The Country Music Hall of Fame 2024 class of inductees was revealed today (March 18). Toby Keith, John Anderson and James Burton will be added to the esteemed Hall later this year.
Burton will be inducted in the Recording and/or Touring Musician category, which is awarded every third year in rotation with Songwriter and Non-Performer categories. Anderson will be inducted in the Veterans Era Artist category and Keith will be inducted in the Modern Era Artist category.
“This year’s nominees exemplify the excellence of our genre,” says Sarah Trahern, CMA CEO. “James, John and Toby have each made an indelible impact and brought their distinctive contributions to country music, enriching our format. Their influence is evident throughout the longevity of their careers, ensuring each legacy will thrive indefinitely. It is with great pride that we welcome these three remarkable individuals into the esteemed ranks of the Country Music Hall of Fame.”
Hall of Fame members Brooks & Dunn hosted the press conference to announce the news, which was also streamed live on CMA’s YouTube channel.
“Toby’s passing left our hearts broken,” says the Covel family. “We miss him so much, but we take comfort that his music and legacy will live forever. Thank you, Country Music Hall of Fame, for helping keep it alive.”
“After several days, I am still trying to grasp the reality of being inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame,” says Anderson. “It is one of the greatest honors I could ever receive. My love and heartfelt gratitude goes out to the fans who have supported me through the years, everyone at the Country Music Hall of Fame and all of those who made this possible. I am proud and honored beyond words.”
“How did I find out about this amazing award? Well, I was on the phone with Keith Urban and I kind of felt that Keith was beating around the bush a bit and small talking me,” says Burton. “He then stated that he was going to hand the phone to a young lady for a minute. I thought it was a friend of Keith’s that just wanted to say hi or talk guitars. Instead, she [Sarah Trahern] introduced herself and simply said ‘Mr. Burton, you’ve been inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame.’ I was completely shocked and couldn’t think of anything to say. All I remember was that my wife Louise started crying, I kept thinking that this couldn’t be real. In fact, when we hung up the call, I redialed the caller’s number just to make sure it wasn’t a prank phone call! I am so humbled and excited to be recognized in this way. So much of my career was spent playing for incredible country artists and to now be going up on that wall with all those innovators and industry greats is just incredible.”
“Each of the three new inductees has left a deep and distinctive stamp on our genre,” says Kyle Young, Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum CEO. “Florida native John Anderson helped steer country music back to its traditions with his bold honky-tonk style. James Burton, who hails from Louisiana, blended country and blues to create a fiery picking style that distinguished countless hits and has inspired guitarists the world over. Toby Keith from Oklahoma brought a sly swagger and a patriotic passion to songs that made him one of the best-selling country artists of the past 30 years. They have all profoundly shaped our music, and we are honored and delighted that their achievements will now forever be enshrined in the Country Music Hall of Fame.”
A formal induction ceremony for Burton, Anderson and Keith will take place at the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum in the CMA Theater this October. The museum’s Medallion Ceremony, a reunion of the Hall of Fame membership, is the official rite of induction for new members.
Bios for the inductees are below.
James Burton. Photo: Courtesy of Burton
James Burton – Recording and/or Touring Musician Category
Leo Fender had been making his Telecaster electric guitars for only a few years when James Burton saw a white 1953 model hanging in J&S Music in Shreveport, Louisiana. It was love at first sight for the 13-year-old. He fell head over heels for the balance of its body and the high-end bite of its tone.
After the young Burton, born in Dubberly, Louisiana, on August 21, 1939, convinced his parents that he and the instrument were made for each other, he set out to emulate musical heroes like Chet Atkins, Merle Travis, Les Paul and Billy Byrd. He quickly figured out that while he couldn’t copy their style, he needed to create a sound as distinct as theirs. So, he developed a hybrid picking style that combined the use of a flat pick between his thumb and index finger and, to make his high notes really pop, a fingerpick on his middle finger.
Within a year, the self-taught Burton was playing professionally, the youngest staff musician on the Louisiana Hayride, a live country music show that broadcast on the clear-channel Shreveport station KWKH-AM (1130). There, he backed country singers like George Jones and Johnny Horton, as well as younger acts like Bob Luman that favored a rockabilly sound.
At 15, Burton went into the KWKH studio with another Louisiana teenager, Dale Hawkins, who had set lyrics to an instrumental with a distinctive, swampy guitar pattern that Burton had written. Though Burton did not receive a writer’s credit on the song, “Susie-Q” reached the Billboard Top 30 in the summer of 1957.
While in a Los Angeles studio with Luman, with whom he sometimes performed on KTTV-TV’s Town Hall Party, Burton came to the attention of Ricky Nelson, then starring on ABC-TV’s The Adventures of Ozzie & Harriet. Burton soon joined Nelson’s band and began backing him on the show, making him the rare guitarist to appear weekly during network primetime just as rock ’n’ roll was exploding in popularity. For a nation full of aspiring guitarists, the effect of watching Burton fuse country, blues and R&B into the licks he played behind Nelson on songs like “Waitin’ in School,” “Stood Up” and “Believe What You Say” — records that charted both country and pop — was much the same as witnessing the Beatles on The Ed Sullivan Show. Except it happened every Wednesday night.
When Burton played, he bent the strings of his Telecaster, mimicking the glide of a pedal steel, while mixing in bursts of staccato notes, a style he referred to as “chicken-picking.” That style soon became one of the most familiar sounds in American popular music, influencing the likes of George Harrison, John Fogerty, Jimmy Page and practically anyone who has ever tried to play country guitar. Burton’s impact was so pervasive that National Public Radio (NPR) once called him “the teen who invented American guitar.”
For years, Burton played only that 1953 Tele, first white and later painted red, as he became a top-flight session player in Los Angeles. He appeared on records by Buck Owens, Merle Haggard, Waylon Jennings, Hank Williams Jr., and Glen Campbell, as well as the Everly Brothers, the Monkees and Buffalo Springfield. He played on the soundtracks for films like Rio Bravo, Viva Las Vegas and a myriad of other movies including most recently Ford v Ferrari.
In 1965, Johnny Cash asked Burton to play Dobro on a song he planned to sing on a new TV show called Shindig! Burton soon became leader of the show’s house band, The Shindogs, which also featured guitarist Delaney Bramlett and keyboardist Glen D. Hardin. Via Shindig!, Burton backed many of that era’s biggest musical stars.
When Elvis Presley debuted at Las Vegas’ International Hotel in 1969, Presley called Burton and asked him to put a band together. As a result, Burton became the Band Leader and lead guitarist of Presley’s iconic “Taking Care of Business” band.
He played with Presley for the rest of the singer’s life, and it was with Presley that he introduced a second Telecaster. That one, a customized 1969 pink paisley model, became as much of an icon in guitar circles as his first one had.
Burton played on Gram Parson’s GP and Grievous Angel albums. Emmylou Harris structured her tour dates around Presley’s Vegas shows so she could have Burton in the first iteration of her Hot Band.
After Presley’s death in 1977, Burton joined John Denver’s band and worked with him for the next 20 years. He recorded and toured with Jerry Lee Lewis and Elvis Costello, and he appeared on albums by artists ranging from Robert Plant, Frank Sinatra and Johnny Cash to Tina Turner and Joni Mitchell. He was also part of the band for the 1988 Cinemax special Roy Orbison and Friends: A Black and White Night.
Burton was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2001 and the Musicians Hall of Fame in 2007. In 2009, he was part of a Grammy Best Country Instrumental Performance win for his participation in the Brad Paisley instrumental “Cluster Pluck,” along with Vince Gill, Steve Wariner, Redd Volkaert, Albert Lee, John Jorgenson and Brent Mason. Since 2005, he has hosted the James Burton International Guitar Festival benefiting his James Burton Foundation, which provides guitars and music instruction to schools, hospitals and community service organizations.
