Kye Fleming

Induction Year: 2009

Birth Name: Rhonda Kye Fleming

Birth Date: 10-09-1951

Place of Birth: Pensacola, Florida

Kye Fleming started writing songs when she was 14. A self-described "Navy brat" who grew up in California, Hawaii, Arkansas and Texas, she attended college for a couple of years at the University of Arkansas. She spent her early twenties on the folk music circuit, performing her original material.

Jerry Scheff, the bass player in Elvis Presley's TCB band, heard her in an Oklahoma club and urged her to move to Los Angeles to pursue a music career. She first had her songs recorded on the West Coast. After stints in New York and Boston, she moved to Nashville in 1977.

Later that year, she signed with Pi Gem Music's Tom Collins as a staff writer. She and another young songwriter, Dennis Morgan, started collaborating, and today their catalog reads like a country music greatest hits package of the '70s and '80s. "Years," "Sleeping Single in a Double Bed" and "I Was Country When Country Wasn't Cool" were country chart-toppers for Barbara Mandrell; "Smoky Mountain Rain" and "I Wouldn't Have Missed It for the World" was a country #1 for Ronnie Milsap; and "Roll on Mississippi" was a Top 10 country hit for Charley Pride. In addition, they wrote BMI's 1983 Country Song of the Year, "Nobody", for Sylvia.

After six years, the Fleming-Morgan team dissolved. She began writing for Almo-Irving Music in 1984. "Give Me Wings," as recorded by Michael Johnson, was named Billboard magazine's Country Song of the Year for 1987. Willie Nelson's 1990 rendition of "There You Are" became yet another Top 10 hit. She has been awarded over 45 BMI awards in her career, making her one of the most-awarded songwriters in country music history. Ten of her songs have been broadcast a million times or more.

Fleming has won BMI's Country Songwriter of the Year Awards three times and has one award as the performance-rights organization's Pop Songwriter of the Year. She has also won the Nashville Songwriters Association International (NSAI) Writer of the Year honor three times.

Fleming also wrote material for such prime-time network television shows as Murder She Wrote, Sonny & Cher and Barbara Mandrell & the Mandrell Sisters.

In addition, she is a successful song publisher and has branched out into record producing.

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Song Catalog

 

"All Roads Lead to You"

(written with Dennis Morgan)

Steve Wariner1981 #1 country
 

"Best of Strangers"

(written with Dennis Morgan)

Barbara Mandrell1980 #6 country
 

"Crackers"

(written with Dennis Morgan)

Barbara Mandrell1980 #3 country
Sara Evans2006 
 

"Cross My Broken Heart"

(written with Verlon Thompson)

Suzy Bogguss1989 #14 country
 

"Easy to Please"

(written with Kent Robbins)

Janie Fricke1986 #5 country
 

"Falling, Falling Gone"

The Williams Brothers1972 
 

"Fooled by a Feeling"

(written with Dennis Morgan)

Barbara Mandrell1979 #4 country, #26 adult contemporary

"Give Me Wings"

(written with Don Schlitz)

Michael Johnson1987 #1 country
Don Schlitz2001 
 

"Going Nowhere"

(written with Paul Begaud, Vanessa Corish)

Wynonna2000 #43 country

"I Was Country When Country Wasn't Cool"

(written with Dennis Morgan)

Barbara Mandrell1981 #1 country
Kenny Chesney & Reba McEntire2006 

"I Wouldn't Have Missed It for the World"

(written with Dennis Morgan, Charles Quillen)

Ronnie Milsap1982 #1 country, #3 adult contemporary, #20 pop
 

"In Times Like These"

(written with Dennis Morgan)

Barbara Mandrell1983 #4 country
Brad Paisley2006 
 

"Like Nothing Ever Happened"

(written with Dennis Morgan)

Sylvia1983 #2 country
 

"Love Is Not a Thing"

(written with Mark Cawley, Mary Ann Kennedy)

Russ Taff1995 #53 country
 

"Missin' You"

(written with Dennis Morgan)

Charley Pride1980 #2 country
 

"Morning Comes Too Early"

(written with Dennis Morgan)

Jim Ed Brown & Helen Cornelius1980 #5 country

"Nobody"

(written with Dennis Morgan)

BMI Country Song of the Year

Sylvia1982 #1 country, #5 adult contemporary, #15 pop
 

"Nobody Wants to Be Alone"

(written with Michael Masser)

Crystal Gayle1985 #3 country
 

"Operator Long Distance Please"

(written with Dennis Morgan)

Barbara Mandrell1982 #9 country
 

"Roll on Mississippi"

(written with Dennis Morgan)

Charley Pride1981 #7 country
 

"Ruby"

(written with Janis Ian)

Marti Jones1988 
Ute Lemper1990 
Janis Ian1995 
Ian Shaw2001 
 

"She Used to Love Me a Lot"

(written with Dennis Morgan, Charles Quillen)

David Allan Coe1985 #11 country

"Sleeping Single in a Double Bed"

(written with Dennis Morgan)

Barbara Mandrell1978 #1 country
Terri Clark2006 
 

"Smoky Mountain Rain"

(written with Dennis Morgan)

Ronnie Milsap1980 #1 country, #1 adult contemporary, #24 pop
 

"Snapshot"

(written with Dennis Morgan)

Sylvia1983 #5 country
 

"Sweet Yesterday"

(written with Dennis Morgan)

Sylvia1982 #12 country
 

"There You Are"

(written with Mike Reid)

Willie Nelson1990 #8 country
 

"Tumbleweed"

(written with Dennis Morgan)

Sylvia1980 #10 country
 

"Wish You Were Here"

(written with Dennis Morgan)

Barbara Mandrell1981 #2 country, #40 adult contemporary
 

"Years"

(written with Dennis Morgan)

Barbara Mandrell1980 #1 country, #38 adult contemporary
Wayne Newton1985 
Randy Owen2006 
Kimberly Cash2009 

Other Media

Kye Fleming

Induction Year: 2009