JENNIFER LOVE HEWITT® - The Biography of My Love

Known as "Love" to family and friends, and just about the entire world, JENNIFER LOVE HEWITT^{^™®} was born LOVE HEWITT^{^™®} (named after her mother's college best friend) on February 21, 19 blah, blah, blah, blah ('79, a Pisces) to the parents of Herbert Daniel Hewitt and Patricia Mae Shipp in Waco, Texas, and raised in nearby Killeen, Texas. Her mother (Italian ethnicity) was a speech pathologist and her father (German ethnicity) is a medical technician.

Her parents were divorced when Love was two weeks old. To this day, Jennifer Love Hewitt keeps in touch with her father.

Jennifer is also a regular visitor to TIFFANY'S---in fact, staffers greet her when she walks in as though she was Norm from the TV sitcom, CHEERS. Her ritual is always the same: she slips on her favorite ring with a classic round stone ("Sometimes, I try on a 3-carat, sometimes the 4"), admires it for a while and then leaves. "I've just always been obsessed with weddings and romance," she says. "I mean, my mom named me 'Love'. Maybe she kind of screwed me up there."

-from an interview between Jennifer Love Hewitt and
Lifetime Magaizne writer Jancee Dunn (May 2004 issue)

When Love was 3 years old, she step away from her mother at a dinner club, and was found on stage, singing the Kris Kristofferson classic composition, "Help Me Make It Through The Night." Later, Love started taking singing and dancing lessons.

While still in Texas, Love was voted a "living doll" in a Texas beauty pageant, and at the age of nine, she joined the Texas Show Team, singing the Whitney Houston classic, "The Greatest Love of All" and the Patsy Cline's classic, "Crazy" to a bunch of pigs...actual "oinkers" in a pig barn. And then later, Love performed in the U.S.S.R. and Denmark.

"I was 6 years old and I performed at a dance recital at one of the local high schools for my dance group. And I was always kind of put in the back of the dancing line because I had been one of the people at this dance studio for the longest period of time, so they always put the new people up front. So this one particular year I kind of kept moving my way to the front, singing and everything, so they decided that they would let me sing. I performed 'The Greatest Love of All.' And the mic was off the entire time. And I was just kind of screaming it at the top of my lungs."

- JENNIFER LOVE HEWITT
once said on excercising
her first love: "singing"

The singing tradition is within the blood of the Hewitt family detouring from another famous family.

Did you know that Jennifer Love Hewitt is---in a way---related to the legendary country singer, PATSY CLINE?

Love's grandmother is the third cousin to Mrs. Cline-Dick (1932-1963) who had classic hits like "I Fall To Pieces" and "Crazy" composed by Willie Nelson.

Patsy Cline born VIRGINIA PATTERSON HENSLEY (named after the state of her birth) on September 8, 1932 in the Shenandoah Valley of Winchester, Virginia. The name: "Patsy Cline" was created with "Patsy" coming from a suggestion by her first manager and "Cline" coming from her first husband, Gerald, in 1953.

When Virginia (Patsy) was little, she wanted to become a dancer. Her idol was screen legend SHIRLEY TEMPLE. But then her next talent turned to singing and piano, and she left her tap dancing shoes behind.

Patsy's first case of facing death was suffering rheumatic fever at age 13. Patsy recalled the ironic fortune of this illness brought her booming singing voice like the booming singing voice of the legendary singer, KATE "God Bless America" SMITH. Patsy taught herself to play the piano by ear. Patsy never learned how to read music.

Her second case of facing death was in 1961 when Patsy and her brother Sam Hensley were involved in a head-on car collision. As a result of the accident, Patsy had a large scar on her forehead that prompted her to wear wigs at her public appearances.

Country Hits like "Walkin After Midnight", "Crazy", "I Fall To Pieces", "True Love", "Sweet Dreams" and more blazed the road of success for Patsy's singing career.

Legend has it that one time Patsy had to quit high school in order to clerk in a drug store to help support her family. In fact, when country music legend & publisher ROY ACUFF offered her a job on his radio show, Patsy decided that she could make more money working in the drug store than on a radio show. So Patsy went back to Winchester, VA.