Inducting Burton into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, the Rolling Stones’ Keith Richards said, “Leo Fender had no idea what he was making for the man who really knows how to play the Telecaster.” Burton became so inextricably linked with that guitar model that when Fender introduced its first “signature” Telecaster in 1990, it bore Burton’s name. Burton’s series of signature Telecaster’s continues today with his latest Burton “Angel” guitar that he plays along with his other guitars on stage and in studios around the world.
Now Burton’s name and likeness will hang in the Rotunda of the Country Music Hall of Fame, joining his heroes Atkins and Travis and many of the musicians with whom he played, a testament to a perfect combination of a man, a guitar and a distinctive musical vision.
John Anderson. Photo: Alysse Gafkjen
John Anderson – Veterans Era Artist Category
Some singers get the knock of being too country for rock and too rock for country. That was never the case with John Anderson. At his best, Anderson was too rock and too country, as likely to sing songs by Van Morrison or Willie Dixon as he was ones by Lefty Frizzell or Marijohn Wilkin.
Born December 13, 1954, John David Anderson grew up in Apopka, Florida, named for the large lake just northwest of Orlando. As a youth, he played in local rock groups like the Living End and the Weed Seeds. He soon turned to country music and counted Merle Haggard as one of his heroes.
He moved to Nashville shortly after graduating high school in the early 1970s, following his older sister Donna, singing with her in a duo. While in Nashville, he performed gigs for a few dollars a night and worked odd jobs. Of those, the one he held the longest, he told the Orlando Sentinel in 1979, was a construction gig where one of his jobs involved helping roof the Grand Ole Opry House prior to its 1974 opening.
He briefly recorded for a small independent label, which quickly folded, but not before he cut a song called “What Did I Promise Her Last Night.” This got the attention of publisher Al Gallico, who got him a publishing deal and signed to Warner Bros. Records. He then moved to Texas to check out the progressive country scene but soon returned to Nashville.
Norro Wilson produced his early records for the label. Each of Anderson’s singles tended to do a little better than the previous one, enough so that Warner Bros. stuck with him, finally releasing his first, self-titled album in 1980. He’d put out seven singles, and with their echoes of Haggard, Frizzell, and Hank Williams, modest early hits like 1979’s “Your Lying Blues” and “She Just Started Liking Cheatin’ Songs” preceded fellow traditionalists Ricky Skaggs, George Strait and Randy Travis. In an era of pop overtures and crossovers, Anderson favored shuffles, waltzes, and heartbreak ballads sung with a back-of-the-throat drawl that could sound like he was choking back tears. His first top 5 hit — a version of Billy Joe Shaver’s “I’m Just an Old Chunk of Coal (But I’m Gonna Be a Diamond Someday)” — came nearly four years after his label debut.
In late 1982, as the title track for Anderson’s fourth album, Wild and Blue, co-produced by Anderson and Frank Jones, was on a trajectory to become his first No. 1 single, several radio stations began playing another song from the album, one Anderson had written with Lionel Delmore, the son of the Delmore Brothers’ Alton Delmore. The buzz on the other record became so loud that Warner’s promotion team had to encourage programmers to wait until “Wild and Blue” had run its course. Sure enough, three weeks after “Wild and Blue” hit No. 1, “Swingin’” hit the country charts. Ten weeks after that, the mildly suggestive number became Anderson’s second chart-topper. The record became so popular that some rock and pop stations began spinning it.
The Country Music Association recognized “Swingin'” as the Single of the Year at the 1983 CMA Awards, where Anderson also was named the Horizon Award winner.
Anderson and Delmore wrote several other songs together, including the 1995 top 3 single “Bend Until It Breaks.”
Anderson had five top 5 singles, including three No. 1s, in two years, but subsequent records peaked farther down the charts as the next wave of young performers arrived.
Following brief stints with MCA Records Nashville and Universal Records, Anderson signed with BNA Records, a subsidiary of RCA, in 1991. When “Straight Tequila Night” came out late that year, Anderson had had just one top 10 single in seven years.
But “Straight Tequila Night” brought Anderson’s career roaring back, making him one of only a handful of acts who’d begun releasing records in the 1970s who continued to have major successes into the 1990s.
Anderson’s 1990s run equaled what he’d done a decade before as he hit with records like the Dire Straits cover “When It Comes to You,” the chart-topping “Money in the Bank,” and the regret-filled “I Wish I Could Have Been There.”
One of those ’90s hits, “Seminole Wind,” had a localized, environmentally conscious theme that did not initially strike BNA executives as particularly commercial. Though Anderson did not write it as such, he knew it was capable of commercial success. Written after a visit with his 95-year-old grandmother in Florida, the song referenced the development of the Everglades in Anderson’s native Florida, flood control efforts that decreased its size by half in a century, and the 19th-century Seminole resistance leader Osceola. Though the record peaked at No. 2, 1992’s “Seminole Wind” sold three million copies and became a career-defining record for Anderson.
After BNA, Anderson recorded for Mercury Records, Columbia Nashville, the Warner imprint Raybaw Records, Country Crossing and Bayou Boys Music. In 2020, he worked with Johnny Cash collaborator David Ferguson and the Black Keys’ Dan Auerbach on his 22nd studio album, Years.
In addition to Anderson’s two 1980s CMA Awards, he participated in the 1994 Album of the Year win for Common Thread: The Songs of the Eagles, on which he covered “Heartache Tonight.” That same year, the Academy of Country Music honored him with its Career Achievement Award.
Truly living out his songs, Anderson has lived the country lifestyle for more than 45 years. When not on the road, Anderson enjoys spending time with his family, hunting, fishing and gardening. Anderson and his wife of more than 40 years, Jamie, share two daughters and their families. “I’ve been very fortunate and blessed to have such a great family life,” Anderson says.
With a discography spanning more than 40 years, Anderson’s career track has had enough peaks and valleys and twists and turns to resemble a rollercoaster. His musical vision hasn’t always aligned with the fashion of the times. But whatever John Anderson decides to sing, as soon as he starts, there’s no mistaking who it is. That voice is timeless, and it has found a forever home in the Country Music Hall of Fame.
Toby Keith. Photo: Andrew Southam
Toby Keith – Modern Era Artist Category
Few artists have had as big of a career as Toby Keith. Outspoken and self-confident, Keith knew what he had, even when others didn’t recognize it. Every time someone undervalued him or sold him short, he turned the slight into motivation and creative fuel for a career that ranks with country’s greatest.
Born July 8, 1961, Toby Keith Covel grew up in a small town outside of Oklahoma City, the son of a second-generation oil-field roughneck. Keith’s grandmother ran a supper club near the Oklahoma-Arkansas state line. When young Keith visited in the summer, he excitedly watched the club’s musicians on the stage as he worked from the back. Having learned to play guitar on an instrument his grandmother had bought him at a local OTASCO store, he occasionally got to sit in. When he got older, he toured regionally with his band, Easy Money.
Young Keith admired artists who could also write their songs, whether in country (Merle Haggard) or rock (Bob Seger). As he began writing his own, he figured if he couldn’t make it as a singer, the songs were good enough to give him a career.
Not everyone agreed. When he first came to Nashville with a cassette of what he considered his six best songs (out of hundreds he had written), one label head told him he sang well enough but that those songs weren’t going to cut it. Keith returned to Oklahoma, dejected, determined, and hard-headed not to return.
Fortunately, Mercury Records Nashville head Harold Shedd heard about Keith and traveled to Oklahoma City to see him on his home turf. Shedd signed Keith to Mercury the next day. He also wanted to record all the songs on that cassette. They included three of his first four singles — the chart-topping hits “Should’ve Been a Cowboy” and “Wish I Didn’t Know Now,” as well as “He Ain’t Worth Missing” which went top 5. A fourth song from the cassette, “Does That Blue Moon Ever Shine on You,” reached No. 1 when it was released on Keith’s 1996’s album Blue Moon.
“Should’ve Been a Cowboy” gave Keith a No. 1 out of the gate and began a string of hits that would continue across four decades. Keith reached No. 1 on the country singles charts 32 times, writing or co-writing 26 of those songs.
