Carly Pearce uses country music to cure heartbreak at Ryman concert

Before she turned 29, Carly Pearce loved romance as hard as she tried to achieve mainstream country music success.

Then, at 29, she was married and divorced in the same year.

Pearce, now 32, lived out her self-described "country music dreams" during her first of two nights headlining at the Ryman Auditorium. Alongside guest appearances from a trio of her fellow Grand Ole Opry members -- the organization's current oldest longest-standing member, "Whisperin'" Bill Anderson, Rascal Flatts' lead vocalist Gary LeVox and bluegrass icon Ricky Skaggs -- she stood in the genre's mother church singing a century of its best-loved songs with its foundational stars. In addition, she proved that country music can cure a broken heart.

Moreover, on multiple levels, she revealed how those curative moments added a new wrinkle to the family traditions upon which country music's historical legacy is built.

Pearce also arrived on stage as country music's most notable acclaim-achieving female artist of the post-COVID quarantine era. She's the reigning Academy of Country Music and Country Music Association female artist and vocalist of the year, plus is currently nominated for five 2022 Country Music Association Awards. As mentioned, she's also a newly-minted member of the Opry, plus she achieved her third No. 1 single on country radio via the Ashley McBryde duet "Never Wanted to Be That Girl." She'll also close out the year by being inducted into her native state's Kentucky Music Hall of Fame.

But back to that heartbreak thing.

At the Ryman, Pearce's set was as much a showcase of her powerful voice as it was Carly from Taylor Mill, who moved to Dollywood and Nashville and almost didn't make it big (her boss when she cleaned AirBnB's while struggling to achieve success in Music City was present in attendance) finally catching up with her girlfriends (and their boyfriends and husbands holding their coats, patiently waiting for their mates to stop screaming and telling their friend how much they love her -- news flash, she "loves them too") after she'd been busy and away from home.

Most people lay bare their hearts when they're performing intensely personal music. But Pearce is a victim of heartbreak now, so instead, she opened up and showed us the pillars -- yes, "written in stone," perhaps -- upon which her moral constitution and physical strength are now built.

More on Carly Pearce:'A lot of the dreams that I had are coming true'

Set opener "Diamondback" sounded precisely like the illogical, embittered kiss-off anthem that it's meant to be. She's lying. Co-ownership of the "material lies" of the "never-ending honeymoon of marital bliss represented by "shiny swimming pools" was as much once a life goal of Pearce's as headlining at the Ryman Auditorium. However, "what [she] thought [she] wanted let [her] down." Another lie. It didn't just "let her down."

It almost destroyed her.

In the context of a concert where she openly denied herself the catharsis of crying through a dream moment, ostensibly not to allow her heartbreak to have that much power over her, it was fascinating. In theory -- and in award-winning and chart-topping presentation -- "29"'s songs are redemptive anthems. But, if you are a fan of following country music's century-long tradition, the album tricks you by seemingly casting her as yet another in a long line of women who are unafraid of exchanging fisticuffs with a cheating partner, calling them a deserter running away from love or cautiously thinking a potential mate is crazy and asking her mother for advice.

However, at the Ryman, the exhaustive frailty that actually guides Pearce's superstar-making album revealed itself.

There were numerous times when Pearce was attempting to perform "29"'s title song that her admission of live performances being where she felt safe, understood, and "able to escape [her] real life, plus "coming from a long line of "strong women" who "tell it like it is" were met with passionate screams of joy from the crowd. She quickly chastised them on both occasions by saying, "don't do that; those aren't good things."

As a table setter for a song about "[finding herself]" as a financially secure and married woman that was written when both of those things were very much both up for debate, it cast the song in its proper light. It's not so much a torch song as much as it is a song that steals its barely beating metaphorical heart from the throes of crippling cynicism.

To that end, her song "Dear Miss Loretta" is the rawest, most honest of performances. On a stage that the late Loretta Lynn played countless times, it resonated more powerfully.

Loretta Lynn memorial:Loretta Lynn to be honored in CMT-broadcasted Grand Ole Opry Celebration

Wynonna to recreate farewell concert:Wynonna enlists Brandi Carlile, Kelsea Ballerini to recreate Judds farewell concert

Before performing it, she told the Opry, as she told The Tennessean on the day the country legend passed away, that, like Lynn, Mee Maw Pearce (her grandmother) was a coal miner's daughter. Moreover, her love of Lynn was inspired by her Mee Maw, who told her that she had to love the icon to "matter" in country music.

The song, lyrically, describes a private moment where Pearce seeks counsel from Lynn in her hour of need. Connect Lynn to her Mee Maw and it's a song that feels like the most painstaking epilogue to The Judds' 1984 hit "Mama He's Crazy."

Moreover, in a similar vein, guest appearances from Anderson, LeVox and Skaggs weren't as much "cool" things that revealed Pearce's love of bluegrass, the Opry, and radio-ready pop country. Sure, that's there, and those are cornerstone parts of understanding her nearly two-decade-long career. However, the trio of performers has lived a combined 200 years of life. Via country music's family, they are as much Pearce's contemporaries as her musical uncles and cousin. Family circles the wagons around family in need. It's tradition.

Bill Anderson singing his Dolly Parton duet "Some Day It Will All Make Sense" was a fantastic moment. He's written hit songs for Kenny Chesney, Vince Gill and George Strait (among many) in his six-decade career. Plus, his first No. 1 single, "Mama Sang a Song," arrived in 1962. "You are what the future of country music is all about," stated Anderson to Pearce. It was as much a factual statement as it was his way of telling her that life is a journey and she had more good days ahead than bad ones behind her.

Notably, too, for different reasons, Ricky Skaggs joining Pearce for a passionate take on Bill Monroe's 1947-released bluegrass "Blue Moon of Kentucky" and Pearce joining Gary LeVox for a variation on Rascal Flatts' 15-year old hit "What Hurts The Most" were poignant.

On the former, Pearce's unclouded past with country music was highlighted. The "Next Girl" vocalist was thoroughly overcome with glee in partnering with the icon. On the latter, it felt like the encapsulation of what songs she performed from her previous releases like "Hide The Wine," "If My Name Was Whiskey" and her show closer (which she performed with her opener -- and fellow Big Machine label-mate Jackson Dean) "I Hope You're Happy Now" was trying to accomplish.

Yes, there's something about driving around Interstate 40 or down 16th Avenue South with a heart full of heartbreak and belting out a banger that feels just right.

Yet, what may feel better than that is living a life feeling emotionally healed and spiritually whole.

Though possibly not there yet, Pearce -- alongside what feels like a sold-out auditorium of her best friends and her family onstage -- is much further along in her self-redemption that likely she, or anyone else who has endured what she has, could ever expect to be.

Carly Pearce at the Ryman Auditorium night 1 setlist

• Diamondback

• You Kissed Me First

• Easy Going

• Dear Miss Loretta

• Should've Known Better

• Never Wanted To Be That Girl

• If My Name Was Whiskey

• Some Day it Will All Make Sence (with "Whisperin'" Bill Anderson)

• Next Girl

• Everybody Gonna Talk

• 29

• Every Little Thing

• Show Me Around

• Blue Moon of Kentucky (with Ricky Skaggs)

• What He Didn't Do

• Hide The WineENCORE

• What Hurts The Most (with Gary LeVox)

• I Hope You're Happy Now (with Jackson Dean)

This article originally appeared on Nashville Tennessean: Carly Pearce headlines Nashville's Ryman Auditorium with Opry guests