Songfacts®:

• Jana Kramer is a popular actress who played Alex Dupre on the young adult television drama, One Tree Hill. In February 2011, she signed with Warner Bros. Nashville Records and after a couple of promotional releases, this story of two young people falling in love was released as her first official single. She debuted the song on the One Tree Hill eighth season finale on May 17, 2011.
• This song was written by the Nashville songwriters Ashley Gorley, Catt Gravitt and Chris DeStefano. "That was just a great, fun, day," Gravitt told us. "Ashley came in and had a great vibe, and just started off running on the song, then we dove in on it. Ashley had to leave at like 3:30 to go pick up his kids, which I completely love and respect that about him. And Chris and I finished up the demo."
• Though Kramer didn't pen the song, she can readily identify with it. "'Why Ya Wanna' is a song that everyone can relate to," she said. "When I first heard the song, I was hooked immediately. It was literally everything I was going through and more, so it meant a lot to record a personal song that became my first single."
• The video was directed by Kristin Barlowe, who also did the clip for Gwyneth Paltrow's "Country Strong." The song's co-writer Catt Gravitt went to the shoot. She told us: "Kristin found this amazing cabin way out in the woods. It belonged to a couple that didn't even speak English - I think they were from Spain. It was this beautiful couple that had this gorgeous little nook in the woods that was basically off the grid, so we were just out in the woods. I couldn't even tell you where it was."
  
  Gravitt says that it watching the video being made, it was was clear that the photogenic Kramer was going to connect with her visual presence. "As I was watching, it reminded me of when Faith Hill first came out," she said. "How instantly she just became the character, and people just fell in love with watching that."
• The song was released to radio during the week of Kramer's last One Tree Hill episode. It was added to the playlists of more than 55 radio stations across the country, the most of a debut artist since the inception of the Country Aircheck/Mediabase chart.
• "The very first time I heard it, I was so sick. I had bronchitis," Kramer recalled to Billboard magazine of hearing this song on the radio. "I needed to go get medicine at the store, and all of a sudden, I heard my name on the car stereo receiver. I thought 'No way.' I turned it up and, sure enough, it was me. I started screaming with this little voice that I had."