Miranda Lambert Performs John Prine’s ‘That’s the Way the World Goes ‘Round’ for Big Night (At the Museum)

Miranda Lambert honored John Prine during the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum’s Big Night (At the Museum) benefit show last week, performing the late singer/songwriter’s “That’s the Way the World Goes ‘Round” while playing Prine’s David Russell Young custom-made guitar.

Lambert, who grew up listening to Prine, performed solo on an empty stage decorated with string lights. “I felt that I have John Prine’s string grease on my fingers,” she joked after playing. “I don’t want to wash my hands.”

Prine wrote “That’s the Way the World Goes ‘Round” for his 1978 album Bruised Orange. In Great Days: The John Prine Anthology liner notes, Prine shared that the inspiration for the song came from him being “kind of fed up with a lot of cynicism that I saw in people, even in myself at the time. I wanted to find a way to get back to a better world, more childlike. I immediately went back and started writing from a child’s perspective.”

The song is a meaningful one to Lambert, who covered “That’s the Way the World Goes ‘Round” on her 2009 album, Revolution. She also had the lyrics engraved on the fire pit at her Tennessee farm along with Prine’s signature. Following Prine’s death in April, Lambert shared the fire pit with fans on her Instagram Story, posting a video of the silver globe. “This is the fire pit at the farm,” she wrote over the video. “John wrote these lyrics for me and signed it and we had them cut into the metal. … He did set my world on fire. All of ours.”

The Texas native also shared an Instagram post dedicated to Prine, uploading a black-and-white photo of the two together. “thank you for everything. One and only. #hellointhere #johnprine,” she wrote. Prine died on April 7 due to complications from COVID-19.

Other performers during Big Night (At the Museum) included Tim McGraw, Kane Brown, Ashley McBryde, Brad Paisley, Reba McEntire and more. While the show was free, viewers were encouraged to donate to the Museum through YouTube Giving and over $590,000 has been raised so far.