Despite Keith having four No. 1 hits and one top 5 with his first five singles, including “Who’s That Man” which he wrote by himself, Mercury shuffled the singer from label to label during his time there, first to Polydor, then to A&M, then back to Mercury, and Keith grew increasingly frustrated. When Mercury turned down his fifth album, which Keith was confident was the best he’d ever made, he asked the label to release him from his contract. Keith paid Mercury for the album, then promptly took it to the recently launched DreamWorks Nashville, which was being run by his producer James Stroud.
The album’s first single, “How Do You Like Me Now?!” spent five weeks at No. 1. DreamWorks allowed Keith to “dress out of his own closet” musically, and his greatest commercial successes at that time came during his years with the label. His five DreamWorks albums all went multi-Platinum, with 2002’s Unleashed and 2003’s Shock’n Y’all reaching five-times Platinum. Songs like “You Shouldn’t Kiss Me Like This,” “I Love This Bar,” and “American Soldier” spent multiple weeks atop the charts.
While “As Good As I Once Was” and a duet with Willie Nelson called “Beer for My Horses” each spent six weeks at No. 1.
Another song, “Courtesy of the Red, White and Blue (The Angry American),” was written about how his dad would have felt when terrorists tore down the buildings on September 11, 2001, and initially used by the Marine Corps as motivation for the U.S. military invading Afghanistan. When the song took on a life beyond the military, Keith, who viewed himself as patriotic but not particularly political, became a cultural lightning rod. Many people tried to portray him as a one-dimensional character, but anyone who knew Keith knew he wouldn’t be limited to that. Keith didn’t write so much about politics as he wrote about communities — the communities found in the military, in bars, in bands that traveled the highways together. He performed on 11 U.S.O. tours, playing more than 200 shows for members of the U.S. Armed Forces.
In 2005, Keith launched his own label, Show Dog Records. He would pursue his musical vision there for the rest of his life, releasing hits like “Get Drunk and Be Somebody,” “American Ride,” “Red Solo Cup,” “Hope on the Rocks,” “Made In America,” “God Love Her” and “Don’t Let the Old Man In,” which he wrote after being inspired by Clint Eastwood who later featured it in his 2018 film The Mule.
Keith nearly missed his induction into the Oklahoma Hall of Fame in 2007 when his son’s football team, which he coached, took their championship game into multiple overtimes. He went into the New York based all-genre Songwriters Hall of Fame in 2015 and the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame in 2021. Keith also received the National Medal of the Arts in 2020 and the BMI Icon Award in 2022, among several other industry awards and honors.
Keith was diagnosed with stomach cancer in 2021 and died on February 5, 2024, at age 62. In an on-air eulogy on his late-night talk show, longtime friend Stephen Colbert, confessed that he, too, had once underestimated Keith. “Toby was always surprising people,” he said. “Toby taught me not to prejudge a guest and to have my intention, but to keep my eyes open to the reality of who they are. For that lesson, and for a lot of other things, I’m always going to be grateful.”
What’s not a surprise, though, is Keith’s selection to the Country Music Hall of Fame. The man who once sang that he “dreamed about living in your radio” has found a permanent home in the Hall of Fame Rotunda.
BREAKING: Toby Keith, John Anderson & James Burton To Be Inducted Into Country Music Hall Of Fame
/by LB CantrellThe Country Music Hall of Fame 2024 class of inductees was revealed today (March 18). Toby Keith, John Anderson and James Burton will be added to the esteemed Hall later this year.
Burton will be inducted in the Recording and/or Touring Musician category, which is awarded every third year in rotation with Songwriter and Non-Performer categories. Anderson will be inducted in the Veterans Era Artist category and Keith will be inducted in the Modern Era Artist category.
“This year’s nominees exemplify the excellence of our genre,” says Sarah Trahern, CMA CEO. “James, John and Toby have each made an indelible impact and brought their distinctive contributions to country music, enriching our format. Their influence is evident throughout the longevity of their careers, ensuring each legacy will thrive indefinitely. It is with great pride that we welcome these three remarkable individuals into the esteemed ranks of the Country Music Hall of Fame.”
Hall of Fame members Brooks & Dunn hosted the press conference to announce the news, which was also streamed live on CMA’s YouTube channel.
“Toby’s passing left our hearts broken,” says the Covel family. “We miss him so much, but we take comfort that his music and legacy will live forever. Thank you, Country Music Hall of Fame, for helping keep it alive.”
“After several days, I am still trying to grasp the reality of being inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame,” says Anderson. “It is one of the greatest honors I could ever receive. My love and heartfelt gratitude goes out to the fans who have supported me through the years, everyone at the Country Music Hall of Fame and all of those who made this possible. I am proud and honored beyond words.”
“How did I find out about this amazing award? Well, I was on the phone with Keith Urban and I kind of felt that Keith was beating around the bush a bit and small talking me,” says Burton. “He then stated that he was going to hand the phone to a young lady for a minute. I thought it was a friend of Keith’s that just wanted to say hi or talk guitars. Instead, she [Sarah Trahern] introduced herself and simply said ‘Mr. Burton, you’ve been inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame.’ I was completely shocked and couldn’t think of anything to say. All I remember was that my wife Louise started crying, I kept thinking that this couldn’t be real. In fact, when we hung up the call, I redialed the caller’s number just to make sure it wasn’t a prank phone call! I am so humbled and excited to be recognized in this way. So much of my career was spent playing for incredible country artists and to now be going up on that wall with all those innovators and industry greats is just incredible.”
“Each of the three new inductees has left a deep and distinctive stamp on our genre,” says Kyle Young, Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum CEO. “Florida native John Anderson helped steer country music back to its traditions with his bold honky-tonk style. James Burton, who hails from Louisiana, blended country and blues to create a fiery picking style that distinguished countless hits and has inspired guitarists the world over. Toby Keith from Oklahoma brought a sly swagger and a patriotic passion to songs that made him one of the best-selling country artists of the past 30 years. They have all profoundly shaped our music, and we are honored and delighted that their achievements will now forever be enshrined in the Country Music Hall of Fame.”
A formal induction ceremony for Burton, Anderson and Keith will take place at the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum in the CMA Theater this October. The museum’s Medallion Ceremony, a reunion of the Hall of Fame membership, is the official rite of induction for new members.
Bios for the inductees are below.
James Burton. Photo: Courtesy of Burton
James Burton – Recording and/or Touring Musician Category
Leo Fender had been making his Telecaster electric guitars for only a few years when James Burton saw a white 1953 model hanging in J&S Music in Shreveport, Louisiana. It was love at first sight for the 13-year-old. He fell head over heels for the balance of its body and the high-end bite of its tone.
After the young Burton, born in Dubberly, Louisiana, on August 21, 1939, convinced his parents that he and the instrument were made for each other, he set out to emulate musical heroes like Chet Atkins, Merle Travis, Les Paul and Billy Byrd. He quickly figured out that while he couldn’t copy their style, he needed to create a sound as distinct as theirs. So, he developed a hybrid picking style that combined the use of a flat pick between his thumb and index finger and, to make his high notes really pop, a fingerpick on his middle finger.
Within a year, the self-taught Burton was playing professionally, the youngest staff musician on the Louisiana Hayride, a live country music show that broadcast on the clear-channel Shreveport station KWKH-AM (1130). There, he backed country singers like George Jones and Johnny Horton, as well as younger acts like Bob Luman that favored a rockabilly sound.
At 15, Burton went into the KWKH studio with another Louisiana teenager, Dale Hawkins, who had set lyrics to an instrumental with a distinctive, swampy guitar pattern that Burton had written. Though Burton did not receive a writer’s credit on the song, “Susie-Q” reached the Billboard Top 30 in the summer of 1957.
While in a Los Angeles studio with Luman, with whom he sometimes performed on KTTV-TV’s Town Hall Party, Burton came to the attention of Ricky Nelson, then starring on ABC-TV’s The Adventures of Ozzie & Harriet. Burton soon joined Nelson’s band and began backing him on the show, making him the rare guitarist to appear weekly during network primetime just as rock ’n’ roll was exploding in popularity. For a nation full of aspiring guitarists, the effect of watching Burton fuse country, blues and R&B into the licks he played behind Nelson on songs like “Waitin’ in School,” “Stood Up” and “Believe What You Say” — records that charted both country and pop — was much the same as witnessing the Beatles on The Ed Sullivan Show. Except it happened every Wednesday night.
