Don Schlitz
Musician · 1952–2026 · Durham, North Carolina
Best known for
Songwriter
Don Schlitz was a North Carolina-born Nashville country songwriter whose 1976 song “The Gambler” — written at twenty-three and turned into a Kenny Rogers signature in 1978 — opened a forty-year run that produced “Forever and Ever, Amen,” “On the Other Hand,” and “When You Say Nothing at All,” among twenty-five chart-topping country singles. In 2022 he became the only non-performing songwriter ever inducted as a member of the Grand Ole Opry.
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- Born August 29, 1952, in Durham, North Carolina.
- Moved to Nashville at twenty to pursue songwriting.
- Wrote “The Gambler” in August 1976 at age twenty-three; Kenny Rogers’s 1978 recording reached No. 1 country and No. 16 pop, won the 1979 Grammy for Best Male Country Vocal Performance, and earned Schlitz his own Grammy for Best Country Song and the CMA Song of the Year.
- Co-wrote “On the Other Hand” and “Forever and Ever, Amen” with Paul Overstreet; both reached No. 1 country for Randy Travis in 1986 and 1987.
- Co-wrote “When You Say Nothing at All” with Paul Overstreet; Keith Whitley’s 1988 recording reached No. 1 country.
- Scored twenty-five No. 1 country singles as a writer or co-writer.
- Won two Grammy Awards and four ASCAP Country Songwriter of the Year awards.
- Inducted into the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame (1993), the Songwriters Hall of Fame, the Country Music Hall of Fame (2017), and the Grand Ole Opry (2022) — the only non-performing songwriter ever made an Opry member.
- Died at a Nashville hospital after a sudden illness on April 16, 2026, at age 73.
