Jim Weatherly

Induction Year: 2006

Birth Name: James Dexter Weatherly

Birth Date: 03-17-1943

Place of Birth: Pontotoc, Mississippi

Death Date: 02-03-2021

Place of Death: Brentwood, Tennessee

Jim Weatherly was a star quarterback at the University of Mississippi, but his enduring successes have occurred off the gridiron, in the annals of American song.

Born in Mississippi, Weatherly began writing songs when he was 13 years old. After a college football career that included a national championship in 1962, he moved to Los Angeles and wrote pop and R&B classics including some of Gladys Knight & the Pips' greatest hits. "Neither One of Us Wants to Be the First to Say Goodbye," "Midnight Train to Georgia" and "You're the Best Thing That Ever Happened to Me" were all R&B chart-toppers, and "Midnight Train to Georgia" also ruled the pop charts.

Weatherly was named the NSAI's Songwriter of the Year and ASCAP's Country Songwriter of the Year in 1974, the same year that Glen Campbell's recording of Weatherly's "Where Shadows Never Fall" won a Dove Award. Weatherly also recorded solo albums while in Los Angeles, scoring a Top 10 country hit with "I'll Still Love You" in 1975 and a Top 20 pop hit with "The Need to Be" in 1974.

Weatherly's songs were often recorded by country artists, and he moved to Nashville in 1985. He's penned country hits for Glen Campbell, Charley Pride, Bryan White, Ray Price (who has recorded more than 50 of Weatherly's songs), Bob Luman, Bill Anderson, Earl Thomas Conley and others, and his songs have been recorded by a diverse array of artists including Neil Diamond, Dean Martin, the Indigo Girls, Vince Gill, Hall & Oates, the Temptations, Etta James, Steve Wariner and the Manhattans. He served on NSAI's board of directors for five years, and is a member of the Mississippi Musicians Hall of Fame and the Ole Miss Alumni Hall of Fame.

"Midnight Train to Georgia" was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 1999, and it was ranked #29 in the Recording Industry Association of America's "365 Songs of the Century," placing just behind the Beatles' "I Want to Hold Your Hand" and just ahead of John Lennon's "Imagine."

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Song Catalog

"A Lady Like You"

(written with Keith Stegall)

Glen Campbell1984 #4 country
Eddy Arnold1991 
 

"All Tangled Up in Love"

(written with Bob McDill)

Earl Thomas Conley1984 #8 country
 

"All That Keeps Me Going"

Ray Price1974 
Jim Weatherly1977 #27 country
 

"Bad for My Own Good"

(written with Joe Hunter, Jim Whitehead)

Reba McEntire2008 

"Best Thing That Ever Happened to Me"

Ray Price1973 #1 country
Dean Martin1973 
Gladys Knight & the Pips1974 #1 R&B, #3 pop
Andy Williams1974 
Ruth Brown1997 
Sweet Surrender2001 
B. J. Thomas2002 
Salena Jones2003 
Anna Wilson2011 
 

"Between Her Goodbye and My Hello"

Gladys Knight & the Pips1974 #45 R&B, #57 pop
 

"Dixie Train"

(written with Carl Jackson)

Carl Jackson1985 #45 country
 

"Farthest Thing From My Mind"

Ray Price1975 #17 country
 

"Gift from Missouri"

Jim Weatherly1980 #34 country
 

"Hot Nights"

(written with Fred Knobloch)

Canyon1989 #40 country
 

"I'll Still Love You"

Jim Weatherly1975 #9 country, #87 pop
 

"If I Didn't Have You in My World"

(written with Vince Gill)

Vince Gill1991 
 

"If You Ever Change Your Mind"

Ray Price1975 #31 country
 

"It Must Have Been the Rain"

Jim Weatherly1975 #58 country
 

"It This Ain't Love"

(written with Bob McDill)

Grayghost1989 #69 country
 

"Jesus Is My Kind of People"

Etta James2005 
 

"Just Enough to Make Me Stay"

Bob Luman1974 #23 country
Ray Price1975 
Sami Jo1975 
 

"Like a First Time Thing"

Ray Price1974 #15 country
 

"Like Old Times Again"

Ray Price1974 #4 country

"Midnight Train to Georgia"

Gladys Knight & the Pips1973 #1 pop, #1 R&B
Eddie Middleton1977 #87 country
Teddy Brown1995 
The Indigo Girls1995 
Sandra Bernhard1998 
Lynn Anderson2002 
Jim Weatherly2003 
Joan Osborne2007 
Neil Diamond2010 
 

"Neither One of Us"

Bob Luman1973 #7 country
Gladys Knight & the Pips1973 #1 R&B, # 2 pop
Cecil Holmes1973 
Vicki Carr1974 
David Sanborn1975 
Johnny Adams1987 
Ronnie Bryant1989 #81 country
Buddy Greco1990 
Joe Simon1991 
The Spinners1999 
Hall & Oates2005 
The Temptations2006 
The Funk Brothers2008 
 

"On a Good Night"

(written with Keith Stegall)

Glen Campbell1990 
 

"Roses and Love Songs"

Ray Price1975 #3 country
 

"Safe in the Arms of Your Love"

Jim Weatherly1980 #82 country
 

"Slowly But Surely"

(written with Michael Garvin, Kenny Jones)

Marie Osmond1989 #75 country
 

"Smooth Sailin'"

Jim Weatherly1979 #32 country

"Someone Else's Star"

(written with Skip Ewing)

Bryan White1995 #1 country
 

"Storms of Troubled Times"

Gladys Knight & the Pips1973 
Ray Price1974 #25 country
Maxine Weldon1975 
Sami Jo1975 
 

"The Need to Be"

Jim Weatherly1974 #11 pop
 

"This Is a Love Song"

Bill Anderson1979 #20 country
 

"Till We Fall Back in Love Again"

(written with Jeff Herndon, Phil Douglas)

Jeff Carson2002 #46 country
 

"Turn Out the Stars (When You Leave)"

(written with John Durrell)

The Manhattans2008 
 

"Until Forever's Gone"

(written with Jeff Carson)

Kenny Rogers2009 

"Where Do I Put Her Memory"

Ray Price1974 
Charley Pride1979 #1 country
Jim Weatherly2001 
 

"Where Peaceful Waters Flow"

Gladys Knight & the Pips1973 #6 R&B, #28 pop
 

"Where Shadows Never Fall"

(written with Carl Jackson)

Glen Campbell1991 
Kelly Nelon Thompson1994 
 

"You Can Always Say Goodbye in the Morning"

Jim Collins1985 #75 country
 

"You Turn Me On (Like a Radio)"

(written with Bob McDill)

Ed Bruce1984 #3 country
 

"Your Memory, Me and the Blues"

(written with Delbert McClinton)

Delbert McClinton2005 

Other Media

Jim Weatherly

Induction Year: 2006