When Burton played, he bent the strings of his Telecaster, mimicking the glide of a pedal steel, while mixing in bursts of staccato notes, a style he referred to as “chicken-picking.” That style soon became one of the most familiar sounds in American popular music, influencing the likes of George Harrison, John Fogerty, Jimmy Page and practically anyone who has ever tried to play country guitar. Burton’s impact was so pervasive that National Public Radio (NPR) once called him “the teen who invented American guitar.”
For years, Burton played only that 1953 Tele, first white and later painted red, as he became a top-flight session player in Los Angeles. He appeared on records by Buck Owens, Merle Haggard, Waylon Jennings, Hank Williams Jr., and Glen Campbell, as well as the Everly Brothers, the Monkees and Buffalo Springfield. He played on the soundtracks for films like Rio Bravo, Viva Las Vegas and a myriad of other movies including most recently Ford v Ferrari.
In 1965, Johnny Cash asked Burton to play Dobro on a song he planned to sing on a new TV show called Shindig! Burton soon became leader of the show’s house band, The Shindogs, which also featured guitarist Delaney Bramlett and keyboardist Glen D. Hardin. Via Shindig!, Burton backed many of that era’s biggest musical stars.
When Elvis Presley debuted at Las Vegas’ International Hotel in 1969, Presley called Burton and asked him to put a band together. As a result, Burton became the Band Leader and lead guitarist of Presley’s iconic “Taking Care of Business” band.
He played with Presley for the rest of the singer’s life, and it was with Presley that he introduced a second Telecaster. That one, a customized 1969 pink paisley model, became as much of an icon in guitar circles as his first one had.
Burton played on Gram Parson’s GP and Grievous Angel albums. Emmylou Harris structured her tour dates around Presley’s Vegas shows so she could have Burton in the first iteration of her Hot Band.
After Presley’s death in 1977, Burton joined John Denver’s band and worked with him for the next 20 years. He recorded and toured with Jerry Lee Lewis and Elvis Costello, and he appeared on albums by artists ranging from Robert Plant, Frank Sinatra and Johnny Cash to Tina Turner and Joni Mitchell. He was also part of the band for the 1988 Cinemax special Roy Orbison and Friends: A Black and White Night.
Burton was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2001 and the Musicians Hall of Fame in 2007. In 2009, he was part of a Grammy Best Country Instrumental Performance win for his participation in the Brad Paisley instrumental “Cluster Pluck,” along with Vince Gill, Steve Wariner, Redd Volkaert, Albert Lee, John Jorgenson and Brent Mason. Since 2005, he has hosted the James Burton International Guitar Festival benefiting his James Burton Foundation, which provides guitars and music instruction to schools, hospitals and community service organizations.
Inducting Burton into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, the Rolling Stones’ Keith Richards said, “Leo Fender had no idea what he was making for the man who really knows how to play the Telecaster.” Burton became so inextricably linked with that guitar model that when Fender introduced its first “signature” Telecaster in 1990, it bore Burton’s name. Burton’s series of signature Telecaster’s continues today with his latest Burton “Angel” guitar that he plays along with his other guitars on stage and in studios around the world.
Now Burton’s name and likeness will hang in the Rotunda of the Country Music Hall of Fame, joining his heroes Atkins and Travis and many of the musicians with whom he played, a testament to a perfect combination of a man, a guitar and a distinctive musical vision.
John Anderson. Photo: Alysse Gafkjen
John Anderson – Veterans Era Artist Category
Some singers get the knock of being too country for rock and too rock for country. That was never the case with John Anderson. At his best, Anderson was too rock and too country, as likely to sing songs by Van Morrison or Willie Dixon as he was ones by Lefty Frizzell or Marijohn Wilkin.
Born December 13, 1954, John David Anderson grew up in Apopka, Florida, named for the large lake just northwest of Orlando. As a youth, he played in local rock groups like the Living End and the Weed Seeds. He soon turned to country music and counted Merle Haggard as one of his heroes.
He moved to Nashville shortly after graduating high school in the early 1970s, following his older sister Donna, singing with her in a duo. While in Nashville, he performed gigs for a few dollars a night and worked odd jobs. Of those, the one he held the longest, he told the Orlando Sentinel in 1979, was a construction gig where one of his jobs involved helping roof the Grand Ole Opry House prior to its 1974 opening.
He briefly recorded for a small independent label, which quickly folded, but not before he cut a song called “What Did I Promise Her Last Night.” This got the attention of publisher Al Gallico, who got him a publishing deal and signed to Warner Bros. Records. He then moved to Texas to check out the progressive country scene but soon returned to Nashville.
Norro Wilson produced his early records for the label. Each of Anderson’s singles tended to do a little better than the previous one, enough so that Warner Bros. stuck with him, finally releasing his first, self-titled album in 1980. He’d put out seven singles, and with their echoes of Haggard, Frizzell, and Hank Williams, modest early hits like 1979’s “Your Lying Blues” and “She Just Started Liking Cheatin’ Songs” preceded fellow traditionalists Ricky Skaggs, George Strait and Randy Travis. In an era of pop overtures and crossovers, Anderson favored shuffles, waltzes, and heartbreak ballads sung with a back-of-the-throat drawl that could sound like he was choking back tears. His first top 5 hit — a version of Billy Joe Shaver’s “I’m Just an Old Chunk of Coal (But I’m Gonna Be a Diamond Someday)” — came nearly four years after his label debut.
In late 1982, as the title track for Anderson’s fourth album, Wild and Blue, co-produced by Anderson and Frank Jones, was on a trajectory to become his first No. 1 single, several radio stations began playing another song from the album, one Anderson had written with Lionel Delmore, the son of the Delmore Brothers’ Alton Delmore. The buzz on the other record became so loud that Warner’s promotion team had to encourage programmers to wait until “Wild and Blue” had run its course. Sure enough, three weeks after “Wild and Blue” hit No. 1, “Swingin’” hit the country charts. Ten weeks after that, the mildly suggestive number became Anderson’s second chart-topper. The record became so popular that some rock and pop stations began spinning it.
The Country Music Association recognized “Swingin'” as the Single of the Year at the 1983 CMA Awards, where Anderson also was named the Horizon Award winner.
Anderson and Delmore wrote several other songs together, including the 1995 top 3 single “Bend Until It Breaks.”
Anderson had five top 5 singles, including three No. 1s, in two years, but subsequent records peaked farther down the charts as the next wave of young performers arrived.
Following brief stints with MCA Records Nashville and Universal Records, Anderson signed with BNA Records, a subsidiary of RCA, in 1991. When “Straight Tequila Night” came out late that year, Anderson had had just one top 10 single in seven years.
But “Straight Tequila Night” brought Anderson’s career roaring back, making him one of only a handful of acts who’d begun releasing records in the 1970s who continued to have major successes into the 1990s.
Anderson’s 1990s run equaled what he’d done a decade before as he hit with records like the Dire Straits cover “When It Comes to You,” the chart-topping “Money in the Bank,” and the regret-filled “I Wish I Could Have Been There.”
One of those ’90s hits, “Seminole Wind,” had a localized, environmentally conscious theme that did not initially strike BNA executives as particularly commercial. Though Anderson did not write it as such, he knew it was capable of commercial success. Written after a visit with his 95-year-old grandmother in Florida, the song referenced the development of the Everglades in Anderson’s native Florida, flood control efforts that decreased its size by half in a century, and the 19th-century Seminole resistance leader Osceola. Though the record peaked at No. 2, 1992’s “Seminole Wind” sold three million copies and became a career-defining record for Anderson.
After BNA, Anderson recorded for Mercury Records, Columbia Nashville, the Warner imprint Raybaw Records, Country Crossing and Bayou Boys Music. In 2020, he worked with Johnny Cash collaborator David Ferguson and the Black Keys’ Dan Auerbach on his 22nd studio album, Years.
