Music

McEntire and Chesney paired for this track from McEntire’s Reba: Duets album, released in 2008. The McEntire/Chesney version earned unsolicited radio airplay, but when the single was officially shipped to radio, singer-songwriter Skip Ewing’s voice replaced Chesney’s.

The song depicts a divorced couple struggling with the logistical and emotional weight of sharing custody of their children and having the children switch homes “every other weekend.”

In 1994, Yearwood and Neville teamed up to recorded a duet version of this Patsy Cline classic. The song was included on the album Rhythm, Country and Blues, a concept album that paired country and R&B/pop singers to reinterpret country and R&B classics. The song earned Yearwood and Neville a Grammy the following year for best country collaboration with vocals.

This haunting revenge ballad, released in August 2022, is a rare addition to the canon of country music male/female duets, which largely tend to focus on the highs and lows of a couple’s relationship. Meanwhile, this story song centers on a man who happens to meet a battered woman, and decides to take revenge on her abuser.

“You rarely hear songs like this that bring light to heavy situations that people are really scared to talk about,” Wilson told Billboard. “I feel, in my heart, that our job is to sing about the things that people are afraid to talk about. It’s a song that definitely starts a conversation.”

Hardy wrote the song with Renee Blair, Hunter Phelps and Jordan Schmidt.

In 1981, married couple Jennings and Colter released the duets project Leather and Lace, spearheaded by this Colter-written single. The song portends that life’s hardships won’t outlast a strong love. Jennings would later include a live performance version of the song, alongside his Waymore Blues band, on his 2000 live album Never Say Die Live.

Written by Parton’s brother Floyd Parton, this simple love song finds a couple vowing to remain faithful and loving through life’s stages, from “rockin’ babies” to spending their twilight years in rocking chairs. Released in 1991, the song topped Billboard’s Hot Country Songs chart. In 2008, a previously-unreleased version of the song, featuring Parton in duet with George Jones, was included on Jones’s album Burn Your Playhouse Down—Unreleased Duets.

The Country Music Hall of Famer and the 12-time Grammy-winning rock artist teamed up to make the 2004 collaborative project Van Lear Rose, which White produced. Lynn had written the lyrics to the song years prior, and while White was visiting Lynn at her home in Hurricane Mills, Tennessee, he found the lyrics she had written in an old notebook.

The song was celebrated at the following year’s Grammy Awards, where won a trophy for best country collaboration with vocals, and was nominated for best country song. Meanwhile, Van Lear Rose won the Grammy for best country album.

This imagining of what an afterlife could look like pairs Parton’s crystalline soprano with Paisley’s warm, accessible vocal tones in this Christian-country ballad. The song not only topped Billboard’s Hot Country Songs chart but also earned Parton and Paisley a CMA Award for musical event of the year in 2006.

In 1981, David Frizzell (brother of Lefty Frizzell) teamed with Shelly West (daughter of Dottie West) and hit No. 1 on Billboard’s Hot Country Singles (now called Hot Country Songs) chart. This wistful song and tribute to the Sooner State was also featured in the Clint Eastwood movie Any Which Way You Can.

Eric Church teamed with Rhiannon Giddens for this duet that became a top 10 Billboard Country Airplay hit in 2017. Written by Church with Luke Dick and Jeff Hyde, this passionate, angsty track determines to “kill” hurtful words such as “fear,” “goodbye,” “hate” and “regret.”

The song earned Church and Giddens a nomination for musical event of the year at the CMA Awards in 2017.

McEntire and Brooks & Dunn were on tour together at the time and teamed up record this searing duet about a former couple who still yearn for each other. Released in 1998, this was a two-week No. 1 on the Country Airplay chart. A decade later they would reunite for another duet, “Cowgirls Don’t Cry.”

In 2011, Paisley and Underwood teamed up for this sultry collab about a couple trying to rekindle the passion that so easily came earlier in their relationship. “Remind Me” was the third single from Paisley’s This Is Country Music album. Paisley wrote the song with frequent collaborators Chris DuBois and Kelley Lovelace.

By the time this song released, Underwood and Paisley were already well-known for their onstage collaboration as co-hosts of the CMA Awards, a role they held for 11 years, from 2008 through 2018.

