Country music is alive and well, thanks in large part to Ella Langley. Langley’s “Choosin’ Texas“, from her sophomore Dandelion album, is Langley’s fourth No.1 single. Written by Langley, Miranda Lambert, Luke Dick, and Joybeth Taylor, the song also just made country music history.
“Choosin’ Texas” not only topped Billboard‘s Hot Country Songs and Country Airplay recently, but it also topped the all-genre Hot 100 chart. According to the Country Music Association, that makes Langley the first female artist to top all three charts at the same time.
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Not only that, but thanks to “Choosin’ Texas”, Langley also holds a record previously held by Taylor Swift. It became the top-selling song in 2026, beating out Taylor Swift’s “The Fate Of Ophelia”.
“I can’t thank y’all enough for what you’ve done with this song,” Langley says of “Choosin’ Texas”. “It blows my mind every single day. Here’s to women and country music.”
The Story Behind “Choosin’ Texas” by Ella Langley
Langley was at a writers’ retreat with Lambert, Dick, and Taylor when she had the idea for “Choosin’ Texas”. The song says, ““She’s from Texas, I can tell by the way / He’s two steppin’ ’round the room / And judgin’ by the smile that’s written on his face / There’s nothin’ I can do / It doesn’t take a crystal ball to see / A cowboy always finds a way to leave / Drinkin’ Jack all by myself / He’s choosin’ Texas, I can tell.”
“I had the amazing opportunity to sit down in a room with Miranda, Luke, and Joybeth on a writing retreat about a year ago,” Langley recalls (via Country Now). “We wrote a bunch of songs together, but the second one really stuck with me. Miranda, being from Texas, started telling us one of her wild stories about drinking and doing something ridiculous. And I said, ‘Well, she’s from Texas, I can tell.’ As soon as I said that, we all just looked at each other like —yep, that’s it! That’s the next song. She’s from Texas, the girl he went with. And I thought well…you know I love a song like that.”
Lambert not only co-wrote “Choosin’ Texas”, but she is also one of the producers of Dandelion. Perhaps more importantly, Lambert is also a big fan of Langley.
“Ella may have grown up in Alabama, but she has a rowdy, fiery side that us Texas women recognize and respect,” Lambert boasts. “She’s an artist through and through, and it was important to me to let her artistry shine through at every stage of the process, from co- writing to co-producing. I’m so proud of how “Choosin’ Texas” does that.”
Photo by Michael Buckner/Billboard via Getty Images
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