Pancho and Lefty (1983)

"Pancho and Lefty", originally "Poncho and Lefty", is a song written by American country singer-songwriter Townes Van Zandt. Perhaps his most well-known song, Van Zandt recorded his original version of this song for his 1972 album The Late Great Townes Van Zandt. The song has been recorded by several artists since its composition and performance by Van Zandt, with a 1983 version by Willie Nelson and Merle Haggard reaching number one on the Billboard country chart.

In 2021, Van Zandt's version was ranked number 498 on Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Songs of All Time. In 2024 it was ranked number 499.

Music and lyrics

The song is composed as a ballad of four stanzas which use the refrain: "All the Federales say they could've had him any day/ They only let him slip away out of kindness I suppose." The first two stanzas are sung back-to-back with the refrain being sung only after the second stanza. The verses of the first stanza introduce Pancho as a restless young soul who leaves home and his loving mother to seek his fortune south of the border. The verses of the second stanza describe him as a Mexican bandit, who "wore his gun outside his pants for all the honest world to feel". The third stanza tells of Pancho's eventual death in "the deserts down in Mexico" and implies that he was betrayed to the federales by Lefty in exchange for being allowed to return to the United States. Lefty spends the last years of his life in a hotel in Cleveland, apparently regretful of his actions. The fourth stanza poetizes Pancho's life and appears to evoke sympathy for Lefty's attempted homecoming.

While Van Zandt did not intend for Pancho to be Pancho Villa, he did not rule out the idea. In an interview, he recalled, "I realize that I wrote it, but it's hard to take credit for the writing, because it came from out of the blue. It came through me and it's a real nice song, and I think, I've finally found out what it's about. I've always wondered what it's about. I kinda always knew it wasn't about Pancho Villa, and then somebody told me that Pancho Villa had a buddy whose name in Spanish meant 'Lefty.' But in the song, my song, Pancho gets hung...and the real Pancho Villa was assassinated."

Background and reception

Like much of Van Zandt's output, the song went largely unnoticed at the time of its release on the album The Late Great Townes Van Zandt in 1972. Neither it nor its parent album made any music charts. In 1973, Lonnie Knight played with Van Zandt for a week at the Rubaiyat in Dallas, Texas. He brought this song back to Minneapolis with him and recorded it on his first album, Family In The Wind, in 1974.

In 1977, Emmylou Harris covered the song on her album Luxury Liner. Harris says she feels it is "her song", and it was this recording of the song that Willie Nelson first heard.

Willie Nelson and Merle Haggard recorded a version for their July 1983 duet album Pancho & Lefty. In the documentary Be Here to Love Me, Nelson states that when he asked Van Zandt what the song was about Van Zandt replied that he didn't know. Nelson also recalls how his album with Haggard was nearly completed but he felt they didn't have "that blockbuster, you know, that one big song for a good single and a video, and my daughter Lana suggested that we listen to 'Pancho and Lefty.' I had never heard it and Merle had never heard it." Lana Nelson returned with a copy of the song and Nelson cut it immediately with his band in the middle of the night but had to retrieve a sleeping Haggard, who had retired to his bus hours earlier, to record his vocal part.

The vocals were recorded in one take that night. The next day, Haggard wanted to rerecord his part, but Nelson told him the song had already been sent to New York. Haggard later stated that the song was the only one he had ever recorded before "he really knew it".

Van Zandt appears in the video for the song, playing one of the federales. "It was real nice they invited me," Van Zandt told Aretha Sills in 1994. "They didn't have to invite me and I made I think $100 a day. I was the captain of the federales. And plus I got to ride a horse. I always like that. It took four and a half days and that video was four and a half minutes long...The money goes by a strange life, or elsewhere."