I Fall to Pieces

In November 1960, Patsy Cline entered a Nashville studio to record "I Fall to Pieces," a song written by Hank Cochran and Harlan Howard, though she had serious doubts about it. She worried that the Jordanaires, the background vocal group on the session, would drown out her voice, and she disliked the pop ballad style producer Owen Bradley wanted, feeling it did not suit her. The musicians also struggled, rejecting the standard shuffle rhythm before giving up and returning to it. On the fourth take, Howard recalled, Cline caressed the melody so tenderly that every grown man in the studio was bawling, and Bradley declared it the one. After hearing the playback, Cline changed her mind and said she had finally found her own identity.

The single came out through Decca Records on 30 January 1961 and was initially ignored by both pop and country radio. A promoter hired by the songwriters' publisher persuaded disc jockeys to give it a chance, and a pop station in Columbus, Ohio, began playing it. Momentum built until the song peaked at number one on the Billboard Country chart in August 1961 and reached number 12 on the pop chart. Its ascent had been the slowest ever seen on the country chart, and its decline was slow as well.

By the time it reached the top, Cline was in a hospital bed. A near-fatal car accident in June 1961 kept her there for two months, cutting into promotion of the record. She later sent Cochran an engraved bracelet and Howard a money clip reading "Thanks for the Hit - Patsy."