Poets and Prophets: Salute to Songwriter Dennis Morgan
Dennis Morgan has been one of the music industry’s most versatile and consistently successful songwriters for more than forty years. His catalog includes more than twenty #1 singles, and his compositions have topped the charts in multiple genres and various countries. Around age twenty, Morgan began his songwriting career when he hitchhiked to Nashville with $40 and a cache of original songs. He soon found success as a session guitarist and jingle writer, including national campaigns for Kentucky Fried Chicken, Opryland, Rubbermaid, and “Pull for America,” a 1976 U.S. bicentennial campaign featuring William Shatner. In 1978, Morgan and fellow songwriter Kye Fleming forged a partnership that led to pop-country hits for Barbara Mandrell (“Crackers,” “I Was Country When Country Wasn’t Cool,” “Sleeping Single in a Double Bed”), Ronnie Milsap (“I Wouldn’t Have Missed It for the World,” “She Keeps the Home Fires Burning,” “Smoky Mountain Rain”), Sylvia (“Nobody,” “Snapshot”), Steve Wariner (“All Roads Lead to You”), and many others. During the 1980s and ’90s, Morgan delivered both more country hits as well as mainstream pop triumphs for Aretha Franklin and George Michael (“I Knew You Were Waiting for Me”) and Rod Stewart (“My Heart Can’t Tell You No”). He maintained his creative excellence in subsequent decades with hits by artists including Eric Clapton, Willie Dixon, Faith Hill, Willie Nelson, and George Strait. Morgan is also a successful song publisher. Little Shop of Morgansongs and Morgan Music Group encompass a catalog of over 8,000 titles. Morgan is a four-time BMI Country Songwriter of the Year, a two-time BMI Pop Songwriter of the Year, and was inducted into the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame in 2004. The Museum’s Allison Moorer will host this program, which will be illustrated with photos, film, and recordings. After the program, Morgan will sign commemorative Hatch Show Print posters. Ford Theater. Included with Museum admission. Program ticket required. Free to Museum members.
- select the date of this program,
- select a gallery entry time of 1:00 p.m. or earlier,
- select your Experience, and
- select the Poets and Prophets program as an add-on.
