A couple quick questions for you.

Are you, by chance, a Willie Nelson fan?

Or, more generally, are you a lover of great music, be it country, jazz, rock and roll, whatever?

Or to zoom out even wider, are you just somebody looking for a little good news?

And would you mind terribly if it's set to some of the greatest songs ever written?

Well, that's what we're bringing.

I'm John Spong, host of One by Willie, where each episode we talk to one notable Willie fan

about one Willie song they love before heading down the kind of rabbit holes that open up

whenever the topic is Willie Nelson.

We've been at it for five years, hosting guests

you'd expect, like Lyle Levin and Bonnie Ray, and others you might not, like Whoopi Goldberg

and Nick Offer. And what they've provided are highly personal takes on the way Willie's music

has shaped their lives and made the world a better place. I mention that now, because a new season of One by Willie is headed your way,

kicking off next week with the great Kenny Chesney.

He's going to open with his love for Willie's 1976 recording of That Lucky Old Son.

And the lucky old son ain't got nothing to do,

but roll around heaven all day.

But then get into how Willie helped inspire the career change

that grew him into Billboard Magazine's top country artist of the 21st century.

It made me happy to know that there was a person like Willie Nelson that was doing it on their own terms,

and he was somebody that you could go, oh wow, well, look how he did it.

As an artist, I felt like I had to change, and I had to be more vulnerable, and I had to be more creative.

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