Dan Penn Explained

Dan Penn
Birth Name:Wallace Daniel Pennington
Birth Date:16 November 1941
Birth Place:Vernon, Alabama, U.S.
Occupation:Songwriter, producer, singer, musician
Genre:blue-eyed soul, blues, country, soul
Instrument:Guitar
Years Active:1960-present
Label:Fame, Sire, Repertoire, Proper, Dandy, Last Music, Bell, Happy Tiger

Dan Penn (born Wallace Daniel Pennington, November 16, 1941) is an American songwriter, singer, musician, and record producer, who co-wrote many soul hits of the 1960s, including "The Dark End of the Street" and "Do Right Woman, Do Right Man" with Chips Moman[1] and "Cry Like a Baby" with Spooner Oldham.[2] Penn also produced many hits, including "The Letter", by The Box Tops.[3] He has been described as a white soul and blue-eyed soul singer. Penn has released relatively few records featuring his own vocals and musicianship, preferring the relative anonymity of songwriting and producing.[4] Dan Penn produced an album on Ronnie Milsap in 1970 on Warner Bros. (AKA the Red Album)

Early life and career

Penn grew up in Vernon, Alabama, United States, and spent much of his teens and early twenties in the Quad Cities–Muscle Shoals area.[5] He was a regular at Rick Hall's FAME Studios as a performer, songwriter, and producer. It was during his time with FAME that Penn cut his first record, "Crazy Over You" in 1960,[6] and wrote his first hit, "Is a Bluebird Blue?", which was recorded by Conway Twitty in the same year. The success of the number 6 pop hit "I'm Your Puppet" by James & Bobby Purify in 1966 convinced him that songwriting was a lucrative and worthwhile career.[7]

Career moves

In early 1966, Penn moved to Memphis, began writing for Press Publishing Company, and worked with Chips Moman at his American Sound Studio.[8] Their intense and short-lived partnership produced some of the best known and most enduring songs of the soul genre. Their first collaboration, the enduring classic "The Dark End of the Street" (1967), was first a hit for James Carr and has since been recorded by many others. A few months later, during a recording sessions in which Jerry Wexler introduced Aretha Franklin to FAME Studios and her first major success, the pair wrote "Do Right Woman, Do Right Man" in the studio for her, which went to number 37 in Billboard in 1967. In early 1967, Penn produced "The Letter" for the Box Tops. Along with long-time friend and collaborator Spooner Oldham, Penn also wrote a number of hits for the band, including "Cry Like a Baby," another song that has been covered many times.[9]

As songwriter

Songs written or co-written by Penn include:[10] [11]

Career:1970s onwards

Penn continued writing and producing hits for numerous artists during the 1960s and finally released four sides of his own on Happy Tiger in 1970, including "Nobody's Fool."[19] An album of the same name followed on Bell in 1973.[14] He was coaxed into the studio again in 1993 to record the acclaimed "Do Right Man," for which he reunited with many of his friends and colleagues from Memphis and Muscle Shoals Sound Studio.[20] He also has recently written and produced for the Hacienda Brothers.[21]

He now lives in Nashville and continues to write with Oldham and other contemporaries, such as Donnie Fritts, Gary Nicholson, and Norbert Putnam. Carson Whitsett and Penn have had their collaborations recorded by Irma Thomas and Johnny Adams and often teamed with writers Jonnie Barmett and, later, Hoy Lindsey. The team of Penn, Whitsett, and Lindsey were responsible for the title track of Solomon Burke's album Don't Give Up on Me (also recorded by Joe Cocker[22]), and Penn produced 2005's Better to Have It by Bobby Purify, which featured twelve songs from the team.[23] Oldham and he also tour together as their schedules permit.

