The Valley Road
Released 1988
Format 7″ (45 rpm)
Genre Pop rock
Length 4:42
Label RCA
Songwriter(s) Bruce Hornsby, John Hornsby
Producer(s) Bruce Hornsby, Neil Dorfsman
“The Valley Road” is a song recorded by Bruce Hornsby and the Range. Hornsby co-wrote the song with his brother John Hornsby and co-produced it with Neil Dorfsman. The song is included on Bruce Hornsby and the Range’s 1988 album, Scenes from the Southside.
Released as the lead single from the album, “The Valley Road” reached the top ten on the Billboard Hot 100 chart in June 1988, peaking at number 5 the week of July 2. It also spent a week atop the Billboard adult contemporary chart in mid-June. This was the group’s third song to reach number 1 on the adult contemporary chart, following “The Way It Is” from 1986 and “Mandolin Rain” from 1987. It also spent three weeks at the summit on the Billboard mainstream rock chart. The song reached number 44 on the UK Singles Chart at roughly the same time.
In 1989, Hornsby re-recorded “The Valley Road” with the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band, and this version of the song was included on the Dirt Band album Will the Circle Be Unbroken: Volume Two. Hornsby and the Dirt Band won a Grammy Award for this recording in 1990 in the category Best Bluegrass Recording. This version of the song was more in the country-bluegrass style of recording, inspired by Leon Russell and his collaborations with the New Grass Revival. Regarding what some in the bluegrass community felt about the award, Hornsby stated: “I won the bluegrass Grammy. It pissed off all the purists. And I understand their feeling about this. Here’s this pop guy, and he’s making this quasi-bluegrass. I totally understood the purists’ protest.”
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia