Wynonna Judd isn’t afraid to take chances, in music or in life. The singer, who rose to fame as one-half of the Judds duo, just released her Recollections EP, featuring covers of some of her favorite songs — of all genres — over the years, and hints there is more music in her future, this time without any boundaries.
“I want to get away with as much as possible. Yeah, I want to take every chance,” Wynonna told The Boot. “I fail a lot. But I’m learning, and that’s all we can do.”
The silver lining for what Wynonna calls her own failures is learning how to get up again, and again, and again.
“I made a lot of not-so-great choices. And you know what? That’s where God’s grace and mercy come in. Because there’s not a real whole lot I can do about that,” Wynonna shared. “And so that’s what I’m going to be doing for the rest of my life, is figuring out what is it that really, really gives me life.”
“That’s what I’m going to do,” she continued. “And everything I do is going to mean something to me. I don’t know about the rest of the world, but this is the truth for me.”
The 56-year-old has had to adjust to not working, at least at her usual frenetic pace, this year because of COVID-19. Although not necessarily easy, Wynonna has learned plenty in her unexpected time off the road.
“This time is both giving in terms of music, which is the best part, and it’s also been a time of reflection,” Wynonna acknowledged. “I’ve had one other time that I had off in 25 years: When my son [Elijah] was born in 1994, I took a year off, and that’s it. I don’t have any period of time that I can say that I had home other than to come home, do laundry, pack, get on the bus, go.
“So this time at home has given me a chance to reestablish my life, my boundaries, my dreams, my hopes,” she continued. “I think it was an important time for me to stop and to not only appreciate where I was, but appreciate where I’m at right this minute, this day, this breath, this heartbeat.”
Wynonna recently revealed she met her brother, Michael, for the first time.
“I have a brother I’ve never met, and I called him. He lives in Kentucky and his name is Michael,” Wynonna revealed to Andy Cohen on SiriusXM’s Radio Andy. “I called him on his birthday and I said, ‘Hi,’ and I have it on tape. I say tape, ’cause that’s where I come from. I have the recording of me saying, ‘Hi. This is your sister.’ I’ve never said that before. I’m going to put it in the middle of a song somewhere. That’s just the way I work. I just apply real life to my stuff.”
Purchase Recollections at Wynonna.com.