Wake up ever mornin,
Heart's full of pain,
Looked out the window,
And it's pourin down with rain,
And I cried, "Baby! Oh baby…
Don't ever leave me again!"

from "DON'T EVER LEAVE ME AGAIN"
Composed by Lillian Claiborne,
James Crawford Jr. and
Virginia Hensley (aka: Patsy Cline)
Published by Sony/ATV Acuff-Rose Music Publishing Inc. (BMI). All Rights Reserved.

10 years after Patsy's death, posthumous achievements were awarded to Patsy. A list of some achievements and some images was courtesy of PatsyCline.com and PatsyCline.info.

In 1973 Patsy Cline was elected into the COUNTRY MUSIC HALL OF FAME.

The Recording Academy aka: THE GRAMMYS honored Patsy Cline and her two hit songs. In 1992 the GRAMMY HALL OF FAME inducted "CRAZY" (composed by WILLIE NELSON); and in 2001, "I FALL TO PIECES" (composed by HANK COCHRAN and HARLAND HOWARD). And in 1995, Patsy was awarded posthumously the GRAMMY LIFETIME ACHIEVEMENT AWARD.

And "SWEET DREAMS" (1985 - Click the title to order the DVD), another critical acclaimed, biographical motion picture look at the singer's rise to fame, starring 1982 Academy Award winner JESSICA LANGE as Patsy Cline and Academy Award nominee ED HARRIS as husband Charlie Dick.

In 1993, The United States Post Office commemoratived the memory of Patsy with a Patsy Cline First Class Postal Stamp.

On August 3, 1999, Hollywood honored Patsy Cline by making her the 2,141 inductee of a star on the HOLLYWOOD WALK OF FAME. Her star is located between screen legends YUL BRYNNER and BARRY SULLIVAN at 6160 Hollywood Boulevard in Hollywood, CA. Charlie Dick and their daughter, Julie, attended the unveiling.

In 2000 at the historic Universal Studios in Universal City, CA (where cousin Jennifer Love Hewitt works at, filming her CBS TV series "Ghost Whisperer"), a street was renamed after Patsy, "PATSY CLINE DRIVE"; and a Universal Studio office building #5225 was renamed the 'OWEN BRADLEY BUILDING" for Patsy Cline's long time record producer.

Charlie Dick and daughter Julie accepting on behalf of wife and mother Patsy in 1999.

Back in her hometown, a bell tower has been erected in her memory at the Shenandoah Memorial Park, where Patsy Cline is interred. Several Highways, including the Patsy Cline Memorial Highway, Route 522, and Patsy Cline Boulevard in Winchester, WVA have been named to commemorate her life.

And this is a triumph! According to PatsyCline.com: Patsy Cline was listed in the 2005 Edition of the Guinness Book of World Records for the album "Patsy Cline's Greatest Hits" having the most weeks on the U. S. Charts by a female artist (of all genre): 722 weeks total, with 251 of them at #1.

Matraca Berg (first name pronounced Muh-TRACE-ah: defined as “exotic hillbilly"), a distanly related cousin to Patsy Cline, made the biggest decision of her life while she was still a kid, she decided to devote her life to writing songs and singing. As a little girl, Matraca grew up surrounded by show business. Aunt Sudie Callaway was a successful Music Row backup singer. “Aunt” Lois Johnson (not an actual relative, but so close she has the designation) became a recording artist and Hank Williams Jr.’s duet partner. Aunts Coleida Callaway and Clara Howard were the backup vocalists on Kentucky’s Renfro Valley Barn Dance. Uncle Jim Baker is a Nashville steel-guitar player who ran Mel Tillis’ song publishing companies for a time.

Matraca is the daughter of an unwed mother, Mama Icie Berg, who migrated from Harlan County to Music City in the 1960s as a singer and songwriter. Later Mama met Ron Berg, Ron Berg, a Vanderbilt University graduate student. He adopted Matraca. Ron taught Matraca how to play piano and was a good father to her. But Icie missed the music world desperately and returned to Nashville. Several years later, Icie became a nurse and married songwriter Dave Kirby (“Is Anybody Goin’ to San Antone,” “Memories to Burn,” “There Ain’t No Good Chain Gang,” etc.). She deferred her own music dreams to her gifted daughter. Mother and daughter even became songwriting partners when Icie saw the gift and talent in her teenage daughter.

