Gretchen Peters To Be Honored In The Country Music Hall Of Fame® And Museum Series ‘Poets And Prophets’ On January 24

NASHVILLE, Tenn. – Newly inducted member of the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame Gretchen Peters will share stories and songs in the acclaimed songwriter series Poets and Prophets: Legendary Country Songwriters, at the Country Music Hall of Fame® and Museum, Saturday, January 24, at 2:00 p.m.

Hosted by Museum Editor Michael Gray, the 90-minute program will include recordings, photos and film clips from the museum’s Frist Library and Archive. Poets and Prophetsis included with museum admission and is free to museum members. Seating is limited, and passes are required for admittance. The interview and performance will be streamed live on the museum’s website.

Immediately following the program, Peters will sign limited edition, commemorative Hatch Show Print posters. (Visit the museum's website for complete admission and signing details.)

Born in Bronxville, New York, Peters grew up in Boulder, Colorado, where she was inspired by the area’s rich music and film culture to write and perform her own songs. Attracted to the singer-songwriter scene in Nashville—at the time home to Steve Earle, Nanci Griffith, and Lyle Lovett among others—Peters moved there in 1987.

Peters’s “Independence Day” appeared on Martina McBride’s album 'The Way That I Am' and became a major hit for her in1994, despite radio’s initial reluctance to play a song that so boldly addresses domestic violence. “Independence Day” struck a chord with listeners and earned Peters a Grammy nomination and CMA Song of the Year honors. Peters penned another track on the same McBride album. “My Baby Loves Me” went to #2 on the Billboard country chart, McBride’s first major hit.

A talented artist and musician, Peters releases her eighth studio album, 'Blackbirds,' on February 10. Other first-rank artists who have had major hits with her songs include Faith Hill (“The Secret of Life”), Patty Loveless (“You Don’t Even Know Who I Am”), George Strait (“The Chill of an Early Fall”) and Pam Tillis (“Let That Pony Run”). Neil Diamond, Etta James, the Neville Brothers and Trisha Yearwood have also found gems in the Peters catalog. Yearwood recorded “On a Bus to St. Cloud;” a fan favorite when Peters performs it live.

With rocker Bryan Adams, Peters has written dozens of songs, for Adams and for other artists, among them “When You Love Someone” (recorded by Adams for the film Hope Floats), “Inside Out” (a duet by Don Henley and Yearwood) and “Rock Steady” (a duet by Bonnie Raitt and Adams). Peters and Adams also contributed songs to the animated feature film 'Spirit: Stallion of the Cimarron.' One of the songs, “Here I Am,” earned a Golden Globe nomination.

The Poets and Prophets series honors songwriters who have made significant contributions to country music history. Previous subjects include Bill Anderson, Matraca Berg, Bobby Braddock, Wayne Carson, Buzz Cason, Jerry Chesnut, Hank Cochran, Roger Cook, Sonny Curtis, Dean Dillon, Bob DiPiero, Tom Douglas, Kye Fleming, Jerry Foster, Dallas Frazier, Red Lane, John D. Loudermilk, Bob McDill, Roger Murrah, Dan Penn, Curly Putman, Allen Reynolds, Mark D. Sanders, Don Schlitz, Whitey Shafer, Red Simpson, Jeffrey Steele, Sonny Throckmorton, Billy Edd Wheeler, Norro Wilson and Craig Wiseman. The Poets and Prophets series is made possible, in part, by grants from the Metropolitan Nashville Arts Commission and by an agreement between the Tennessee Arts Commission and National Endowment for the Arts.

Accredited by the American Alliance of Museums, the Country Music Hall of Fame® and Museum is operated by the Country Music Foundation, a not-for-profit 501(c)(3) educational organization chartered by the state of Tennessee in 1964. The museum's mission is the preservation of the history of country and related vernacular music rooted in southern culture. With the same educational mission, the foundation also operates CMF Records, the museum's Frist Library and Archive, CMF Press, Historic RCA Studio B® and Hatch Show Print®.

###