
Meet the queer vanguard of country music
CNN
LGBTQ country stars like Orville Peck, Patrick Haggerty of Lavender Country and Allison Russell are challenging country music stereotypes -- and broadening the genre. They open up about what it means to tell authentic stories.
Orville Peck's got a fringed mask that obscures most of his face and a cowboy hat with an upturned brim. You'll never see him without them, just like Dolly would never let you catch her without a full face of makeup.
Maybe you've heard or seen of Peck, a country star on the rise -- one of his songs just appeared in HBO's "Euphoria," and last year he appeared in ads for Beyoncé's Ivy Park collection. With his striking accessories -- not to mention his acrobatic voice, evocative of Elvis -- he's hard to miss.

More than two decades ago, on January 24, 2004, I landed in Baghdad as a legal adviser, assigned an office in what was then known as the Green Zone. It was raining and cold, and my duffle bag was thrown into a puddle off the C-130 aircraft that had just done a corkscrew dive to reach the runway without risk of ground fire. Young American soldiers greeted me as we piled into a vehicle, sped out of the airport complex and then along a road called the “Highway of Death” due to car bombs and snipers.