In 1997, Brooks and Yearwood earned a No. 2 Billboard Country Airplay hit with this duet, written by Brooks with John Peppard and Bobby Wood. The couple had been singing harmonies on each other’s albums over the years (including Brooks’s “Ain’t Goin’ Down (‘Til the Sun Comes Up”) and his rendition of the Billy Joel hit “Shameless”), but this marked their first full-fledged released duet. “In Another’s Eyes” went on to earn Brooks and Yearwood a Grammy for best country collaboration with vocals.

Brooks and Yearwood wed in 2005, and have recorded numerous duets over the years, including “Where Your Road Leads,” “Squeeze Me In,” “Love Will Always Win” and “The Call.” Brooks & Yearwood also released a rendition of “Shallow,” the Lady Gaga/Bradley Cooper hit from the 2018 remake of A Star Is Born.

Two of country music’s most sterling voices pair on this ballad of a love and longing the years can’t diminish. The video is one of country music’s classic, heart-tugging pieces, as McEntire portrays a Navy officer in training, while Gill performs the role of her drill instructor.

This 1999 duet from Vince Gill and Patty Loveless highlight each vocalist’s bluegrass-influenced voice on a tender ballad about a couple putting love before “diamonds or big fancy cars.” The song won a CMA Award for vocal event of the year in 1999.

Of course, the Gill-Loveless connection began years before their official duet collaboration. According to the documentary CMA Fest: 50 Years of Fan Fair, Loveless stood in line to get an autograph at Gill’s booth at Fan Fair in 1985. Loveless would become a star in her own right, but the chemistry in their voices is undeniable and they provided harmonies on each other’s records over the years.

This Wynette/Jones duet became the couple’s first No. 1 Billboard country hit, hitting a two-week run at the pinnacle in 1973; the song was written by Jones and Earl Montgomery. Though Jones and Wynette were married to one another at the time, the tumultuousness of the relationship was apparent, as the couple nearly divorced around the same time that “We’re Gonna Hold On” was released. They would reconcile for a time, before divorcing in 1975.

Jones and Wynette continued to have numerous hits throughout and even after their married ended. They became known for collaborations including “(We’re Not) The Jet Set,” “Golden Ring,” “Near You” and “Two Story House.”

Released in 1997, this steamy love ballad from married couple and country artists Tim McGraw and Faith Hill topped Billboard’s Hot Country Songs chart for six weeks. Billboard later named “It’s Your Love” as the No. 1 country hit of 1997.

In 2004, this stirring duet between Paisley and Krauss reached No. 3 on the Hot Country Singles and Tracks (now Hot Country Songs) chart.

The hit, written by Bill Anderson and Jon Randall, depicts a couple whose separation leads the man to drink himself to death, while the woman follows suit after he dies, out of an abundance of loss and self-guilt. The pairing of Paisley’s earthy voice and Krauss’s ethereal, whispery soprano heightens the dramatic storyline of the song. “Whiskey Lullaby” was honored with the CMA’s song of the year honor in 2005.

Randall would later include a version of the song on his 2005 album Walking Among the Living.

The Bee Gees wrote this now-iconic song, originally intending for it to be recorded by an R&B artist. However, Rogers heard the song and initially attempted to record it solo, before bringing Parton in to add her vocal to the song. The result was iconic, with the two effervescent artists combined their energetic vocals, intertwining harmonies throughout the majority of the song to create a flirtatious, dramatic track that has become of music’s most enduring recordings.

The song stayed atop Billboard’s Hot 100 chart for two weeks in 1983.

By 1967, Johnny Cash and The Carter Family member June Carter had already had a hit collaboration including “It Ain’t Me, Babe,’ while Cash had also earned a top 20 hit with “Busted,” featuring The Carter Family.

But this sassy collaboration highlighted the undeniable chemistry between the two musicians, and reached No. 2 on the Billboard country chart. “Jackson” also garnered Cash and Carter a Grammy win for best country & western performance duet, trio or group (vocal or instrumental). Cash and Carter would marry a year later, and the iconic country music couple would continue to record hit duets including “If I Had a Hammer” and “If I Were a Carpenter.”

This 1971 hit became Lynn and Twitty’s first No. 1 duet together, spending two weeks at the pinnacle of Billboard’s Hot Country Singles (now Hot Country Songs) chart, and winning a Grammy for best country vocal performance by a duo or group–marking Twitty’s sole Grammy win.

Twitty and Lynn would record numerous duets together, earning No. 1 hits for collaborations including 1971’s “Lead Me On,” 1973’s “Louisiana Woman/Mississippi Man,” 1974’s “As Soon as I Hang Up the Phone” and 1975’s “Feelins’”.