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The Family Way: Parents, Kids, In-Laws and Relations that Help Define Music City |
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Written by Edward Morris
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The Family Way: Parents, Kids, In-Laws and Relations that Help Define Music City
By Edward Morris
© 2007 CMA Close Up News Service / Country Music Association, Inc.
Mapping the Human Genome Project was a walk in the park compared to diagramming the family relationships that thread, like chains of DN A, up, down and across Music Row. There’s a reason for this genealogical coziness. Though fresh talent abounds in this town, relatives of major movers and shakers have the built-in advantage of knowing the players, the field and the rules of the game — plus, many are sharp enough to have made it on their own, regardless of their legacy.
Being a Bradley
The Bradleys are Music Row’s bluebloods, with roots that reach three generations deep into the business. After brothers Owen and Harold built one of Nashville’s first recording studios, Owen went on to head Decca/MCA Records’ Country division and produce artists Patsy Cline, Red Foley, k. d. lang, Loretta Lynn, Webb Pierce and Kitty Wells. Harold became a world-class guitarist — and reputedly the world’s most recorded one. Now 81, he remains the very active President of the Nashville Association of Musicians. Both he and Owen have been inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame.
Jerry, Owen’s son, is the former chief of RCA Records Nashville and the man behind the “Outlaws” marketing concept in the mid 1970s that gave Country Music a more assertive edge. He subsequently developed musical properties for Gaylord Entertainment, including Acuff-Rose Music, the famed publishing company he served as President. Currently, he manages various Bradley holdings on the Row.
Jerry’s wife, Connie Bradley, is Senior VP of ASCAP. His sister, Patsy
Bradley, who has helped songwriters and publishers for more than forty
years, just retired in October from her role as Assistant VP of Writer
and Publisher Administration for BMI. And his son, Clay, is an A&R
executive for Sony BMG Nashville.
“It wouldn’t be Music Row without the Bradleys,” insisted Connie, who
had already spent 10 years in the music business when she married Jerry
in 1978.
Bradley family gatherings are not, she added, the free-for-alls one
might expect: “Occasionally something comes up, but as a whole it’s
more about family. You’ve got ASCAP and BMI in the same family, so it’s
kind of difficult. I don’t want to divulge any of my secrets, so we
leave our work at the office.”
Clearly there are advantages to having ties to this family. “It opens a
lot of doors,” Connie admitted. “It automatically gives you acceptance
and respect — for a while. Then you have to prove if you’re worthy of
being a Bradley.”
The Kennedy Connections
The songwriting Kennedy brothers — Shelby, Bryan and Gordon — are the
offspring of guitarist and producer Jerry Kennedy, who produced hits
for Tom T. Hall, Reba McEntire, Roger Miller and the Statler Brothers,
among others, during his tenure as an executive at Mercury Records
Nashville from 1969 through ’84. He is now retired.
“Me and my brothers, my dad and my [late] mother, were neck deep in the
music,” said Shelby, the youngest of the brothers and now Director of
Writer and Publisher Relations at BMI. Like his father, whose recording
career began at age 11, Shelby tasted success early; he was still in
college when Ray Charles cut one of his songs.
His career has taken him through publishing jobs with Al Gallico and
Harold Shedd, a 10-year stint at ASCAP and four years as Director of
A&R for Lyric Street Records. He co-wrote “I’m a Survivor,” which
McEntire turned into a hit in 2001 and then picked as the theme song
for her sitcom.
Writing with and for Garth Brooks, Bryan has created winners including
“American Honky Tonk Bar Association” and “Beaches of Cheyenne,” not to
mention opening shows for the superstar. Gordon, a fabled studio
guitarist and former member of the band Whiteheart, has also penned
hits for Brooks, co-written the 1996 Grammy Song of the Year, Eric
Clapton’s “Change the World” with Tommy Sims and Wayne Kirkpatrick, and
co-produced Peter Frampton’s Fingerprints, which won a Grammy in 2006
as Best Pop Instrumental Album.
“Music Row is the pond we grew up around,” Shelby explained. “So we swim in it.”
Cannons Target the Stars
Kenny Chesney’s producer, Buddy Cannon, didn’t push daughters Melonie
and Marla into the music business. “I didn’t encourage them at all,” he
insisted. “I don’t think anybody in his right mind would. But they grew
up around the music business. It was just the norm.”
Years before Melonie blazed her trail as a powerful vocalist and Marla
Cannon-Goodman made her mark as a songwriter, Buddy arrived in
Nashville as bass player for Texas rockabilly artist Bob Luman. Later,
he worked with Mel Tillis, playing in his band and devoting more than a
decade to writing for his publishing company.
When Tillis sold his publishing interests to PolyGram, Cannon went
along to oversee the catalog. From there he moved to the A&R
department at Mercury Records, which led to his producing newcomer
Sammy Kershaw. His fortunes as a producer and songwriter have since
skyrocketed, including a 2005 CMA Album of the Year Award for producing
Chesney’s When the Sun Goes Down.