In November 2012, the collection The Fame Recordings was released.[24] [25] It included 24 numbers (23 unreleased) Penn had recorded at the FAME Studios in Muscle Shoals, Alabama, between 1964 and 1966.[26] In the fall of 2013, he was inducted in the Alabama Music Hall of Fame.[27]

Discography

References

Notes and References

  1. Web site: Chips Moman - Biography, Albums, Streaming Links. AllMusic. 8 June 2019.
  2. Web site: Spooner Oldham - Veteran Songwriter, Keyboardist, Road Warrior. Spooneroldhammusic.com. 8 June 2019.
  3. https://boxtops.com/dan-penn/ Box Tops Dan Penn
  4. Web site: BOX TOPS: DAN PENN. Boxtops.com. 8 June 2019. 3 March 2016. https://web.archive.org/web/20160303175258/http://www.boxtops.com/btpenn.htm. dead.
  5. http://www.allmusic.com/artist/dan-penn-mn0000668302 Dan Penn
  6. https://charts.nz/showitem.asp?interpret=Dan+Penn&titel=Crazy+Over+You&cat=s Crazy Over You
  7. Web site: Dan Penn and Spooner Oldham interview. Furious.com. 8 June 2019.
  8. http://www.danpenn.com/dan.htm Dan Penn Biography
  9. http://www.coverinfo.de/start.php?wert=12&lang=2&suchbegriff=%22Cry+Like+A+Baby%22&sort=2&suchenach=title&tabelle=1&suchebemerkung=&suchoption=xsearch&seite=1&xpert=0 "Cry Like a Baby"
  10. http://www.secondhandsongs.com/artist/718 Artist: Dan Penn
  11. http://www.geocities.jp/hideki_wtnb/danpenncover.html Cover Songs of Dan Penn
  12. http://www.coverinfo.de/start.php?wert=12&lang=2&suchbegriff=%22I%27m+Your+Puppet%22&sort=2&suchenach=title&tabelle=1&suchebemerkung=&suchoption=xsearch&seite=1&xpert=0 "I'm Your Puppet"
  13. Web site: List of songs by James & Bobby Purify. Songfacts.com. 8 June 2019.
  14. Book: The Guinness Who's Who of Soul Music. Colin Larkin. Guinness Publishing. 1993. First. 0-85112-733-9. 194/5.
  15. Web site: Coverinfo.de - database with cover versions and musical quotations . 2012-12-01 . https://web.archive.org/web/20160304044240/http://www.coverinfo.de/start.php?wert=12&lang=2&suchbegriff=%22A+Woman+Left+Lonely%22&sort=2&suchenach=title&tabelle=1&suchebemerkung=&suchoption=xsearch&seite=1&xpert=0 . 2016-03-04 . dead .
  16. https://arktimes.com/rock-candy/2022/10/27/dan-penn-master-of-the-slow-pocket Spradlin, Greg. "Dan Penn, master of the ‘slow pocket,’" Arkansas Times (Little Rock, AR), Thursday, October 27, 2022.
  17. Web site: Original versions of Sweet Inspiration written by Dan Penn, Spooner Oldham - SecondHandSongs. Secondhandsongs.com. 8 June 2019.
  18. Web site: Pegi Young Album. https://web.archive.org/web/20130126161805/http://www.pegiyoung.com/album.html. dead. 26 January 2013. 26 January 2013. 8 June 2019.
  19. Web site: Happy Tiger Label Discography - 45. 45cat.com. April 19, 2024.
  20. http://www.geocities.jp/hideki_wtnb/dan2nd.html Dan Penn - Do Right Man
  21. http://www.geocities.jp/hideki_wtnb/danpennworks.html Dan Penn's Works
  22. http://www.secondhandsongs.com/work/36368 Song: Don't Give up on Me
  23. http://www.geocities.jp/hideki_wtnb/bobby-p.html Bobby Purify - Better To Have It
  24. Web site: Dan Penn: The FAME Recordings RCR American Roots Music. Rubbercityreview.com. 20 November 2012 . en-US. 2018-03-07.
  25. News: Dan Penn: The Fame Recordings – review. Smith. Caspar Llewellyn. 2012-12-06. The Guardian. en. 2018-03-07.
  26. http://www.allmusic.com/album/the-fame-recordings-mw0002431739 Dan Penn - The Fame Recordings
  27. http://www.alamhof.org/newsroom/alamhof-news/announcing-the-2013-alabama-music-hall-of-fame-inductees/ Announcing the 2013 Alabama Music Hall of Fame Inductees

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