In addition to Anderson’s two 1980s CMA Awards, he participated in the 1994 Album of the Year win for Common Thread: The Songs of the Eagles, on which he covered “Heartache Tonight.” That same year, the Academy of Country Music honored him with its Career Achievement Award.
Truly living out his songs, Anderson has lived the country lifestyle for more than 45 years. When not on the road, Anderson enjoys spending time with his family, hunting, fishing and gardening. Anderson and his wife of more than 40 years, Jamie, share two daughters and their families. “I’ve been very fortunate and blessed to have such a great family life,” Anderson says.
With a discography spanning more than 40 years, Anderson’s career track has had enough peaks and valleys and twists and turns to resemble a rollercoaster. His musical vision hasn’t always aligned with the fashion of the times. But whatever John Anderson decides to sing, as soon as he starts, there’s no mistaking who it is. That voice is timeless, and it has found a forever home in the Country Music Hall of Fame.
Toby Keith. Photo: Andrew Southam
Toby Keith – Modern Era Artist Category
Few artists have had as big of a career as Toby Keith. Outspoken and self-confident, Keith knew what he had, even when others didn’t recognize it. Every time someone undervalued him or sold him short, he turned the slight into motivation and creative fuel for a career that ranks with country’s greatest.
Born July 8, 1961, Toby Keith Covel grew up in a small town outside of Oklahoma City, the son of a second-generation oil-field roughneck. Keith’s grandmother ran a supper club near the Oklahoma-Arkansas state line. When young Keith visited in the summer, he excitedly watched the club’s musicians on the stage as he worked from the back. Having learned to play guitar on an instrument his grandmother had bought him at a local OTASCO store, he occasionally got to sit in. When he got older, he toured regionally with his band, Easy Money.
Young Keith admired artists who could also write their songs, whether in country (Merle Haggard) or rock (Bob Seger). As he began writing his own, he figured if he couldn’t make it as a singer, the songs were good enough to give him a career.
Not everyone agreed. When he first came to Nashville with a cassette of what he considered his six best songs (out of hundreds he had written), one label head told him he sang well enough but that those songs weren’t going to cut it. Keith returned to Oklahoma, dejected, determined, and hard-headed not to return.
Fortunately, Mercury Records Nashville head Harold Shedd heard about Keith and traveled to Oklahoma City to see him on his home turf. Shedd signed Keith to Mercury the next day. He also wanted to record all the songs on that cassette. They included three of his first four singles — the chart-topping hits “Should’ve Been a Cowboy” and “Wish I Didn’t Know Now,” as well as “He Ain’t Worth Missing” which went top 5. A fourth song from the cassette, “Does That Blue Moon Ever Shine on You,” reached No. 1 when it was released on Keith’s 1996’s album Blue Moon.
“Should’ve Been a Cowboy” gave Keith a No. 1 out of the gate and began a string of hits that would continue across four decades. Keith reached No. 1 on the country singles charts 32 times, writing or co-writing 26 of those songs.
Despite Keith having four No. 1 hits and one top 5 with his first five singles, including “Who’s That Man” which he wrote by himself, Mercury shuffled the singer from label to label during his time there, first to Polydor, then to A&M, then back to Mercury, and Keith grew increasingly frustrated. When Mercury turned down his fifth album, which Keith was confident was the best he’d ever made, he asked the label to release him from his contract. Keith paid Mercury for the album, then promptly took it to the recently launched DreamWorks Nashville, which was being run by his producer James Stroud.
The album’s first single, “How Do You Like Me Now?!” spent five weeks at No. 1. DreamWorks allowed Keith to “dress out of his own closet” musically, and his greatest commercial successes at that time came during his years with the label. His five DreamWorks albums all went multi-Platinum, with 2002’s Unleashed and 2003’s Shock’n Y’all reaching five-times Platinum. Songs like “You Shouldn’t Kiss Me Like This,” “I Love This Bar,” and “American Soldier” spent multiple weeks atop the charts.
While “As Good As I Once Was” and a duet with Willie Nelson called “Beer for My Horses” each spent six weeks at No. 1.
Another song, “Courtesy of the Red, White and Blue (The Angry American),” was written about how his dad would have felt when terrorists tore down the buildings on September 11, 2001, and initially used by the Marine Corps as motivation for the U.S. military invading Afghanistan. When the song took on a life beyond the military, Keith, who viewed himself as patriotic but not particularly political, became a cultural lightning rod. Many people tried to portray him as a one-dimensional character, but anyone who knew Keith knew he wouldn’t be limited to that. Keith didn’t write so much about politics as he wrote about communities — the communities found in the military, in bars, in bands that traveled the highways together. He performed on 11 U.S.O. tours, playing more than 200 shows for members of the U.S. Armed Forces.
In 2005, Keith launched his own label, Show Dog Records. He would pursue his musical vision there for the rest of his life, releasing hits like “Get Drunk and Be Somebody,” “American Ride,” “Red Solo Cup,” “Hope on the Rocks,” “Made In America,” “God Love Her” and “Don’t Let the Old Man In,” which he wrote after being inspired by Clint Eastwood who later featured it in his 2018 film The Mule.
Keith nearly missed his induction into the Oklahoma Hall of Fame in 2007 when his son’s football team, which he coached, took their championship game into multiple overtimes. He went into the New York based all-genre Songwriters Hall of Fame in 2015 and the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame in 2021. Keith also received the National Medal of the Arts in 2020 and the BMI Icon Award in 2022, among several other industry awards and honors.
Keith was diagnosed with stomach cancer in 2021 and died on February 5, 2024, at age 62. In an on-air eulogy on his late-night talk show, longtime friend Stephen Colbert, confessed that he, too, had once underestimated Keith. “Toby was always surprising people,” he said. “Toby taught me not to prejudge a guest and to have my intention, but to keep my eyes open to the reality of who they are. For that lesson, and for a lot of other things, I’m always going to be grateful.”
What’s not a surprise, though, is Keith’s selection to the Country Music Hall of Fame. The man who once sang that he “dreamed about living in your radio” has found a permanent home in the Hall of Fame Rotunda.
My Music Row Story: Sony Music Nashville’s Taylor Lindsey
/by LB CantrellTaylor Lindsey
Taylor Lindsey is the SVP, A&R at Sony Music Nashville, where she oversees the label’s dynamic new A&R team as well as signs and develops a diverse roster that includes recorded music icons, breakthrough acts and newcomers.
Prior to taking on her current expanded role, Lindsey was directly involved with the development of artists such as Old Dominion, Luke Combs, Maren Morris, Ryan Hurd and Mitchell Tenpenny, among others. Before joining Sony Music Nashville, she was at BMG where she signed and developed the careers of songwriters and artists as well as pitched the catalogs of 13 chart-topping songwriters, including her award-winning sister, Hillary Lindsey.
A respected industry executive, Lindsey has been included in a number of industry power lists including Billboard’s 40 Under 40 (2018), Billboard’s Women In Music (2018, 2019, 2023), Billboard’s Country Power Players (2022, 2023), Variety’s Hitmakers Impact (2020), Variety’s Young Leaders In Music (2019) and more. She is also a graduate of the Leadership Music Class of 2019. She currently resides in Nashville with her husband, Grammy-nominated songwriter Derrick Southerland, and their daughter, Lyle, and son, Ryder.
Lindsey will be honored as part of the current class of MusicRow’s Rising Women on the Row on March 19. For more details about the class and the event, click here.
MusicRow: Where did you grow up?
I grew up in a small town called Washington, Georgia, which is about 45 minutes east of Athens and 45 minutes west of Augusta.
Photo: Courtesy of Lindsey
What did you like to do as a kid?
Washington is really small town, so there really wasn’t very much to do. I was in the church choir growing up and I cheered. But even though it was small, it was a great upbringing. We didn’t lock our doors at night. We didn’t lock our cars. We walked to the local pharmacy to get snacks after school and just signed a little sheet of paper instead of paying, because it just went on our parents’ credit. I don’t think I learned how to pump gas until I was a freshman in college because all of the gas stations were full service. It was just a really sweet, idealistic way to grow up, and I really appreciate it now that I’m older.
