiddle and guitar players joined him. A few backing vocalists made the arrangement even more poignant. By the end, Jackson was looking glassy-eyed.
Coal Miner's Daughter: A Celebration of the Life & Music of Loretta Lynn aired on CMT on Sunday night (Oct. 30), but two additional encore airings are scheduled for Nov. 2 at 8PM ET and Nov. 6 at 11AM ET.
Jackson and Lynn shared a special relationship. The late country icon's first appearance after her debilitating stroke was to induct him into the Country Music Hall of Fame in October 2017. She recalled telling him he'd be a special singer and noted that she wasn't wrong.
Lynn died on Oct. 4 at her home in Hurricane Mills, Tenn. The CMT special included a star-studded list of performers and even more celebrities joining with video messages. George Strait, the Highwomen, Brandi Carlile, Jack White, Keith Urban, Tanya Tucker and Wynonna Judd were a few more artists who gathered to remember Lynn. Taylor Swift, Dolly Parton, Tim McGraw and Faith Hill all shared memories of the "Coal Miner's Daughter" singer.