Erin Enderlin
American country music singer-songwriter
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Erin Enderlin is an American country music singer-songwriter from Conway, Arkansas. She first gained recognition as a songwriter when Alan Jackson recorded "Monday Morning Church", which reached number five on the Billboard country chart in 2004.[1] Her songs have also been recorded by Lee Ann Womack, Randy Travis, Luke Bryan, Reba McEntire, Terri Clark, and Willie Nelson.[2][3] As a recording artist, she is known for character-driven traditional country songs on albums including Whiskeytown Crier (2017), Faulkner County (2019), and Barroom Mirrors (2023).[4][5]
Erin Enderlin | |
|---|---|
| Origin | Conway, Arkansas, U.S. |
| Genres | Country |
| Occupation | Singer-songwriter |
| Instruments | Vocals, guitar |
| Years active | 2004–present |
Early life and education
Enderlin grew up in Conway, Arkansas, listening to traditional country music and learning to sing, play guitar, and write songs. She began writing songs while in tenth grade after reading an interview in which Reba McEntire discussed the importance of developing an individual artistic identity.[6] She moved to the Nashville area after high school and studied in the recording industry program at Middle Tennessee State University. She earned a degree in Recording Industry with minors in Mass Communications and Entrepreneurship.[2][7]
Career
Songwriting
While a senior at Middle Tennessee State, Enderlin learned that Alan Jackson would record "Monday Morning Church", which she co-wrote with Brent Baxter. Jackson released the song in late 2004, and it reached number five on the Billboard country chart.[1][8] During the same period she secured a song cut by Randy Travis and an artist-development agreement with RCA Nashville.[8]
Enderlin later co-wrote Womack's "Last Call" with Shane McAnally; the recording became a Top 20 country single.[3] Her other songwriting credits include Bryan's "You Don't Know Jack" and McEntire's "The Bar's Getting Lower".[9][8] Artists including Travis, Clark, and Lee Ann Womack have recorded additional Enderlin compositions.[2][8]
In 2025, Enderlin co-wrote two songs for Trisha Yearwood's album The Mirror: "So Many Summers" with Yearwood and Jim "Moose" Brown, and "Goodnight Cruel World" with Yearwood and Sunny Sweeney.[10][11] Yearwood said she met Enderlin through Sweeney while arranging songwriting sessions for the album.[12] The 2026 deluxe edition added a third Enderlin co-write, "Put It in a Song", written with Yearwood and Brown.[13][14]
Recording career
After spending nearly five years in an RCA artist-development deal without releasing an album, Enderlin worked behind the scenes at the Grand Ole Opry before making her first performance there in 2013.[8][7] Her 2013 release I Let Her Talk was followed by Whiskeytown Crier in 2017.[4] Made with Jamey Johnson and Jim "Moose" Brown, Whiskeytown Crier is a concept album whose songs concern residents of a fictional community and their appearances in its newspaper.[4] Enderlin modeled the setting partly on William Faulkner's fictional Yoknapatawpha County and cited his use of multiple narrators and stream of consciousness in As I Lay Dying as influences on her writing.[15][6] A review in Wide Open Country praised its traditional country sound and storytelling and noted guest appearances by Chris Stapleton, Ricky Skaggs, Randy Houser, and Jon Randall.[16]
Enderlin was selected for CMT's Next Women of Country class of 2018.[3] In 2019 she released four three-song EPs, each centered on a different character, before combining their tracks with two additional songs on the album Faulkner County.[1] Johnson and Brown produced the 14-track album, which includes guest vocals by Alison Krauss, Vince Gill, and Cody Jinks.[1] At the 2020 Arkansas Country Music Awards, Enderlin received awards for country artist, songwriter, song, and album of the year.[9]
Enderlin released a six-song EP titled Barroom Mirrors in October 2021.[17] Five of its songs were incorporated into a self-produced, 11-track album of the same name, released in 2023, with guest vocals from Rosanne Cash and Terri Clark.[5][18] Declan Culliton of Lonesome Highway described the album as an accessible traditional-country record centered largely on drinking and barroom themes.[5] A Generation Country review similarly characterized it as traditional honky-tonk focused on heartbreak and barroom settings, praising Enderlin's restrained vocal delivery and the fiddle- and steel-led arrangements.[19]
In 2025, Enderlin worked with the nonprofit SongwritingWith:Soldiers and retired military veterans Brent Fogleman and Tanja Struyck-Fogleman to write "When You Look at Me", which she performed at the Grand Ole Opry on June 28. She subsequently paired with Randy Houser to prepare a commercial recording of the song.[20]
Musical style
Enderlin's work draws on traditional country music and frequently uses narrative songs told from the perspectives of fictional characters.[1][2] MusicRow has described her writing as "intelligent, sturdy storytelling framed in traditional country instrumentation", while WMOT noted the prominence of fiddle, pedal steel guitar, and harmony vocals in her recordings.[4][1] Her interest in dark narratives was shaped by childhood exposure to Murder, She Wrote and story songs such as "Coward of the County".[15] She has described preferring relatively spare arrangements built around acoustic guitar, upright bass, fiddle, and drums, with occasional electric or pedal steel guitar, while keeping recordings raw enough to preserve changes in emotion across a performance.[6]
Discography
Albums
| Year | Title |
|---|---|
| 2013 | I Let Her Talk |
| 2017 | Whiskeytown Crier |
| 2019 | Faulkner County |
| 2023 | Barroom Mirrors |
Extended plays
Selected songwriting credits
| Year | Song | Recording artist |
|---|---|---|
| 2004 | "Monday Morning Church" | Alan Jackson featuring Patty Loveless[23] |
| 2008 | "Last Call" | Lee Ann Womack[23] |
| 2011 | "You Don't Know Jack" | Luke Bryan[23] |
| 2018 | "Waffle House Christmas" | Bill Anderson[24] |
| 2019 | "The Bar's Getting Lower" | Reba McEntire[25] |
| 2024 | "I Wrote This Song for You" | Willie Nelson[26] |
| 2025 | "So Many Summers"[10][11] | Trisha Yearwood |
| "Goodnight Cruel World"[10][11] | ||
| 2026 | "Blood in the River"[27][28] | The War and Treaty |
| "The Devil's Boat"[27][28] | Larkin Poe | |
| "I'll Be Here with You"[27][28] | Shania Twain and Drake Milligan | |
| "Heart of America"[27][28] | Willie Nelson |