ND: You became a Christian in 1968.
CS: Yeah, with help from Hank Snow’s son, Jimmie Rodgers Snow. I did a TV show at Easter time at his church that year. I didn’t grow up in church. My parents weren’t Christians. My mother got saved later on but when I was a child we did not go to church. There were times after I moved to Nashville when I’d go to church and I’d want to cry. But I felt like everyone would look at me because I was Connie Smith. So I couldn’t go.
I remember a preacher coming to my house wanting to witness. I basically shut the door in his face. I thought, “What right did he have to invade my privacy and judge me?” That’s the way I felt. I knew there was a God out there, but I had no idea that he could really make a change in your life. I didn’t know him personally.
And so when I did this TV show, which I thought I was safe doing, they started talking about God and I started crying. I couldn’t understand that. I had no idea about the spirit of God dealing with your heart, so I just ran outta there. But Jimmie Snow took me out to the parking lot and read me some scriptures. He read the plan of salvation to me that Jesus is the one that saves us and he’s the one that changes us and it doesn’t depend on us. That’s a great freedom. I found out that repentance is not a big thumb coming down judging you, but repentance is a freedom.
ND: Some have observed — and rightly — that you were every bit as good a singer as Loretta, Dolly, and Tammy were during y’all’s ’60s and ’70s heyday. And that you still are, for that matter. And yet because you chose to be at home raising your children and, therefore, out of the public eye, much of the past 20 years, people don’t always include you in their company.
CS: I don’t know if that’s the reason or if I just didn’t accomplish what they accomplished. They did a lot of work in the years that I was at the house.
ND: Has that ever bothered you?
CS: No, I don’t regret my decision to stay home. I’ve got the five greatest kids in the world — and three grandbabies. I wouldn’t trade any of those years. Had I traded it, I feel confident I would have been more popular, or at least had my home paid for [laughs]. I believe that I could have, but to me the price would have been too high. So no, I don’t have any regrets. I believe I made the right decision for myself at that time, and for my children.
And look at the chance I have now. I’ve got Warner Bros. backing me, and they’re committed to me even though they know radio won’t play me. I’m still making a living and I’m still enjoying it. I’ve still got my health, so I’ve got no complaints.
ND: You’ve always said that you’re primarily a singer as opposed to an entertainer. Can you elaborate on that?
CS: I’m more comfortable just singing. I’m not that great — I don’t think — of an entertainer. I’m still not that comfortable walking out onstage for everybody to look at. Once I’m singing and I’m telling a story, sure, I want people to listen, ’cause a song is a story to me. So that I enjoy. And I enjoy doing a show when I have a good band. It’s wonderful to fall back into the arms of the music. I love to sing. But even if I wasn’t doing that, I’d be singing at the house, while I’m cooking or cleaning or whatever.
ND: The other day on the phone you cited a passage of scripture, ‘God inhabits the praises of his people.’ What does that mean to you, especially in light of your gifts as a singer?
CS: The strongest that scripture ever came to my heart was when I came to town and I had “Once A Day”. Everybody would go nuts when I’d sing “Once A Day”, so it became my closing song. Well, then I got saved, and I was talking to Conway Twitty. We were out on the road together and he said, “I always believe you leave ’em with what you want ’em to think you are.” That just really rang in my heart and I got to thinking, “Well, yeah, I’m glad I’ve got ‘Once A Day’, and I’ve never gotten tired of singing that song, but what I want them to think I am is a follower of Christ. That’s the main thing.” So I decided to close my show with a hymn that meant a lot to me, a song called “I Saw A Man” that I heard Johnny Cash do. Arthur Smith wrote it.
I closed my next show with “Once A Day” and they whooped and hollered and yelled, and I came back and sang “I Saw A Man” and it bombed. I walked off almost in a silence. Somebody’s manager came up to me and said, “Well, that was a nice gesture, but I think you should put it in the middle where it won’t hurt the show.” I really wrestled with that. In the carnal way of looking at it, it really hurt the show. And yet I made up my mind in the dressing room, I thought, “No, I’m gonna end my show with a hymn, whether it ever goes over or not.” And so I did that for awhile and it didn’t go over.
Then one day I heard Sonny James sing a song called “How Great Thou Art”. I loved that song so much that I learned it and I started closing my show with it. I’ve closed my show with that song for the last 25 years. And I remember when they put my picture in the [Country Music] Hall of Fame, that was the song they played behind it instead of “Once A Day”.
Then I was at Fan Fair one year, and while I was singing “How Great Thou Art”, the scripture came in mind that “God inhabits the praises of his people.” I thought, “This ain’t working because I’m singing well. It’s working because God is fulfilling his word that says he inhabits the praises of his people. That song is a song of praise to him. When I go out and I get a standing ovation with “How Great Thou Art”, I can’t take it to myself. The audience might think it’s my singing, and I might think it’s my singing, but the truth is it’s God inhabiting the praises of his people and fulfilling his word.
When I’m singing that song, I feel like I’m doing what I’ve really come to do. If I go out to sing a song just to promote Connie Smith, that will wind up coming to naught. I mean, sooner or later somebody’s gonna say who’s Connie Smith? But if I sing praises to God, that’s eternal.
If faced with a desert island disc decision between Loretta Lynn, Dolly Parton, Tammy Wynette, and Connie Smith, ND contributing editor Bill Friskics-Warren would take a collection of Smith’s RCA recordings, if only not to forget what it’s like to hear an angel sing.
