Ella Langley ended her Dandelion Tour with a confession. On Oct. 31, at Grand Casino Arena in St. Paul, Minnesota, the Alabama singer told the crowd that one of the most personal songs she sings almost belonged to somebody else.
“Multiple artists had this one on hold,” she said.
The song is “Speaking Terms,” a quiet prayer of a song from her album “Dandelion.” Ella didn’t write it. Her close friend Joybeth Taylor wrote it with Nashville songwriter Helene Cronin.
It has been quite a year for Ella. “Dandelion” came out in April and debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 album chart. She goes into the CMA Awards on Nov. 18 with nine nominations, more than anyone else this year. The show airs at 8 p.m. ET on ABC, with Lainey Wilson as host.
In Nashville, an artist can put a song “on hold.” That means the writers agree not to give it away while the singer decides whether to record it. A hold can last a few days or a long time. Plenty of songs sit on hold with one star and end up with another.
Ella knew “Speaking Terms” well before it was ever hers. Helene Cronin explained on her website that Joybeth “began to get a lot of notice playing this song around Nashville.” She added, “As Joybeth’s best friend, Ella heard it often.”
So why didn’t Ella grab it sooner? She told the St. Paul crowd she didn’t feel she deserved it yet.
“I just wanted the song to win, and I didn’t feel like at the time I was worth enough for it until I had that moment,” she said, as reported by Holler.
Whiskey Riff described that moment as one of spiritual reflection. Ella has talked openly this year about leaning on God. At a show in Auburn, Alabama, she said the song made her think about “how much I’m praying for being on speaking terms with Jesus.”
Once she felt ready, she called one of the writers. “I called her right then, and I said, ‘Hey, can I put that song on hold?'” Ella recalled. The answer came fast. “She said, ‘Absolutely, yes.'”
Before that call, though, the song had already been making the rounds. Then Ella named some of the artists who had held it before her.
“Beyoncé had this song on hold for a second, believe it or not,” Ella said.
The pop superstar was working on country music at the time. Whiskey Riff reported that her hold came while she was recording “Cowboy Carter,” the 2024 country album that later won the Grammy for Album of the Year.
The other name will sound familiar to every country fan. Ella said Cody Johnson, the Texas singer known for “‘Til You Can’t,” had it on hold too. “And there’s a lot of people that this song didn’t land on,” she added.
Neither star commented on Ella’s story in the Holler or Whiskey Riff reports.
In the end, it landed with the singer who had heard it most. Helene Cronin wrote that the song then “stayed in the pile of potential songs for DANDELION” for a year and a half before it made the album.
This is the official audio from her album “Dandelion.”
Hear Ella’s recording of “Speaking Terms”
Ella can also hold a room with nothing but a guitar. Here she sings her biggest hit for Billboard’s Women in Music event.
Ella sings “Choosin’ Texas” at Billboard Women in Music
On Nov. 18, Ella will walk into the CMA Awards as the most nominated artist of the night. The song she almost let go is one she still lives by. “I work every day to be a little bit better on being on speaking terms with Jesus,” she told her Auburn crowd, as Holler reported in September.