When Icie felt that Matraca was ready, Icie began to take her to Music Row song publishing companies. When young Matraca played her songs for established songwriter Bobby Braddock (“He Stopped Loving Her Today,” “Golden Ring,” “D-I-V-O-R-C-E,” etc.), he volunteered to cowrite with the newcomer. Their collaboration, “Faking Love,” sung by T.G. Sheppard and Karen Brooks, topped the charts on February 19, 1983. Matraca and her mother were overjoyed. The result was Matraca's her first No. 1 record as a songwriter at age 18. That, in turn, has qualified her to become one of the youngest Hall of Fame nominees in history: To be eligible, a writer must have first achieved prominence at least 25 years ago.

In the years since, Berg’s songs have practically become the soundtrack of contemporary Nashville and recorded by artists like: Clint Black, Suzy Bogguss, Deana Carter, Terri Clark, The Dixie Chicks, Sara Evans, Faith Hill, Patty Loveless, Martina McBride, Mindy McCready, Reba McEntire, Linda Ronstadt, Pam Tillis, Randy Travis, Tanya Tucker, Keith Urban, Trisha Yearwood, The Legendary Dusty Springfield, and Patsy Cline's best friend and Country Legend Loretta Lynn. And the list grows.

Also The Nitty Gritty Dirt Band has recorded Matraca's songs. Ironically, on December 4, 1993 she married singer-songwriter and an original member of The Nitty Gritty Dirt Band, Jeff Hanna.

In 1989, RCA Records (a BMG Record) offered Matraca Berg a recording contract. "Lying to the Moon", her debut CD, appeared in 1990. Its singles “Baby Walk On” and “The Things You Left Undone” cracked the top-40, but subsequent releases fared less well. The label decided not to release her follow-up CD, Bittersweet Surrender. But Berg never gave up as she continued to record a new album in 1993. Berg issued "The Speed of Grace," again on RCA. Recorded in Los Angeles, the album was another gathering of her sterling compositions, plus a striking version of “Jolene,” written by one of her role models, Dolly Parton.

By now one of the most respected songwriters of her generation, Matraca Berg earned a second recording contract in 1996. The following year she issued Sunday Morning to Saturday Night on Rising Tide Records.

“That Train Don’t Run” and “Back in the Saddle” made the country charts from the CD, and its “Good Ol’ Girl” became the title tune to the well-received theatrical production.

“Making records has done more for my career than anything, I think. It raised my profile as a writer like nothing else. It was because of my records that Trisha and Martina and Faith and everyone recorded my songs. But none of my records was exactly like I wanted them to be. There would be a few shining moments here and there. Now I want to make something that is absolutely, without a doubt, me. And I think I do know exactly what I want to sound like.”

-MATRACA BERG

Matraca Berg now has nearly 400 published songs and has earned a dozen BMI songwriter awards. But she does not consider herself to be ready for the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame. At least, not yet.

“I do love my cowriters. I respect them tremendously. But one main reason that I like to cowrite is that I am so hard on myself that I can’t get anything done when I write alone. I need someone say, ‘That is fine. That is good.’ Otherwise, I just kill myself. “Lately, I’ve been writing with some of the younger writers. I’ve got some experience, and my publisher wants me to teach them something. They’ll probably teach me something, too. I had the good fortune of having people like Bobby Braddock and Harlan Howard (one of the song writers of Patsy Cline's first #1 hit "I Fall To Pieces") devote their time to me, teaching me and opening their hearts. It was done for me, and now I’m helping to pass it on down. I don’t really feel wise. But I do have some knowledge.”

-MATRACA BERG

Properties: Amazon.com & Zomba Recording Corporation - Bertelsmann Companies, The Associated Press, Matraca Berg and Universal Music Group,
The Patsy Cline Estate & PatsyCline.com, PatsyCline.info, Copyright Control, Country Music Hall of Fame, Dennis Maxim Inc., and Love Songs Inc. All Rights Reserved.