Willie Nelson - Oh What a Beautiful World

Willie Nelson spends Oh What a Beautiful World inside the songbook of his old friend Rodney Crowell, and the pairing feels like two Texas storytellers swapping tales on the porch.

Released in 2025, the album gathers twelve songs written or co-written by Crowell, each one hand-picked by Nelson himself. He had been singing Crowell's songs for decades but had never devoted a whole record to them until now. Longtime collaborator Buddy Cannon produced in Nashville, keeping the arrangements uncluttered so that voice and lyrics stay front and center.

Some of the choices will surprise listeners who never knew Crowell wrote them. Shame on the Moon, a hit for Bob Seger, becomes a weathered, wise meditation in Willie's hands, and Making Memories of Us glows with plainspoken tenderness. What Kind of Love, co-written with Roy Orbison and Will Jennings, carries a gentle, aching beauty. On the title track Crowell joins in on vocals, and the two voices fit together like old leather.

Mickey Raphael's harmonica and the battered tone of Nelson's guitar Trigger add the familiar textures, while the band plays with an easy, unhurried grace.

In his nineties, Nelson still sounds curious and wonderfully present, and this is one of the loveliest records of his late career.