Collin Raye - A Voice Undefeated

A Voice Undefeated

COLLIN RAYE

With a Foreword by Governor Mike Huckabee

IGNATIUS PRESS SAN FRANCISCO

Unless otherwise noted, Scripture quotations have been taken from the Revised Standard Version of the Holy Bible, Second Catholic Edition, 2006 by the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. All rights reserved.

Cover photograph of crucifix by Wolfgang Moroder
Other photographs courtesy of Collin Raye

Cover design by Enrique Javier Aguilar Pinto

2014 by Ignatius Press, San Francisco
All rights reserved
ISBN 978-1-58617-817-8
Library of Congress Control Number 2013950844
Printed in the United States of America

To our precious little child in heaven, Haley,
who knows Jesus Christ face-to-face.
May her constant intercession help us get to where she is .

Contents

One Mans Struggle for Integrity (1960-1972)

Thank You for the Gift (1973-1979)

Faith and Fatherhood (1980-1984)

Impact and Aftermath of the Reno Years (1985-1989)

The Agony and the Ecstasy of Country Music

The Albums and Songs of Collin Raye (early 1990s)

The Albums and Songs of Collin Raye (mid-1990s to 2002)

Surviving the Country Music Business (2001-2002)

Gods Holy Gift to Us (2003-2007)

Praise Him Anyway (2008-April 3, 2010)

Resurrection (Easter 2010 to the Present)

Pure Grace

In January of 2012 I was privileged to be a speaker on the same stage with Collin Raye at the March for Life in our nations capital, and I was reminded of the first time I met him. It was in the mid-nineties, when I was governor of Arkansas, and I got to play with him a number of times at the Collinfest, which takes place in his hometown of De Queen every summer. This illustrious son of Arkansas has a whole music festival named after him, an honor accorded to few musicians (and to even fewer governors)! I couldnt help but be impressed by the enthusiasm with which Collin performed on stage: his energy was boundless, and his voice was pure. I had loved his music since I first heard his incomparable Love, Me hit the charts in the early nineties; yet seeing him perform in person was a true gift.

Generally when we look at a star like Collin, we see a life lived under the lights: an outwardly perfect and shining personality that has taken years to cultivate; yet the polished image of the performer on stage is actually just an outline of the real person who lives most of his life behind the curtain. That private person has a history and a whole realm of real life stories and circumstances that have contributed to making him the star that he is. These reveal the fuller picture of the man with all the limitations, heartaches, and sufferings that each of us struggles with dailyand maybe even a few more. I can certainly attest to the fact that public life has its own set of difficulties, which men who live purely private lives are spared. Collins autobiography, A Voice Undefeated , offers us a fuller picture of a true American artist.

Because I am a musician, I particularly enjoyed reading an insiders view of what went into the making of his albums during his time in Nashville, but the number of hardships that Collin has had to overcome to get where he is today was a total revelation to me. Of particular note are the extraordinaryactually calamitoushealth incidents that have afflicted members of his family through the years: from watching both his brother and his son languish in hospitals after terrible car accidents; to keeping vigil at the bedside of his comatose wife who almost died during childbirth; to the death of his nine-year-old granddaughter, Haley, in 2010 from a neurological disease that even the best minds in the medical field could not figure out. In between those two incidents, the tale of countless, perhaps thousands of, hours he spent looking after his loved ones in hospitals is nothing short of amazing. I wont spoil the story for you by giving too much detail here, but suffice it to say that Collin has often picked himself (and his family) up from catastrophe while continuing to walk forward on the journey of life to the place of peace and wholeness where he stands today. Lesser men would have crumbled in the face of it all and given up, but Collin has met all the challenges with great honesty and, above all, with faith.

There is a river of grace, as he calls it, that has flowed through his life from the beginning. That, undoubtedly, is the real story that Collin wants to tell. His perception of Gods guiding hand throughout his life is the foundation of any success he has had, and he very appropriately gives credit for his successes to the One who gave him his talents and sustained him through all his trials. The story is not just pious history, though; Collin is not shy about recounting his faults and owning up to the way they have contributed to some of his own defeats. Yet this personal honesty has a way of playing the true Light of his life, Jesus Christ, against the darkness of the human condition and of humanizing the life of a star who many think can do no wrong. His story is at times heartrending and at other times heartwarming, but it is essentially a witness to how the goodness of God can work miracles in anyones life, especially for those who are humble enough to accept correction and guidance from a loving Father in heaven.

I am blessed to call Collin Raye my friend and to have accompanied him, for a few steps anyway, on his familys difficult journey in the last few years with the decline and loss of his beautiful granddaughter. Collin is a man who has known both the heights of popularity and the depths of suffering, and to this day I marvel at his resolve to continue fighting the good fight and performing for the good of others. He is a self-made man with no sense of entitlement; he is a man of faith and optimism despite many crushing defeats; he has always given the world wholesome things (such as his music) and has never hesitated to stand behind the most important causes, such as the rights of the handicapped and the unborn.

Collins autobiography is well named after his song Undefeated, and I imagine that his many devoted fans will find it to be a treasury of information about a fascinating man who has already captured their hearts with his music and charisma. I am also sure that his story will be a burst of inspiration to many thousands more who will read it looking for some measure of encouragement from a public figure who has never let them downand who, by Gods grace, never will.

Mike Huckabee
Former Governor of the State of Arkansas
April 3, 2013

May angels lead you into paradise; may the martyrs come to welcome you and take you to the holy city, the new and eternal Jerusalem. May choirs of angels welcome you and lead you to the bosom of Abraham; and where Lazarus is poor no longer may you have eternal rest .

Funeral Prayer

The stirring and poetic words that end every Catholic funeral are always so consoling, and I truly needed the prayer of the Church on the day we laid to rest my nine-year-old granddaughter. The grief I had felt at Haleys death was indescribable, and now we had arrived at the final good-bye.

After Deacon Lee Davis had finished the closing prayer, those who could not join us at the cemetery for the burial paid their final respects there at the funeral home. I remained standing in the front, and Haleys mother, my daughter, Britanny, stayed seated with Haleys younger sister, Mattie, while the guests followed the customary ritual of filing by the casket. Some knelt at the prie-dieu, some stood, before coming over to wish us their best. The meeting and greeting was difficult, but it was over quickly. The well-wishers finished their condolences and slowly filed out of the room, milling about the reception area and talking in the whispered tones appropriate to a funeral parlor until all their conversations had run their course. The sound of their voices gradually dissipated as they left one by one.