100 Greatest Men: #27. Bill Anderson

100 Greatest Men: The Complete List

An impressive run of hit singles and his visible Opry stardom gave him tremendous success as a singer, but it’s been Bill Anderson’s songwriting that’s kept him topping the country charts for decades longer than even his most successful contemporaries.

The man who’d become known as Whisperin’ Bill Anderson had always wanted to be a professional writer, but it was sports journalism that was his original goal.  But as he was working his way through college as a radio disc jockey, he was inspired to try his hand at songwriting.  An early attempt was “City Lights”, which ended up a smash hit for Ray Price and began a songwriting career that is still going strong 55 years later.

Soon, he was writing hits for himself as well as others.  He earned his Whisperin’ moniker from his soft, conversational singing style, which found him speaking as often as singing.   The sixties brought classic recordings like “The Tips of My Fingers”, which didn’t include the plural of tip when he recorded it, but was added when other artists like Roy Clark and Steve Wariner also had hits with it.   He launched Connie Smith’s career with “Once a Day”, just a year after he released a country classic of his own, the #1 smash hit, “Still.”

In addition to his solo hits like “Po’ Folks” and “I Get the Feeling”, he had a series of successful duets with Jan Howard and with Mary Lou Turner.  A collaboration with the latter, “Sometimes”, was his final #1 hit in 1975, after which his hits as an artists became fewer and far between.   From this point on, his popularity as a performer would be limited to his Opry appearances, and when those shows became televised in the eighties, his colorful personality reached an entire new audience.

While he had plenty of songs recorded in the eighties and nineties, it’s been in the new century that Anderson had his most prolific songwriting renaissance.  He’s co-written songs for contemporary artists such as Sara Evans and Sugarland.  Amazingly, in his fifth decade of writing, he earned his first Song of the Year trophy for the Brad Paisley and Alison Krauss hit, “Whiskey Lullaby.”  Just a couple of years later, he won a companion piece for his mantle, taking home honors for the George Strait hit, “Give it Away.”

Amazingly, these awards came after he was already inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame, an honor he received in 2001.  In addition to remaining a current songwriter on the charts, Anderson continues to document the incredibly legacy of country music, hosting popular concert reunions for country singers and songwriters of days gone by.  He has also written successful memoirs and reflections on life, and can still be found on the Opry stage sharing some of those stories in between performances of the songs that have kept him on the stage for more than five decades.

Essential Singles:

• The Tip of My Fingers, 1960
• Po’ Folks, 1961
• Mama Sang a Song, 1962
• Still, 1963
• For Loving You (with Jan Howard), 1967
• My Life (Throw it Away if I Want to), 1969
• Sometimes (with Mary Lou Turner), 1975

Essential Singles by Other Artists:

• City Lights (Ray Price), 1958
• Once a Day (Connie Smith), 1964
• The Cold Hard Facts of Life (Porter Wagoner), 1967
• The Lord Knows I’m Drinking (Cal Smith), 1973
• Whiskey Lullaby (Brad Paisley and Alison Krauss), 2004
• Give it Away (George Strait), 2006

Essential Albums:

• Sings Country Heart Songs, 1962
• Still, 1963
• Bright Lights and Country Music, 1965
• I Love You Drops, 1966
• For Loving You (with Jan Howard), 1968
• Wild Weekend, 1968

Next: #26. Roy Acuff

Previous: #28. Hank Williams Jr.

100 Greatest Men: The Complete List