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Country Music

HIS LAST SHOW WAS 18 SONGS WITH HALF A LUNG AND DOUBLE PNEUMONIA — AND HE DIED ON HIS OWN BIRTHDAYMerle Haggard had 38 #1 hits and a career spanning five decades.But on February 13, 2016, the Hag could barely breathe. He’d already been hospitalized for double pneumonia. Doctors told him to stop touring. He didn’t listen.At the Paramount Theatre in Oakland, his son Ben stood close on guitar, the band stretched their solos longer between songs to give him time. Merle even picked up a fiddle and played — and for a moment, he looked like he was enjoying himself more than anyone in the room.He spoke about his pneumonia plainly, no self-pity. Then he powered through an 18-song set, closing with “Okie From Muskogee.” The crowd gave him standing ovations, sensing deep down this might be the last time.It was. He never took a stage again.Less than two months later, on April 6 — his 79th birthday — the Poet of the Common Man was gone. Why did he keep performing when his own body was begging him to stop?

Introduction HIS LAST SHOW WAS 18 SONGS WITH HALF A LUNG AND DOUBLE PNEUMONIA —...

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