On Hot Country mornings with Melody & Jody, we shared with you on the Country Catch Up a little story about Blake Shelton and what motivated him to move to Nashville and what he had to do once he got there according to a conversation Blake had with an 80-year-old woman?!
Who was the woman? Music legend Mae Axton. Who’s Mae Axton? Mae Axton was an American singer-songwriter. She was known in the music industry as the “Queen Mother of Nashville. She co-wrote the Elvis Presley hit single “Heartbreak Hotel“[1] with Tommy Durden. She worked with Mel Tillis, Reba McEntire, Willie Nelson, Eddy Arnold, Tanya Tucker, and Johnny Tillotson.
Blake’s conversation with Mae, changed his life.
Blake met Mae in his hometown in Oklahoma, and she told him if he wanted to make it in the business, he needed to move to Nashville.
Two weeks after high school graduation, even though he was only 17, he packed up, called her, and asked what to do next.
This was her advice: Get a job.
So, she hired him to paint her house, even though he had no clue how to paint. That gig led to him meeting her son, Hoyt Axton, who became a close friend. And then one day Hoyt played Blake a song he wrote called “Ol’ Red”.
Seems like that was a pretty fortunate person for Blake to meet.
So, the official rules for getting famous in Nashville are: Get a job . . . but make sure one of your co-workers is an incredible songwriter and has a famous mom. 😉