Photo: Courtesy of Lindsey
Were you musical?
I wouldn’t consider myself that musical, but music was always a part of my DNA and my childhood. My parents used to throw dinner parties with all of their friends quite often, and some of my earliest memories are of dancing in the kitchen to Motown with them and their friends as a little girl. I don’t have a ton of core memories where music isn’t a part of them; my dad dashboard drumming to the latest country song while driving me to school in the morning or my mom humming along to a Carly Simon or Bonnie Raitt song, watching my sisters both sing in talent shows (and win most of them)—music was just always a constant in our household.
Where did you go to college?
I went to the University of Georgia. I met my husband [Grammy-nominated songwriter Derrick Southerland] there when we were in school. We were both in the music business program there. It was Bruce Burch who stopped me on campus one day and convinced me to join the program. I needed an elective class and thought it’d be easy to study organic chemistry in the back of the class, but I was wrong.. and I really fell in love with the prospect of working in music then.
Photo: Courtesy of Lindsey
I take it you liked the music business classes.
Yeah, I did. [Laughs] Fun fact—though my dad doesn’t think it’s so fun—I didn’t graduate. I have one three-hour class requirement to actually graduate. Essentially, in my junior year, I really realized this was something that I could do. Because my sister Hillary [Lindsey] was already here, I had already been meeting so many people. So I started pitching her songs first.
One summer [before I moved to Nashville full time] I came here and I had my very first pitch meeting as a song plugger with Renee Bell, who used to be the head of A&R at Sony. I sat on her little white couch and played her some of Hillary’s songs.
What happened when you moved here full-time?
Hillary was independent at the time and she had a little company called Raylene Music. I moved to Nashville and became her full-time everything. I was pitching songs and booking co-writes, but because she didn’t have any kind of a big company behind her, I was also helping negotiate soundtrack fees for songs she had written for movies and all sorts of things. I really cut my teeth by trial and error, just having to figure it out by leaning on her and the people that I met along the way, and Hill and I had so much fun back then doing it together.
After about a year of that, BMG acquired Hillary’s catalog and hired me as a song plugger. When I was at BMG, I had 13 artist-writers, including Hillary.
Photo: Courtesy of Lindsey
Tell me about moving over to Sony Music Nashville.
In 2013, Jim Catino called me and said there was an open A&R job at Sony and someone that he really respected and loved—Jesse Frasure—brought my name up. Jim said that he thought about it and that he didn’t have anybody else in mind for the job.
He said, “Think about it. Pray about it. Talk to Derrick about it. If you want it, call me on Monday and you can have it.” The ironic thing is that Derrick had just been offered a publishing deal with Still Working Music, who had a joint venture with BMG, so I was about to have the opportunity to work with him when this opportunity came up.
After a lot of consideration, I took the job. I never thought I would fall in love with A&R or the label system. It was never on my radar or a goal of mine from a career standpoint. But it was a two-year contract and I just thought I could do anything for two years, and if I hated it, I would just tough it out and be a better publisher in the long run. I obviously fell in love with it.
Photo: Courtesy of Lindsey
What are some of the first projects you worked on in A&R at Sony?
I would say the first pillar of establishing myself as an A&R person was signing Maren Morris in 2015. She had already released some songs on Spotify, and she and Janet Weir were creating their own little nucleus of independent artistry, but her partnering with Sony and really being a part of that was pretty incredible.
Were there any learning curves transitioning from being a publisher to a label exec?
The label system is a lot different than the publishing system. What publishing gave me was an understanding of the impact of the creative—and the art—and how you always have to have the creative right; how the music should always come first, but what I had to learn was really the scope and detail of what it takes to market a song or an artist—the promotional aspect of that down to the A&R admin side and the release-planning side. How a million chips have to fall into place to get a song from when I hear it as a work tape to the release and what it takes to make it successful.
What would you say is the most fulfilling part of your job now?
My role has evolved so much over the years, going from a pure A&R person to now, a department head and having an A&R team around me. On the one hand, I’m not in the weeds as much as I used to be on the true creative. I don’t have as many artists that I am properly point on for A&R because my responsibilities are so much wider and dedicated to the label system as a whole, but there is something really special about hearing a demo or a work tape from the publishing community and going, “Man, I’ve got to play that for so and so.” Those creative wins are still really important to me.
On the other side of that coin, it’s fulfilling to sit in a room with this A&R team every day, hear their ideas, see what they’re signing and be a part of that. I help where I can, but I really attribute so much of our recent success as an A&R team and label to them.
Photo: Courtesy of Lindsey
What would your younger self think about you now?
My younger self would be really proud of the fact that I’ve made it this far in my career by being honest, trying to hold integrity and not forgetting that everyone around me is a human just like I am. I try to actually look people in the eye everyday and just be real and thoughtful.
With Derrick being a successful songwriter and also being in the business—we can both get caught up in how crazy the business is. We try so hard to stay grounded for our two kids. That’s something I’m really proud of.
Who have been some of your mentors?
Jim Catino. What I didn’t know about what a major label system was how to navigate the political side of it. Jim always did such an amazing job of navigating that. He taught me so much even if he wasn’t trying to.
What’s the best piece of advice you’ve ever gotten?
That’s a great question. Someone once told me, “If you were given a seat at the table, you’re meant to be there.” I feel like a lot of times, especially when you’re starting out in your career, you sit in rooms and sometimes you’re scared to speak up. You could have the best idea, but you don’t know if it’s appropriate or you don’t want to step on other people’s toes, so you never say it even though you should.
You will be honored at next week’s Rising Women on the Row ceremony. What would you tell a young woman who wants to be where you are one day?
To be real. Don’t forget where you came from. Try not to sell out. You don’t have to kiss ass to get to the next phase in your career. It’s cliche, but if you want something, just go after it and be okay with pivoting if you have to. Don’t beat yourself up over it, show yourself grace instead. You’ll end up exactly where you’re supposed to.
Chayce Beckham To Drop Debut Album ‘Bad For Me’ In April
/by Liza AndersonPhoto: Robby Klein
Chayce Beckham plans to drop his debut album, Bad For Me, on April 5 via 19 Recordings/Wheelhouse Records/BMG Nashville.
The singer-songwriter gave fans a new taste of the project today (March 15) with the release of “Waylon in ’75.” The 13-track collection also features Beckham’s solo-written, Platinum single “23,” which recently scored a CMT Music Awards nomination for Breakthrough Male Video of the Year.
Bad For Me touches on themes like substance abuse, guilt and romantic remorse, joined by the inner struggle of a man wishing he was more. With the album, Beckham aims to depict an appreciation for life itself and a promise to keep up the fight. Apart from “23,” the collection was produced by Bart Butler, and includes more Beckham-penned pieces such as “Mama,” which he performed on American Idol, and “Drink You Off My Mind.”
The artist is currently on his headlining “Bad For Me Tour,” and will join Luke Bryan on his “Mind Of A Country Boy Tour” this summer.
Bad For Me Track Listing:
1. “Devil I’ve Been” (Chayce Beckham, John Pierce, Lindsay Rimes)
2. “Addicted And Clean” (Chayce Beckham, Emily Landis, Justin Morgan)
3. “Waylon In ‘75” (Jon Randall, Brett James, Parker McCollum, Lee Thomas Miller)
4. “Bad For Me” (Joe Fox, Randy Montana, Tyler Chambers)
5. “Drink You Off My Mind” (Chayce Beckham)
6. “Everything I Need” (Chayce Beckham, John Pierce, Lindsay Rimes)
7. “Whiskey Country” (Chayce Beckham, John Pierce, Lindsay Rimes)
8. “Glitter” (Joey Hendricks, Mark Trussell, Natalie Hemby)
9. “Smokin’ Weed and Drinkin’ Whiskey” (Chayce Beckham, Andy Albert, Mark Trussell)
10. “Something Worth Holding On To” (John Pierce, Brandon Kinney, Micah Wilshire)
11. “Mama” (Chayce Beckham)
12. “If I Had A Week” (Chayce Beckham, Scooter Carusoe)
13. “23” (Chayce Beckham)
Country Music Hall Of Fame & Museum Acquires The British Archive Of Country Music
/by John Nix ArledgePhoto of a 78-rpm record by Big Bill Campbell and His Rocky Mountain Rhythm, released in 1947 and included in the British Archive of Country Music collection. Photo: Courtesy of the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum
The Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum has expanded its collection with the addition of the British Archive of Country Music, comprising over 50,000 recordings alongside books, periodicals, videotapes, photographs and more.
