Chris Stapleton

About Chris Stapleton

Chris Stapleton spent about fifteen years writing hits for other people before anyone outside Nashville knew his name. He moved to Tennessee in 2001 and quietly became one of those guys who shows up in the liner notes of half the country albums on the shelf. He wrote or co-wrote five number ones for Kenny Chesney, George Strait, and Luke Bryan, plus deeper cuts for everyone from Adele to Brad Paisley. The whole time he was also fronting a bluegrass group called The SteelDrivers, then a rock band called The Jompson Brothers. He wasn't hiding exactly, just working.

His solo debut Traveller came out in 2015 when he was 37, which is almost retirement age in the current Nashville system. The album was written largely after the death of his father, recorded live in just a few days with a band playing in one room. The title track started as a road song he'd written years earlier with his wife Morgane, who sings on most of his records now. Tennessee Whiskey became the thing everyone talks about, with its Etta James groove underneath a lyric about getting sober through love instead of liquor. It works because Stapleton's voice sounds like it's been marinated in the subject matter.

What changed everything was the 2015 CMA Awards performance with Justin Timberlake. They did Tennessee Whiskey and Drink You Away, and the next day Traveller jumped something like 6000 percent on iTunes. Stapleton won three CMAs that night looking genuinely confused. The album eventually went quadruple platinum, which doesn't happen much anymore for anything, let alone a roots country record with no pop production tricks.

He followed with two albums in 2017, both called From A Room because they were recorded at RCA Studio A, the same room where Waylon and Willie cut records. Volume 1 had Either Way and Broken Halos. Volume 2 had Midnight Train to Memphis. They basically sounded like Traveller because why mess with a formula built on not following formulas.

Starting Over came in 2020 and debuted at number one on the Billboard 200, the all-genre chart, which is rare for straight country records now. The title track and Cold had that same stripped-down feel. He covered a Guy Clark song, opened with a cover of an old soul tune, and generally made the kind of album Nashville used to make before everything got compressed and snare-drum heavy.

He's become the guy other artists point to when they want to prove country can still mean something. Eight Grammys, ten CMAs, constant touring. He still sounds like he showed up to the session in whatever he was already wearing. That's probably the point.

His shows are quiet affairs where thousands of people seem to forget how to talk. He plays with a backing band but the focus never leaves his voice. The crowd hangs on every word like he might not come back for an encore. No banter, no showmanship—just a man and his guitar for two hours straight.

Known for Tennessee Whiskey, Traveller, Nobody, From A Room: Volume 1, Starting Over Again

See Chris Stapleton Live