1974 · Behind the Songs
A country standard she recorded twice, seven years apart.
“Silver Threads and Golden Needles” was written by Dick Reynolds and Jack Rhodes and first recorded by Wanda Jackson in 1956. The British folk-pop trio the Springfields took it to No. 20 on the Billboard Hot 100 in September 1962 — the first single by a British group to reach the American Top 20. Skeeter Davis cut it the same year, Jody Miller took it to No. 54 in 1965, and the Cowsills reached No. 77 with it in September 1969. Ronstadt recorded it twice: a straight country version on her 1969 debut solo album Hand Sown… Home Grown, and a country-rock crossover reading on Don’t Cry Now (1973), produced by JD Souther.
The second version was released as a single in January 1974 and became her first country hit, reaching No. 20 on the country chart and No. 67 on the Hot 100 on the chart dated April 6, 1974. The song kept traveling long afterward: Sandy Denny recorded it for Rendezvous (1977); in 1993 Dolly Parton, Tammy Wynette and Loretta Lynn cut it together for Honky Tonk Angels, reaching No. 68 on Hot Country Singles & Tracks — and Parton had performed it years earlier on her 1976–77 television show Dolly! with guests Linda Ronstadt and Emmylou Harris. The Grateful Dead, meanwhile, played it about twenty times across 1966, 1969 and 1970.