{"id":15292,"date":"2025-04-22T08:21:03","date_gmt":"2025-04-22T08:21:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/new50.info\/?p=15292"},"modified":"2025-04-22T08:21:03","modified_gmt":"2025-04-22T08:21:03","slug":"merle-haggard-and-willie-nelson-delivered-a-legendary-performance-of-pancho-and-lefty-during-their-last-of-the-breed-tour-in-2007-the-two-country-icons-both-well-into-their-storied-careers-took-the","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/new50.info\/?p=15292","title":{"rendered":"Merle Haggard and Willie Nelson delivered a legendary performance of Pancho and Lefty during their Last of the Breed tour in 2007. The two country icons, both well into their storied careers, took the stage together, effortlessly blending their voices on the beloved classic."},"content":{"rendered":"<p>In 2007, Willie Nelson, Merle Haggard, and Ray Price launched their Last of the Breed Tour. The co-headlining outing saw three groundbreaking country legends on the road together. In just a few short years, Price would pass away in 2013. Haggard followed him three years later on his birthday. Today, Nelson is the only member of the tour\u2014and the oldest country legend\u2014who is still alive.<\/p>\n<div class=\"code-block code-block-19\">\n<h2 id=\"video-header\" class=\"g1-delta g1-delta-2nd g1-collection-title\">Videos<\/h2>\n<\/div>\n<p>Haggard, Nelson, and Price closed out the Last of the Breed Tour with a recorded concert. They made an album as well as a PBS television special that night. Backed by Price\u2019s Cherokee Cowboys and Ray Benson and his band Asleep at the Wheel, the trio of legends performed some of their biggest hits on the tour\u2019s final night. Watch Nelson and Haggard sing \u201cPancho and Lefty\u201d below.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper video-seo-youtube-embed-wrapper\">\n<div class=\"video-seo-youtube-player\" data-id=\"fOHCXTuVJUA\">\n<div class=\"video-seo-youtube-embed-loader\" tabindex=\"0\" role=\"button\" data-id=\"fOHCXTuVJUA\" aria-label=\"Load YouTube video\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Willie Nelson &amp; Merle Haggard &quot;Pancho and Lefty&quot;\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/fOHCXTuVJUA\" width=\"350\" height=\"235\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\" data-origwidth=\"350\" data-origheight=\"235\" data-mce-fragment=\"1\"><\/iframe><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/figure>\n<p>Nelson and Haggard recorded three albums together\u2014<em>Poncho &amp; Lefty\u00a0<\/em>(1983),\u00a0<em>Seashores of Old Mexico<\/em>\u00a0(1987), and\u00a0<em>Django and Jimmie<\/em> (2016). However, the title track of their first collaborative album would go on to be their best-known duet.<\/p>\n<h3 id=\"h-merle-haggard-and-willie-nelson-cover-an-outlaw-legend\" class=\"wp-block-heading\">Merle Haggard and Willie Nelson Cover an Outlaw Legend<\/h3>\n<p>When it comes to Outlaw and Alternative country music, few songwriters receive as much respect as Townes Van Zandt. Criminally underrated during his lifetime, Van Zandt left behind a wealth of great songs. \u201cPancho and Lefty\u201d is among his most popular songs.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI realize that I wrote it, but it\u2019s hard to take credit for the writing because it came from out of the blue,\u201d Van Zandt said about the song. \u201cit came through me and it\u2019s a real nice song, and I think, I\u2019ve finally found out what it\u2019s about. I\u2019ve always wondered what it\u2019s about. I kinda always knew it wasn\u2019t about Pancho Villa and then someone told me that Pancho Villa had a buddy whose name in Spanish meant Lefty,\u201d he recalled. \u201cBut in the song, my song, Pacho gets hung \u2026 and the real Pancho Villa was assassinated,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n<p>Merle Haggard and Willie Nelson were among many artists who covered \u201cPancho and Lefty\u201d over the years. However, they had the biggest hit with the song. It went to No. 1 on the\u00a0<em>Billboard<\/em>\u00a0Hot Country Songs chart when they released it in 1983.<\/p>\n<div class=\"code-block code-block-3\"><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In 2007, Willie Nelson, Merle Haggard, and Ray Price launched their Last of the Breed Tour. The co-headlining outing saw three groundbreaking country legends on the road&#8230; <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":15293,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15292","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.2 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Merle Haggard and Willie Nelson delivered a legendary performance of Pancho and Lefty during their Last of the Breed tour in 2007. The two country icons, both well into their storied careers, took the stage together, effortlessly blending their voices on the beloved classic. -<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/new50.info\/?p=15292\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Merle Haggard and Willie Nelson delivered a legendary performance of Pancho and Lefty during their Last of the Breed tour in 2007. The two country icons, both well into their storied careers, took the stage together, effortlessly blending their voices on the beloved classic. -\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"In 2007, Willie Nelson, Merle Haggard, and Ray Price launched their Last of the Breed Tour. 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