Jackson, Alan (17th October 1958-Present)

He is a singer-songwriter born Alan Eugene Jackson in Newnan, Georgia, as the only boy of five children. He grew up listening to gospel music and then became acquainted with the music of John Anderson, Gene Watson and Hank Williams Jr. through a friend. His parents bought him his first guitar when he was 16 years old and this also got his interests up.

After he had finished with high school he worked at various jobs and perfomed with the band Dixie Steel and others as well as marrying high school sweetheart, Denise, in 1979. After his wife managed to get him known to Glen Campbell when she had met him while working as a flight attendant, they moved to Nashville and through him he managed to start pursuing his musical career.

In 1986 he was working as a songwriter in Glen Campbell’s publishing company and in 1989 he landed a contract with the Arista label. In 1989 he released his debut hit album Here in the Real World which led to his following albums over the next few years being equally successful and producing many hits such as “The Blues Man”, “I’ll Go On Loving You”, “Little Bitty”, “Right on the Money” and “Where I Come From”. His 1995 release, Alan Jackson: The Greatest Hits Collection really was what it said as it included 17 of the hit songs that he had on the charts in the previous few years. In 1997 he signed a lucrative contract with Ford Trucks to provide the sole endorsement for them over several years and saw him featuring Ford vehicles in his video for “Who’s Cheating Who?” and changing the lyrics of “Mercury Blue” for use in their Ford F-series commercials.

The 2000s came along and he and George Strait had their song “Murder on Music Row” become a hit without ever being officially released as a single which led to the invitation for the two of them to perform it at as the opener for the 2000 Academy of Country Awards ceremony. The following year his “Where Were You (When the World Stopped Turning)”, which he premiered at the CMA Awards, was an instant success and soon became a mainstream hit winning him the 2002 Grammy Award for “Best Country Song”. During the mid-2000s he could also be heard as a guest musician with Jimmy Buffett in concerts held at Nashville, Illinois and Dallas and duetting with him on the No. 1 country hit song “It’s 5 O’clock Somewhere”. In more recent times he has released the 2008 Good Time with the first single being the 2007 “Small Town Southern Man”.

The albums he has appeared on are numerous and include his own Don’t Rock the Jukebox, High Mileage, Let It Be Christmas, A Lot About Livin’ (And a Little ‘Bout Love), Under the Influenceand Who I Am as well as License to Chill by Jimmy Buffett, Walls Can Fall by George Jones, Latest Straitest Greatest Hits by George Strait and the soundtrack of Home Alone 2: Lost in New York.

His songwriting career has also brought him much success with the co-written “Better Class of Losers”, “Forever Together” and “I’d Surrender All” being chart hits for Randy Travis, “I Can’t Do That Anymore” being a hit for Faith Hill and “If I Could Make a Living” by Clay Walker.

Recognised for his contribution to country music he has had more than 20 nominations and 13 wins in the Country Music Association Awards, with 10 of them in 2002 becoming a record. He has also won 9 CMA Awards, received two ASCAP Awards and was inducted into the Grandy Ole Opry in 1991 and the Georgia Music Hall of Fame in 2001. He received a star on Hollywood in 2010 and will later be inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame in 2017.

Today he continues to perform with his long-time band The Strayhorns who have been his back-up group since 1989.

Here he is performing his “Where Were You (When the World Stopped Turning)”…

Sources:

Jackson, Alan (17th October 1958-Present)

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