Songwriter extraordinaire, guitar-slinger, author and Southern belle supreme Marshall Chapman will be playing her first Houston gig in ages Thursday, February 17, at McGonigel's Mucky Duck.

According to Chapman, Tuesday night's release party at Nashville's Bluebird for her latest album, Big Lonesome, an homage to her longtime musical partner Tim Krekel, was a smash.

"Will Kimbrough played with me and we played the songs from Big Lonesome top to bottom, something I have never done, but it went great," she says. "Rodney Crowell - Houston's own - was in the audience, and we're still buzzing."

Both Chapman and Crowell have new books to promote. Crowell's memoir of his Telephone Road childhood, Chinaberry Sidewalks, is due out in January; Chapman's book, They Came To Nashville, has just been released by Vanderbilt University Press. Hers chronicles the lives of 15 writers and performers, ranging from legends like Bobby Bare, John Hiatt, Kris Kristofferson, Emmylou Harris and Crowell to newcomers like Miranda Lambert.

It opens with a zinger: "The night I met Billy Joe Shaver, my hair caught on fire. I kid you not. The year was 1971. The place was Nashville, Tennessee."

Pretty compelling reading so far.

Chapman is a larger-than-life character, so don't be surprised if something equally wacky happens during her gig at the Duck (listen to Krekel's description of her on