The collection, established in 1987, was assembled over a span of seven decades by late British collector Dave Barnes. This treasure-trove of country music history contains extensive recordings and files regarding artists from the UK, Europe, Australia, Canada and the US. After Barnes’ death in 2020, his family began working with the museum to facilitate the acquisition and transport of the collection from Dover, England with support from the Tyson Family Foundation.
“My father Don Tyson was a huge, lifelong fan of country music,” says John H. Tyson, Chairman of the Board of Tyson Foods, Inc. “He passed that love of music on to his children and grandchildren as well. When we learned of the British Archive of Country Music, we immediately knew it was a treasure that should be located in posterity at the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum. We are pleased to have been able to work with Mr. Barnes’ son, Alan, and the team at the museum to make this a reality. My son, John Randal and daughter Olivia and I are delighted to have made this collection available so that future generations of country music fans can continue to enjoy this music as Mr. Barnes did years ago as he was putting the archive together.”
With the addition of the BACM collection, the museum now ranks among the world’s largest collections of country music recordings, boasting over 250,000 sound recordings ranging from phonograph cylinders to digital files.
CEO of the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum, Kyle Young, expresses his gratitude to the Barnes family and the Tyson Family Foundation for their pivotal role in bringing the BACM collection to the museum. “The British Archive of Country Music speaks to the international influence of country music. We’re honored to preserve the collection and continue BACM’s legacy of making this music available to researchers and scholars across the world,” he says.
Kameron Marlowe Is ‘Keepin’ The Lights On’ This May
/by Lorie HollabaughKameron Marlowe is gearing up for the release of his sophomore album Keepin’ The Lights On, set for May 31, and shared the title track and visualizer with fans today (March 15).
The 16-track collection features previously released singles “Quit You,” “Strangers (with Ella Langley)” and “Tennessee Don’t Mind.” Writers contributing to Keepin’ The Lights On include Kendell Marvel, Michael Hardy, Wyatt McCubbin, Trevor Rosen, Brad Tursi and Charles Kelley, among others.
“I feel like I discovered a lot about myself while making this record,” shares Marlowe. “I got to reflect on a lot of life from when I was a kid to life today. This album explores everything from loss to love, depression to joy, and overcoming the voices in your head telling you you’re not good enough. I found myself looking at life through a different lens throughout the process.
“The namesake of the album, ‘Keepin’ The Lights On’ came from a conversation with my dad over the holidays about how he’s always thanking the man upstairs for keeping it all together, especially when times get tough,” he continues. “For me, this record is a reminder of hard work, dedication and keeping the promises that we make. It’s still crazy to me that people are listening to a small town boy from Kannapolis, North Carolina, but here I am releasing my second album. I can’t wait for y’all to hear it.”
Marlowe will head down under with Lainey Wilson for her international tour next week, and share his new music on his headlining “Strangers Tour” in April.
Carys Selvey Inks With Edgehill Music Publishing
/by Madison HahnenPictured (L-R, back row): Josh Joseph and Tara Joseph. (L-R, front row): Carys Selvey and Julia Keefe
London-based songwriter Carys Selvey has signed a global publishing deal with Edgehill Music Publishing.
Selvey first signed with Sony/ATV London at 14 years old and has since made her own distinctive voice in songwriting. Her partnership with Edgehill is in collaboration with her management team, Joel Reyes at Moko Management and Declan McAlister at 31 Management.
“When I first heard Carys’ work, I was immediately drawn to the rawness of her writing,” shares Julia Keefe, Head of A&R, Edgehill. “In addition to her writing, the energy she brings into every room paired with her ability to connect with creatives on a deeper level, truly sets her apart. We are so excited to have Carys apart of the Edgehill family.”
“I am unbelievably excited to be part of the Edgehill family!” Selvey shares. “Josh [Joseph], Tara [Joseph] and Julia have created an environment unlike any music company I have known beforeand I feel so honoured to be a part of it and get to work with all of their incredibly talented writers and producers.”
Industry Ink: Kylie Morgan, Alison Abbey Hudak, Sawyer Brown & Mac McAnally, CMA
/by Madison HahnenKylie Morgan Receives RIAA Gold Certification
Kylie Morgan and UMG Nashville Chair & CEO Cindy Mabe. Photo: Courtesy of UMG Nashville
EMI Records Nashville artist Kylie Morgan has been awarded her first ever RIAA Gold certification for her hit single “If He Wanted To He Would.” UMG Nashville Chair & CEO Cindy Mabe shared the news with the singer and presented her with a plaque.
“I have been writing songs as a form of therapy since I was twelve,” says Morgan. “I have always dreamed of one of those therapy sessions turning into thousands singing my words back to me and a plaque on my wall. Over 14 years later, that dream has come true. This song has allowed me to connect with millions of strangers, and has become a constant reminder of why I started writing songs. I am feeling eternally grateful, humbled, and so excited to put even more therapy sessions out for the world, so we can heal together.”
Alison Abbey Hudak Exits Nashville Lifestyles Magazine
Alison Abbey Hudak. Photo: Robby Klein
Alison Abbey Hudak has exited Nashville Lifestyles after her five year post as Editor-in-Chief to pursue new opportunities. During her time at the magazine, Hudak featured Hayley Williams, Dolly Parton, Yola, Bobby Bones and Wynonna Judd. She also produced live events with Kristin Chenoweth, Chris Young, Mallory Ervin, John Drake and Dee Pate. On Nashville Lifestyles: The Podcast, she interviewed superstar Morgan Wallen, which remains the most downloaded episode.
Hudak can be reached at alisonabbey@gmail.com.
Sawyer Brown & Mac McAnally Perform At Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum
Pictured (L-R): Mac McAnally, Mark Miller, Gregg “Hobie” Hubbard. Photo: Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum
Mark Miller and Gregg “Hobie” Hubbard from legendary country group Sawyer Brown performed alongside dynamic songwriter Mac McAnally during a songwriter session at the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum. The event was in celebration of the band’s Desperado Troubadours album release and the 40th anniversary of winning Star-Search.
During the event, they sang some of the bands most well known songs such as “Some Girls Do,” “Thank God For You,” “The Walk” and more, which McAnally co-penned. Miller also shared stories from the band’s time in the industry, and even spotlighted MLB all-star Adam Wainwright, who was in attendance.
CMA Hosts Country Music Consumption Membersips Event
Pictured: Michael Farris (CMA Senior Director, Business Strategy and Insights) and John Murphy (Luminate Vice President, Music Publishing and Financial Solutions) lead a discussion during a MemberSIPS event focused on Country Music consumption on Tuesday, March 12 at CMA HQ in Nashville. Photo: Emily April Allen
The Country Music Association (CMA) hosted a MemberSIPS event on March 12 at their headquarters for CMA members. The event focused on country music consumption across the U.S. as well as internationally in 2023. Members from across the industry participated in a collaborative conversation and looked into the future of country music.
CMA Senior Director, Business Strategy and Insights Michael Farris and Luminate Vice President, Music Publishing and Financial Solutions John Murphy shared the data around consumption and led discussions what the data shows and what trends can be identified.
Abbey Cone Signs With Downtown Artist & Label Services For Distribution
/by Liza AndersonAbbey Cone at Nashville’s Ryman Auditorium. Photo: Erika Rock
Singer-songwriter Abbey Cone has signed with Downtown Artist & Label Services for distribution.