“Vern Gosdin lived around the corner from me when my kids were in their
early teens,” Cannon recalled. “He used to come to my house two or
three times a week to write. He was actually the first one who pulled
Melonie in. He and I were sitting around and singing one day, and he
pulled her over and said, ‘Hey, sing this part.’ She latched onto that
harmony like it was second nature to her. He was the first one who
pointed out to me that I should listen to her, that she had a voice.”
Melonie contributed background vocals to hits including Chely Wright’s
“Single White Female” and Chesney’s “I Go Back” before moving on as a
solo artist with her self-titled debut in 2004, for Skaggs Family
Records. Recently, her dad paired her with Willie Nelson for a remake
of Nelson’s 1968 hit, “Little Things,” intended to appear on Melonie’s
next album.
As for Marla, who can boast cuts by Tracy Byrd, Eric Church, Blake
Shelton and Lee Ann Womack of songs she has written for Cal IV
Entertainment, Buddy insisted that she “just started writing songs. I
had songwriters at my house all the time. From that and from writing
high school poetry, it just kind of evolved. Once I heard some of her
songs, I knew she had the talent.”
Walkers on the Move
Born in Australia and classically trained in music, Bill Walker came to
Nashville in 1964 and established himself quickly as a first-rate
producer, arranger and music director. He played a critical role in
boosting the careers of artists that ranged from Eddy Arnold to Johnny
Cash, and he became an essential link between Country acts and network
television producers who couldn’t understand Nashville’s exotic ways of
making music.
In the 1970s, he started his own label, Con Brio Records. Walker is
married to singer Jeanine Ogletree and is the father of Jeff Walker,
President of the AristoMedia Group, which specializes in video, radio
and club promotion, as well as publicity and new media. Jeff, in turn,
is married to the former Terri Hollowell, who was on Con Brio’s roster
in the late 1970s. Their children, Jonathan Walker and Christy
Walker-Watkins, both work for AristoMedia, he as Director of New Media
and she as a publicist.
Though he earned a music business degree from Belmont University and
joined his father’s company in 2004, Jonathan dreamed at first of
working in a band. “I’ve been playing drums since I was 13,” he said.
“I still do play a lot, just not professionally. My grandfather was
always having recording sessions at his house. And we were always going
to see him play at the Opry and with the Statler Brothers [on TNN]. But
in college I kind of had the revelation that the business side is where
it’s at. There’s a lot of competition on the other side of the fence.”
Daughter Christy had a similar epiphany. Like her brother, she started
as a drummer and played for eight years before reconsidering her future
and accepting an administrative position at AristoMedia; recently she
received a marketing and business degree at Belmont while working at
Aristo as a publicist. “The business side of me was screaming,” she
explained. “It took over all the time I had. I always had some sort of
inkling I would be doing something in music. But never did I think I
would be working with my father and my brother. We’re lucky that we all
get along well.”
All in the Families
From boardroom to studio, the tangle of relations only grows thicker
the closer you look. Take Ron Stuve, VP of A&R and GM for BMG Music
Publishing, whose part in this story traces back to the night he met
his future wife, Regina, at an industry party. “She was working at
Capitol Records,” he remembered.
“I’d been pals with [then President] Scott Hendricks for years. We
water-skied together a lot, so he invited me to Capitol’s houseboat
party on Tims Ford Lake in August of 1995. I actually brought a date.
Then I met Regina and kind of lost track of my date. There were
fireworks — literally. It was a crazy weekend. Four years later, we got
married on Scott’s farm in Leiper’s Fork.”
Regina Stuve now works for Universal Music Group Nashville as Director
of Artist and Media Relations. The couple’s 1-year-old son, Nathaniel
Jordan, is still weighing his music biz options.
There’s more: Hank Adam Locklin, CMA Senior Manager of Membership and
Industry Relations, is the son of Grand Ole Opry star Hank Locklin.
Guitarist and producer Dann Huff is the son of arranger and former
Nashville Symphony Orchestra conductor Ron Huff and brother of Los
Angeles-based drummer David Huff. Scott Borchetta, President and CEO of
Big Machine Records, is the son of Mike Borchetta, President of Lofton
Creek Records. Del Bryant, President and CEO of BMI, is the brother of
Music Row realtor Dane Bryant. Steve Buchanan, Senior VP of Media and
Entertainment for Gaylord Entertainment, is married to Ree Guyer
Buchanan, President and Owner of Wrensong Publishing and WE Records.
Chris DuBois, songwriter and a partner with Brad Paisley and Frank
Rogers in Sea Gayle Music, is the son of Tim DuBois, the former head of
Arista Nashville Records and former Senior Partner of Universal Records
South. Producer Kyle Lehning’s son, Jason, is also a producer and
studio engineer. Brandon Blackstock, who works for Starstruck
Entertainment’s management agency and formerly worked for Rascal Flatts
as road manager, is the son of Narvel Blackstock, McEntire’s manager
and husband. Even the writer of this article is bound by blood to Music
Row. His son, Jason Morris, is VP of A&R for Big Picture
Entertainment. His wife Norma and daughter Erin own Morris Public
Relations. And sons-in-law Pete Huttlinger and Jody Serratto are
musicians and songwriters.
What’s it all mean? Well, if you’ve got an uncle or aunt with a finger
on the pulse of it all, try asking them. The answer often lies there —
in the family.
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