"Would You Hold It Against Me" is a song co-written and recorded by American

country music Country (also called country and western) is a genre of popular music that originated in the Southern and Southwestern United States in the early 1920s. It primarily derives from blues, church music such as Southern gospel and spirituals, ...

singer

Dottie West Dorothy Marie Marsh West (October 11, 1932 – September 4, 1991) was an American country music singer and songwriter. Along with her friends and fellow recording artists Patsy Cline and Loretta Lynn, she is considered one of the genre's most in ...

. It was released in March 1966 as the second single from the album '' Suffer Time''. West wrote the song with her then-husband Bill. By 1966, Dottie West's professional career in Country music was only getting started. However, two years before, West achieved her first Top 10 hit with " Here Comes My Baby". The song won West a

Grammy award The Grammy Awards (stylized as GRAMMY), or simply known as the Grammys, are awards presented by the Recording Academy of the United States to recognize "outstanding" achievements in the music industry. They are regarded by many as the most pres ...

for ''

Best Female Country Vocal Performance The Grammy Award for Best Female Country Vocal Performance was first awarded in 1965, to Dottie West. The award has had several minor name changes: *From 1965 to 1967 the award was known as Best Country & Western Vocal Performance - Female *In 1 ...

'' in 1965, making West the first female Country singer to ever win a Grammy. However, after the success of "Here Comes My Baby", West couldn't really follow-up her success with another Top 10 hit for a while, and West never won a Grammy award again, although she would receive several later nominations. However, 1966 was a year of great change for West. Not only did she release her highest-selling solo album of all time ("Suffer Time"), but she also released the single "Would You Hold It Against Me". The song was written by West and her husband Bill. The song was released on her new album that year, and was soon released to the Country charts. The song became Dottie West's biggest hit of the year, peaking at number 5 on the

Hot Country Songs Hot Country Songs is a chart published weekly by ''Billboard'' magazine in the United States. This 50-position chart lists the most popular country music songs, calculated weekly by collecting airplay data from Nielsen BDS along with digital sal ...

list in 1966. The song was West's biggest hit as a solo artist that decade. "Would You Hold It Against Me" was definitely a

Nashville Sound The Nashville Sound originated during the mid-1950s as a subgenre of American country music, replacing the chart dominance of the rough honky tonk music, which was most popular in the 1940s and 1950s, with "smooth strings and choruses", "sophist ...

recording, with

violins The violin, sometimes known as a ''fiddle'', is a wooden chordophone (string instrument) in the violin family. Most violins have a hollow wooden body. It is the smallest and thus highest-pitched instrument (soprano) in the family in regular ...

and other string instruments that can be heard in the background of the song. "Would You Hold It Against Me" set the stage for a couple of other hits in the 1960s for West.

Charts

References

{{Dottie West singles 1966 singles Dottie West songs RCA Records singles Songs written by Dottie West 1966 songs