Erin Enderlin

Erin Enderlin
OriginConway, Arkansas, U.S.
GenresCountry
OccupationSinger-songwriter
InstrumentsVocals, guitar
Years active2004–present

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]

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

Year Title
2019 Chapter One: Tonight I Don't Give a Damn
Chapter Two: I Can Be Your Whiskey
Chapter Three: Whatever Gets You Through the Night
Chapter Four: The Queen of Marina del Rey[21]
2021 Barroom Mirrors
2026 Songs from the Gray House[22]

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

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Havighurst, Craig (November 14, 2019). "Erin Enderlin's Characters Can't Be Contained to One Song in Faulkner County". WMOT. Retrieved July 22, 2026.
  2. 1 2 3 4 Moore, Rick (June 18, 2012). "Nashville Songwriter Series: Erin Enderlin". American Songwriter. Retrieved July 22, 2026.
  3. 1 2 3 "Erin Enderlin — Songwriter Session, 2020". Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum. Retrieved July 22, 2026.
  4. 1 2 3 4 Nicholson, Jessica (August 31, 2017). "Erin Enderlin Traces Pain, Loss on Concept Album Whiskeytown Crier, Out Friday". MusicRow. Retrieved July 22, 2026.
  5. 1 2 3 Culliton, Declan (July 17, 2023). "Erin Enderlin: Barroom Mirrors". Lonesome Highway. Retrieved July 22, 2026.
  6. 1 2 3 Harris, Vincent (February 15, 2019). "Tellin' Stories". Greenville Journal. p. 32. Retrieved July 22, 2026 – via Newspapers.com.
  7. 1 2 Watts, Cindy (April 28, 2019). "Erin Enderlin". The Tennessean. p. A4. Retrieved July 22, 2026 – via Newspapers.com.
  8. 1 2 3 4 5 Price, Deborah Evans (December 11, 2019). "Songwriter Spotlight: How Erin Enderlin Went from Grand Ole Opry Hostess to Revered Singer/Songwriter". Billboard. Retrieved July 22, 2026 – via ErinEnderlin.com.
  9. 1 2 Moore, Rick (August 2, 2021). "Erin Enderlin Places New Songs, Wins Arkansas Country Music Awards". American Songwriter. Retrieved July 22, 2026.
  10. 1 2 3 Tamburin, Adam (July 17, 2025). "Trisha Yearwood finds her voice as a songwriter on new album The Mirror". Axios. Retrieved July 22, 2026.
  11. 1 2 3 Holthouse, Jerry. "Trisha Yearwood To Celebrate New Album With Free Nashville Show". Nashville.com. Retrieved July 22, 2026.
  12. ↑ Wickstrom, Matt (July 18, 2025). "Trisha Yearwood On The Mirror, Her Favorite Country Ladies & Friends In Low Places". Grammy.com. Retrieved July 22, 2026.
  13. ↑ Hollabaugh, Lorie (December 8, 2025). "Trisha Yearwood Announces The Mirror (Deluxe) EP & New Acoustic Tour". MusicRow. Retrieved July 22, 2026.
  14. ↑ "Put It In A Song – Trisha Yearwood". Shazam. Retrieved July 22, 2026.
  15. 1 2 Thanki, Juli (November 11, 2017). "Angela Lansbury, William Faulkner inspire hit songwriter". The Tennessean. p. A2. Retrieved July 22, 2026 – via Newspapers.com.
  16. ↑ Moore, Addie (September 1, 2017). "Stream Erin Enderlin's Ode to Traditional Country, Whiskeytown Crier". Wide Open Country. Retrieved July 22, 2026.
  17. ↑ Hestand, Stacie (October 18, 2021). "Erin Enderlin Releases New EP Barroom Mirrors". Raised Rowdy. Retrieved July 22, 2026.
  18. ↑ "Barroom Mirrors by Erin Enderlin". Apple Music. June 2, 2023. Retrieved July 22, 2026.
  19. ↑ Generation Country (June 20, 2026). "Album Review: Erin Enderlin – Barroom Mirrors". Generation Country. Retrieved July 22, 2026.
  20. ↑ Dowling, Marcus (July 6, 2025). "How military veterans turned battlefield trauma into song". The Daily Herald. Columbia, Tennessee. p. A1. Retrieved July 22, 2026 – via Newspapers.com.
  21. ↑ Whitaker, Sterling. "Erin Enderlin Announces Debut Album, Faulkner County". The Boot. Retrieved July 22, 2026.
  22. ↑ "Songs from the Gray House – EP by Erin Enderlin". Apple Music. March 6, 2026. Retrieved July 22, 2026.
  23. 1 2 3 "Erin Enderlin". Grand Ole Opry. Retrieved July 22, 2026.
  24. ↑ "Waffle House Christmas – Song by Bill Anderson". Apple Music. Retrieved July 22, 2026.
  25. ↑ "Erin Enderlin: Songwriter Session". Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum. 2020. Retrieved July 22, 2026.
  26. ↑ Dansby, Andrew. "Willie Nelson looks outward on new album The Border". Houston Chronicle. Retrieved July 22, 2026.
  27. 1 2 3 4 "The Gray House Soundtrack Album Details". Film Music Reporter. January 30, 2026. Retrieved July 22, 2026.
  28. 1 2 3 4 "Songwriter Session: Erin Enderlin". Nashville Downtown Partnership. Retrieved July 22, 2026.
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