{"id":2485586,"date":"2026-07-02T21:29:48","date_gmt":"2026-07-02T21:29:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/?p=2485586"},"modified":"2026-07-02T21:29:48","modified_gmt":"2026-07-02T21:29:48","slug":"rhett-akins-invited-to-become-new-member-of-the-grand-ole-opry","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/rhett-akins-invited-to-become-new-member-of-the-grand-ole-opry\/","title":{"rendered":"Rhett Akins Invited to Become New Member of the Grand Ole Opry"},"content":{"rendered":"<br><div id=\"pryc-wp-acctp-original-content\">\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\n<figure class=\"aligncenter size-large\"><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><br\/>Better him than his son. But it\u2019s really hard to feel one way or another about the Grand Ole Opry choosing songwriter and performer Rhett Akins as its newest inductee. Nonetheless, he will be the next Grand Ole Opry member when he\u2019s formally inducted later this year. <\/p><p>Though some might best know Rhett Akins from his brief stint as a pretty popular country music performer in the mid \u201990s with hits like \u201cThat Ain\u2019t My Truck\u201d and \u201cDon\u2019t Get Me Started,\u201d his inconsistency at minting hits for himself turned into a very consistent career of minting hits for others, and he now has thirty six #1 songwriting credits to his name from folks like Brooks &amp; Dunn and Joe Nichols, to Jason Aldean and Luke Bryan. <\/p><p>As a member of the \u201cPeach Pickers\u201d with fellow hit writers Dallas Davidson and Ben Hayslip, it\u2019s not an unfair accusation to say that Rhett Akins helped seed country music with a few Bro-Country selections through that era. He is also the father of pop country performer Thomas Rhett. <\/p><p>The Opry invitation was bestowed on Monday, June 29th by Opry Member <a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/savingcountrymusic.com\/?s=jon+pardi\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\" title=\"\">Jon Pardi<\/a>, who snuck into The Opry and surprised Akins. Jon Pardi had a hit with the Akins-penned \u201cDirt On My Boots.\u201d <br\/><em><br\/>\u201cRhett has always been somebody who has always been a mentor and taught a lot to me about how to write songs, how to be a co-writer. He has over 30 No. 1\u2019s,\u201d<\/em> Jon Pardi said, clearly nervous in the moment (see below). <em>\u201cYou\u2019ve always been family to me, but I\u2019m here to invite you to be part of a different family. Rhett Akins I am here to invite you to become a member of the Grand Ole Opry.\u201d<\/em><\/p><p>Rhett Akins nelt down in the Opry\u2019s hallowed circle at center stage and said,<em> \u201cAll I do everyday is write words and I can\u2019t think of any words right now except, \u2018Thank you Lord Jesus. I have been listening to the Grand Ole Opry since I was a little kid with my grandparents. Watching it when it used to be on TNN. Anytime they\u2019d ask me to play, if I was in Alaska, I\u2019d fly home immediately.\u00a0 I love country music with all my heart and all I ever wanted to do was meet Hank Jr.. Meet George Strait. I never dreamed I\u2019d be in this circle right here with Bill Monroe, Minnie Pearl, Roy Acuff, Garth and Alan\u2026and Jon Pardi. This is just unbelievable.\u201d<\/em><\/p><p>Rhett Akins was joined on the stage by his family, including son Thomas Rhett. <br\/><\/p>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"jeg_video_container jeg_video_content\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Rhett Akins Invited To Become Newest Grand Ole Opry Member By Jon Pardi!\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/eSnzyc5pYjE?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><br\/>This Opry invitation feels like worthy recognition for the artist who wrote and sang \u201cThat Ain\u2019t My Truck\u201d in 1995. But it feels a little dubious for the guy who wrote \u201cHuntin\u2019, Fishin\u2019 and Lovin\u2019 Every Day\u201d for Luke Bryan in 2015. Were there more worthy names who could\u2019ve earned this distinction before Rheyy Akins? Of course. But it\u2019s also a rather conventional pick, and Akins will be able to sing hits from the Opry stage that he wrote, and will be immediately recongnizable by a wide audience. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u2013 \u2013 \u2013 \u2013 \u2013 \u2013 \u2013 \u2013<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>If you found this article valuable, consider leaving<\/em><strong><em>\u00a0<a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/tiptopjar.com\/trigger\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Saving Country Music A TIP<\/a>.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n<!-- PRyC WP: Add custom content to bottom of post\/page: Standard Content START --><\/div>\r\n<p><em> \u2018 The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\r\n<p><em> \u2018 Some details of this article were extracted from the following source savingcountrymusic.com \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\r\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Better him than his son. But it\u2019s really hard to feel one way or another about the Grand Ole Opry choosing songwriter and performer Rhett Akins as its newest inductee. Nonetheless, he will be the next Grand Ole Opry member when he\u2019s formally inducted later this year. Though some might best know Rhett Akins from [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2485587,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[25179],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2485586","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-music"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/Rhett-Akins-Invited-to-Become-New-Member-of-the-Grand.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2485586","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2485586"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2485586\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2485588,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2485586\/revisions\/2485588"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2485587"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2485586"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2485586"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2485586"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}