If the stakes are high, Wynonna Judd is in. All in.
“I just like to try stuff,” she said. “It’s almost like you just have to jump off or you’ll never know the thrill. Maybe I’m a thrill seeker. It’s either the dumbest move I’ve ever made, or exhilarating and people think I’m a badass, or they just go, ‘Wow, she’s insane.’”
The superstar has never been afraid to put herself out there. Like hitting the floor with Tony Dovolani for the recent season of “Dancing With the Stars.”
“This incredible two-time world champion came to my home. I turned my gym into a dance studio, and the next thing I know I’m doing the cha-cha? Oh yeah, that’s for me,” Wynonna said and laughed.
While she was the first to be eliminated from the show that season, she’s up for anything.
“If I get a call to go sing with Willie Nelson, I say yes because I’m both terrified and just exhilarated by the opportunity, and I just keep showing up to these things,” the singer-guitarist said. “I think I’m curious to see if I can pull it off, and when I do, the victory ride home is just massive, an epic day for me.”
There have been lots of big wins since Wynonna took the stage with her mother, Naomi. From 1983-91, The Judds, with their sweet harmonies, had 14 No. 1 country songs, including “Why Not Me,” “Girls’ Night Out,” “Love Is Alive” and “Have Mercy.” The Grammy Award winners were riding high when a chronic case of Hepatitis C forced Naomi to retire. Wynonna went solo in 1992.
“I was willing to go out on stage at the [American Music Awards] in front of all my peers in every genre of music and sing for the first time by myself, terrified,” she recalled. “My mother taught me to fail brilliantly; it was her motto. And what happened was that Ashley [Judd, sister and actress] and I both turned it around and made it, I think, the ability to just be at times fearless.”
Success kept coming. Her first three singles — “She Is His Only Need,” “I Saw the Light” and “No One Else on Earth” — topped the country charts. “Something You Can’t Live
Without” is Wynonna’s latest single. She helped her husband, drummer Cactus Moser, write the rocking track with David Lee Murphy.
Asked when a new disc would be out, she said, “You know the old saying, ‘There will be no wine before its time?’ There will be no Wy before,” she stopped in mid-sentence to laugh. “Nowadays it’s harder to find certain songs that I want to sing because all of the songs being written are for 20- and 30-year-olds. It’s a little bit tougher to find a song that I can relate to; it’s taking a little extra time.”
She’s being patient.
“I’m looking for fun, that’s another thing a song is going to have to have, that sassy fun to it, because I’m pretty grateful as well as just so full of myself because I have put up with and dealt with so much in 30 years.”
One of the biggest challenges: her husband’s devastating motorcycle accident that took his leg and nearly his life last year. The couple decided to share their story; “Wynonna & Cactus: The Road Back” airs on Great American Country.
“You go from newlywed to nurse in a matter of seconds. It was only two months into our marriage, and I was still in that glow of saying ‘I do.’ And all of the sudden I’m watching him be life-flighted and, oh, by the way, I don’t know if he’s going to live in the next 10 minutes, and I’ve got a 45-minute ride in a car.
“I think this stuff, it not only makes you stronger, we’re bonded for life. And I think we wanted to tell our story not because we’re famous but because of the inspiration it’s given to so many,” Wynonna said. “We all need to see modern-day miracles and have hope.”
Wynonna and The Big Noise, including Moser, will play an 8 p.m. show July 20 at Hollywood Casino Toledo. Tickets are $45.
“I’ve been doing chores,” Wynonna said during a call from her farm near Nashville, Tenn. “That’s why I go on the road so I can be a diva. What I mean by ‘diva’ is I can luxuriate and bask in the glory of 12 hours of sleep and hmmm, I think I’ll go take a walk or I’ll take a nap or put more sparkle on my hair and then I can go out and get all that love and attention from the fans.
“I, of course, relish it; after 30 years you realize, oh my gosh, this is such a privilege.”
