After debuting the original version of “When A Cowboy Trades His Spurs For Wings”, the duo, Gillian Welch and David Rawlings, was set to take the stage for this song during the 91st Annual Academy Awards at Dolby Theatre on February 24 in Hollywood.
The song was nominated as the Best Original Song of Oscar, which is one of the beautiful soundtracks for The Ballad of Buster Scruggs in the Coen brothers’ omnibus movie by actor Tim Blake Nelson and singer-turned-actor Willie Watson.
The performance borrows the aesthetic of the west scenery in the film. Dressed in embroidered cowboy suits, surrounded by the starry sky of desert and immersed in the dark-pinky stage lights, the pair chanted in a soft voice with their authentic emotion, led us to a broad landscape stretching beyond the horizon. Even if the melody, rhythm and lyrics are simple, the performance left purity and beauty to the audience.
Watch Rawlings and Welch perform “When A Cowboy Trades His Spurs For Wings” below.
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