She has also released her first song with the company, a cover of Leonard Cohen‘s “Hallelujah,” which was recorded live when Cone opened for LeAnn Rimes Nashville’s Ryman Auditorium.
“My first year as an independent artist was surprising in so many ways,” she says. “One of the biggest surprises was being asked to open up for LeAnn Rimes at the Ryman in December. I’ve always loved this song because of how powerful it is, and how much it moves people. It’s representative of the kind of music I want to create and the way I want to move people with my music, too.”
Cone is contining to build an independent team, which currently includes Amanda Quinton of Quinton Digital for management services, Wasserman Group for booking and Warner Chappell Music/T.R.U.T.H. for publishing.
“One of the many lessons I’ve learned in my almost 10 years in the music industry is how important it is to have a team of people that will actually get in the trenches with you and figure out how to build a sustainable and authentic career,” she shares. “Small wins feel bigger when you’re an independent artist. It’s an accumulation of small victories that feel really rewarding when you’re doing it for yourself instead of to impress a label or a gatekeeper. For the first time, I’ve actually been able to make money from my music because I own my masters. It’s empowering to be able to choose how to reinvest that money and also be able to choose who I work with. I feel free. I feel like I finally work for myself instead of working to impress someone else that ‘holds the keys’ to my success.”
Willie Nelson Unveils Title Track Of Upcoming Album ‘The Border’
/by Lorie HollabaughWillie Nelson has unveiled the title track of his upcoming studio album The Border, set for release on May 31.
Cowritten by Rodney Crowell and Allen Shamblin for Crowell’s 2019 Texas album that featured Nelson, “The Border” is a track that describes the inner life and outer reality of a border guard.
The 10-tune project also includes four new Nelson and Buddy Cannon compositions, “Once Upon a Yesterday,” “What If I’m Out of My Mind,” “Kiss Me When You’re Through” and “How Much Does It Cost,” along with “Hank’s Guitar,” written by Cannon and Bobby Tomberlin. The country legend rounds out The Border with his versions of “I Wrote This Song for You” penned by Larry Cordle and Erin Enderlin, “Many a Long & Lonesome Highway” crafted by Crowell and Will Jennings, “Made in Texas” written by Shawn Camp and Monty Holmes and “Nobody Knows Me Like You” created by Mike Reid.
The album will be available digitally as well as on CD and black vinyl. Additionally, Barnes & Noble will offer an exclusive LP edition pressed on orange vinyl, and Nelson’s D2C store will provide an exclusive vinyl version that includes a lyric book featuring the artwork with listening notes by Mikal Gilmore and photos by Pamela Springsteen.
Following the project’s release, Nelson will hit the road for this year’s “Outlaw Music Festival Tour.”
The Border Track Listing:
1. “The Border”
2. “Once Upon a Yesterday”
3. “What If I’m Out of My Mind”
4. “When I Wrote This Song for You”
5. “Kiss Me When You’re Through”
6. “Many a Long & Lonesome Highway”
7. “Hank’s Guitar”
8. “Made in Texas”
9. “Nobody Knows Me Like You”
10. “How Much Does It Cost”
Ernest Previews Sophomore Album ‘Nashville, Tennessee’ With Five New Tracks
/by Lorie HollabaughErnest will release his sophomore album, titled Nashville, Tennessee, on April 12.
As part of the album’s pre-order launch, Ernest released the video and song for “I Went To College / I Went To Jail,” featuring fellow Nashville native Jelly Roll, as well as tracks “Ain’t As Easy,” “How’d We Get Here,” “Ain’t Too Late” and “Why Dallas (feat. Lukas Nelson),” which join already available songs “Kiss Of Death” and “Slow Dancing In A Burning Room” on the project.
In addition to the previously-released tracks and five new songs, the 26-track album will include additional musical collaborations with Lainey Wilson, Morgan Wallen, Hardy and Ernest’s two-year-old son, Ryman. Writers contributing to the album include Jessie Jo Dillon, Luke Bryan, Grady Block, Chandler Paul Walters and many more.
Nashville, Tennessee is the follow up to Ernest’s 2021 debut album, Flower Shops (The Album), which featured the double Platinum title-track “Flower Shops (feat. Morgan Wallen).” He has over a billion streams as a solo artist to date, and has also earned nine No. 1s as a writer, including Jelly Roll’s double Platinum “Son of a Sinner,” Kane Brown‘s Platinum “One Mississippi,” Sam Hunt‘s Platinum “Breaking Up Was Easy In The 90’s,” Chris Lane‘s double Platinum “Big, Big Plans” and Morgan Wallen hits including seven-times Platinum “Wasted On You,” four-times Platinum “You Proof,” five-times Platinum “More Than My Hometown” and Platinum “Everything I Love.”
Nashville, Tennessee Tracklist:
1. “I Went To College / I Went To Jail (feat. Jelly Roll)” (Ernest Keith Smith, Chandler Paul Walters, Rivers Rutherford, Luke Bryan)
2. “Ain’t As Easy” (Ernest Keith Smith, Dean Dillon, Jessie Jo Dillon, Chandler Paul Walters)
3. “Why Dallas (feat. Lukas Nelson)” (Ernest Keith Smith, Chandler Paul Walters, Grady Block, Jordan Merrigan, Lukas Nelson)
4. “One More Heartache” (Ernest Keith Smith, Chandler Paul Walters, Jessie Jo Dillon, Dean Dillon)
5. “Hangin’ On (feat. Morgan Wallen)” (Ernest Keith Smith, Grady Block, Rhys Rutherford, Jacob Durrett, Rafe Tenpenny)
6. “Did It For The Story” (Ernest Keith Smith, John Byron, Ryan Vojtesak, Blake Pendergrass)
7. “How’d We Get Here” (Ernest Keith Smith)
8. “Never Said I Love You” (Ernest Keith Smith, Chandler Paul Walters)
9. “Would If I Could (feat. Lainey Wilson)” (Dean Dillon, Donald Ewing II)
10. “Honkytonk Fairytale” (Ernest Keith Smith, Rafe Tenpenny, Dallas Wilson, Brad Clawson)
11. “Smokin’ Gun” (Ernest Keith Smith, Rhys Rutherford, Grady Block, Ryan Vojtesak, Blake Pendergrass)
12. “Twinkle Twinkle (Live At Fenway Park) [feat. Ryman Saint]” (Jane Taylor)
13. “Life Goes On” (Ernest Keith Smith, Ashley Gorley, Ryan Vojtesak)
14. “If You Don’t Know By Now” (Clint Daniels, Dale Dodson)
15. “You Don’t Have To Die” (Clint Ingersoll, Chris Stapleton)
16. “Redneck Sh*ttt” (Ernest Keith Smith, Mark Holman, Nicolle Galyon)
17. “Small Town Goes” (Ernest Keith Smith, Grady Block, Cody Lohden, Ryan Vojtesak, Chandler Paul Walters)
18. “Kiss Of Death” (Ernest Keith Smith, Andy Albert, Ryan Vojtesak)
19. “Slow Dancing In A Burning Room” (John Clayton Mayer)
20. “Ain’t Too Late” (Ernest Keith Smith, Grady Block, Chandler Paul Walters, Jordan Merrigan, Cody Lohden)
21. “Sayin’ You Love Me” (Ernest Keith Smith, Mark Holman, James McNair)
22. “Summertime Flies” (Ernest Keith Smith, Rafe Tenpenny, Grady Block, Jacob Durrett, Ross Portaro)
23. “Ain’t Right Ain’t Wrong” (Ernest Keith Smith, Rhys Rutherford, Ryan Vojtesak)
24. “Creep (feat. Hardy)” (Colin Greenwood, Jonathan Greenwood, Albert Hammond, Michael Hazlewood, Edward O’Brien, Philip Selway, Thomas Yorke)
25. “Bars On My Heart” (Ernest Keith Smith, Mark Holman, Nicolle Galyon)
26. “Dollar To Cash” (Ernest Keith Smith, Grady Block, Rafe Tenpenny, Brett Tyler)