Waylon Jennings Estate Inks Management Deal With WME

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Waylon Jennings. Photo: Billy Mitchell

WME’s Legends group, a management company focused on estate, legacy artist and brand management, has partnered with the estate of Country Music Hall of Fame member Waylon Jennings.

The late country icon’s wife, CMA and Grammy winning artist and songwriter Jessi Colter, and their son, artist and producer Shooter Jennings, will work with WME Legends to manage Waylon’s name, image, likeness and intellectual property rights and assets.

“WME Legends is proud to be working with Jessi Colter, Shooter Jennings and the Waylon Jennings estate. Waylon is considered the most important force in country’s outlaw movement—not only creatively but also for the business standard he set for other artists to strive for in their musical freedom,” says Phil Sandhaus, head of WME Legends.

Waylon Jennings is one of the founding pioneers of the outlaw movement in country music. His career began when he starred in the film Nashville Rebel and scored top 10 hits with “The Chokin’ Kind” and “Only Daddy That’ll Walk the Line.” He won his first of two Grammy awards in 1969 for his collaboration with the Kimberlys on “MacArthur Park.”

Waylon’s albums released in the ’70s are some of his most renowned work, including Lonesome, On’ry and Mean and Honky Tonk Heroes. In 1976, Waylon released Wanted! The Outlaws which included songs by himself, his wife Jessi Colter, Willie Nelson, and Tompall Glaser. It became the first album in country music history to be certified Platinum.

Wanted! The Outlaws also launched Waylon and Willie as one of country’s most famous duos. Together the two released “Good Hearted Woman” in 1976, and “Luckenbach, Texas (Back to the Basics of Love)” in 1977. Waylon and Willie won a Grammy together in 1978 for their country classic, “Mamas Don’t Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be Cowboys.”

Later on Waylon and Willie found success in the Highwaymen, a country supergroup they formed with Kris Kristofferson and Johnny Cash.

Waylon was inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame in 2001, and died in February of 2002.

LB Cantrell
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