Dennis Linde

Dennis Linde (LIN-dee, March 18, 1943 – December 22, 2006) was an American musician and songwriter based in Nashville who has had over 250 of his songs recorded. He is best known for writing the 1993 song "John Deere Green" by Joe Diffie, as well as the 1972 Elvis Presley song, "Burning Love", an international hit that has been featured in at least five motion pictures. In 1994, Linde won BMI's "Top Writer Award" and received four awards as BMI's most-performed titles for that year. He never liked publicity, and shunned awards shows to the extent of having family members collect his awards for him. He wrote both words and music for most of his songs, rarely collaborating with co-writers. He earned 14 BMI "Million-Air" songs (a song played on the air one million times). In 2001, he was inducted into the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame. Linde wrote the following top-5 U.S. country hits: "Long Long Texas Road" (Roy Drusky, 1970), "The Love She Found in Me" (Gary Morris, 1983), "Walkin' a Broken Heart" (Don Williams, 1985), "Then It's Love" (Don Williams, 1986), "I'm Gonna Get You" (Eddy Raven, 1988), "In a Letter to You" (Eddy Raven, 1989), "Bubba Shot the Jukebox" (Mark Chesnutt, 1992), "It Sure Is Monday" (Mark Chesnutt, 1993), "Callin' Baton Rouge" (Garth Brooks, 1993), and "John Deere Green" (Joe Diffie, 1993). He also wrote "Goodbye Earl", a gold single for The Chicks in 2000. Linde died in 2006 at age 63 of idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis at Vanderbilt University Medical Center. Sixteen years after his death, Ashley McBryde released a concept album entitled Lindeville, a tribute to Linde's work. The album was nominated for Best Country Album of 2022 at the 65th Annual Grammy Awards.