Bill's Blog

BILL BLOG Thursday September 5, 2024   Thursday arises and I have a day of traveling to Marion, Illinois. More on that at the end of today’s Blog. Back up to 90 with sun today.   YESTERDAY I wrote with Darrell Clanton yesterday for the first time. Darrell lives in Lakeland, Florida with his wife and back in the day he was an artist here in Nashville and had a couple of country songs on the charts, and had several folks record his songs.     These days Darrell and his band “Bad Habit” are very active in the Trop Rock genre playing a lot of beach music and beach shows. A couple of years ago Darrell and I played the Jim Parker Songwriter Show in Huntsville, Alabama along with my buddy Brent Burns . And then Darrell and I just played it again a few months ago. Then yesterday I really got to know him and we did write a beach song for him.   We’ll be writing more for sure in the future. And there’s a chance that sometime next year that we’ll do a cruise toget

BILL BLOG Wednesday September 4, 2024 Here comes the first “Hump Day” in September. 85 with sun today in Nashville. The weather is a little cooler all of a sudden. But in Phoenix they’ve had 100 days this year of 100 degree heat. Yikes.   YESTERDAY I hooked up online with Troy Engle in Pennsylvania and wrote a danged “sad” country song. They still record those…so I hear. And this one certainly went down heartbreak road on us.   I’ve mentioned it before Troy is one of those guys who plays every instrument (well) sings, produces, records bluegrass records and more. He’s played behind some of your favorite stars for years out on the road. These days he’s mostly doing what he does from his home in PA and doing it so well.   His current album that has some co-writes of ours on it including the title track of “Back Home” has been showing up on the bluegrass charts now for almost 10 weeks…a good thing. Fun day creating something new with Troy.     MO-MO

BILL BLOG Tuesday September 3, 2024   Labor Day weekend is over. Back to work y’all. It’s Tuesday. And…we have pleasant temperatures all of a sudden. 84 for a high today.   YESTERDAY Well it was Labor Day but I wound up working anyway. That is if you call writing a song work. This work was done with my Knoxville friend Tim Stafford online. And it was a good thing to be writing with him on the world wide web hook-up because Tim is just getting over a bout with COVID. His third time around he told me. (Anyone NOT had multiple rounds?)   But he was in more than good enough health and spirits to bring a great song idea that we wrote and that he’s already pitched to a noted bluegrass artist who’s looking for songs. Always a pleasure to get to write with Tim who stays busy writing and playing festivals and shows with his great group Blue Highway .   PENSACOLA SONGWRITERS FESTIVAL The schedule rolled out for that yesterday. It’s been several years since I

BILL BLOG Monday September 2, 2024   Monday morning and we’ve rolled into the first week of September and the unofficial end to summer.  And…it’s Labor Day! 85 for a high here in Nashville.   THE WEEKEND Our “ Hits & Grins ” trio with me, Steve Dean & Victoria Venier had a wonderful Saturday evening playing in the “Grand Ole Barn” at Starstruck Farm in Lebanon, Tennessee. Jay Wilfong bought the old Reba McEntire property in 2019 and has converted it into a wonderful entertainment venue.   We had a great crowd in front of us…and all of them were well fed as these are dinner shows.   I always appreciate owners who insist that their music venue are true listening room as this one is.   We played over 90 minutes and just had the best time.   At one point Steve Dean had Victoria Venier sing his #1 song that Reba recorded “Walk On”. That was appropriate as we were singing at Reba’s old farm. Thank you Ginny Foley for capturing THIS