This past week, the Country Music Hall of Fame announced the three elite inductees that will comprise their Class of 2025. In a few weeks, the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame will make a similar induction announcement. The debate amongst fans and critics that these announcements elicit are always passionate to say the least, and have become as noteworthy of a part of the annual festivities as the inductions themselves. That’s to be expected with any type of subjective industry honor, but such debates surrounding each of the respective music halls has become even more intense due to each institution having their own respective issues with their induction process.
That’s not meant as a criticism leveled against the overall existence or intentions of the Halls of Fame. Both entities should be celebrated for the high quality of curation, exhibits, and overall preservation of popular music history that they both achieve with their impressive museums. (Actually attending the Rock Hall in Cleveland is still on my bucket list, but my visit to the Country Hall this past fall was a rich highlight among my many experiences as a music fan.) Any institutional honoring process such as that of a Hall of Fame induction is always going to be mired in some form of debate, not to mention unfortunate industry bias or overly commercial considerations.
So, what would that process and the overall inductee rosters of these hallowed halls look like if a fan like myself could just wave a magic wand and “solve” all of these perceived problems? That’s what this latest 706 series, Fantasy Ballots is all about! I’ve reviewed the list of current inductees and the criteria for each hall, flipped them on their heads, and come up with five years of dream ballots of each hall, ultimately arriving at what I would view as my perfect Hall of Fame pictures by the year 2030. A moot exercise in the grand scheme of things? Of course. So, what does it accomplish? Merely creates a fun and thoughtful conversation for music lovers like ourselves to have about some pivotal, beloved musical figures that overdue for some grander industry recognition. Pure and simple.
Since the Country Class of 2025 was just announced, we’ll start with that Hall. Similar features on the Rock Hall will commence after their 2025 announcement in late April.
The Country Music Hall of Fame’s most glaring challenge at the moment, besides the same bias toward male artists that has permeated the overall country industry for decades, is the slow-as-molasses rate at which they add names. Their current limitations to just three inductees a year has created a mountainous backlog of deserving artists who will likely see induction long after they’re alive, if ever at all at this rate. I completely understand the necessity of protecting the prestige and elite status of a Hall of Fame honor. Not every artist who ever experienced any type of success in the industry can see induction; if you put every one in then you dilute the value of the whole thing. With that said, a Hall is less relevant if outdated, exclusionary methods push things to the opposite extreme, and this current snail-pacing of inductions has most definitely done this as it relates the CMHOF. There are now fresh debates occurring about artists from the 1990s and 2000s who are becoming due or overdue for recognition, and rightfully so. The problem is there are dozens of artists from the 80s all the way back to the 30s who have been in the same boat for decades now. As Waylon Jennings once famously said, “we need a change!”
Back in 2001, it appeared that the Hall was interested in making a course-correction to their backlog when they elected a larger “catch-up” class consisting of a record dozen inductees. Unfortunately, that practice hasn’t been used a single time in the nearly quarter-century since. However, we’re going to use that precise template of 12 annual inductees for the purposes of our Fantasy Ballots for the years 2026 through 2030. For each ballot, we’ll select 10 artist category honorees and 2 songwriter/musician category selections. (This is to take nothing away from the very deserving producers, executives, and other pivotal industry players that are also worthy of induction. Perhaps we’ll circle back to those folks in the future, but for “brevity’s” sake, we’re going to stick to these categories, which will already cover sixty acts.
The selections on each ballot are not necessarily in a specific order; there was more thought put into creating an equally vibrant and diverse class for each year. Ultimately, however my main goal was ending in 2030 with the artists I want to see inducted by then, with the overall list spread out with minimal strategy over the five entries. I’m still following the same eligibility threshold the Hall currently uses: twenty years passing after an artist’s initial recorded debut.
See below for links that will be added as we progress through this five-part series, and also reference a complete list of already-elected inductees from the first class in 1961 through the recently announced class of 2025, which will honor Kenny Chesney, June Carter Cash, and Tony Brown.
Fantasy Ballots- Country Music Hall of Fame
Complete List of Inducted Country Music Hall of Fame Members
Class of 1961: Jimmie Rodgers, Hank Williams, Fred Rose
Class of 1962: Roy Acuff
Class of 1964: Tex Ritter
Class of 1965: Ernest Tubb
Class of 1966: Eddy Arnold, Uncle Dave Macon, Jim Denny, George D. Hay
Class of 1967: Red Foley, Jim Reeves, J.L. Frank, Stephen H. Sholes
Class of 1968: Bob Wills
Class of 1969: Gene Autry
Class of 1970: The Carter Family, Bill Monroe
Class of 1971: Art Satherley
Class of 1972: Jimmie Davis
Class of 1973: Chet Atkins, Patsy Cline
Class of 1974:Owen Bradley, Pee Wee King
Class of 1975: Minnie Pearl
Class of 1976: Kitty Wells, Paul Cohen
Class of 1977: Merle Travis
Class of 1978: Grandpa Jones
Class of 1979: Hank Snow, Hubert Long
Class of 1980: Johnny Cash, Sons of the Pioneers, Connie B. Gay
Class of 1981: Vernon Dalhart, Grant Turner
Class of 1982: Lefty Frizzell, Marty Robbins, Roy Horton
Class of 1983: Little Jimmy Dickens
Class of 1984: Ralph Peer
Class of 1985: Flatt and Scruggs
Class of 1986: The Duke of Paducah, Wesley Rose
Class of 1987: Rod Brasfield
Class of 1988: Loretta Lynn, Roy Rogers
Class of 1989: Hank Thompson, Cliffie Stone, Jack Stapp
Class of 1990: Tennessee Ernie Ford
Class of 1991: Felice & Boudleaux Bryant
Class of 1992: George Jones, Frances Preston
Class of 1993: Willie Nelson
Class of 1994: Merle Haggard
Class of 1995: Roger Miller, Jo Walker Meador
Class of 1996: Buck Owens, Ray Price, Patsy Montana
Class of 1997: Harlan Howard, Cindy Walker, Brenda Lee
Class of 1998: Tammy Wynette, Elvis Presley, George Morgan, E.W. “Bud” Wendell
Class of 1999: Dolly Parton, Conway Twitty, Johnny Bond
Class of 2000: Charley Pride, Faron Young
Class of 2001: Waylon Jennings, Bill Anderson, Don Gibson, The Everly Brothers, The Delmore Brothers, Homer & Jethro, The Jordanaires, The Louvin Brothers, Webb Pierce, Sam Phillips, Ken Nelson, Don Law
Class of 2002: Porter Wagoner, Bill Carlisle
Class of 2003: Carl Smith, Floyd Cramer
Class of 2004: Kris Kristofferson, Jim Foglesong
Class of 2005: Glen Campbell, Alabama, DeFord Bailey
Class of 2006: Sonny James, George Strait
Class of 2007: Mel Tillis, Vince Gill, Ralph Emery
Class of 2008: Emmylou Harris, Tom T. Hall, The Statler Brothers, Ernest “Pop” Stoneman
Class of 2009: Roy Clark, Barbara Mandrell, Charlie McCoy
Class of 2010: Don Williams, Jimmy Dean, Ferlin Husky, Billy Sherrill
Class of 2011: Jean Shepard, Reba McEntire, Bobby Braddock
Class of 2012: Garth Brooks, Connie Smith, Hargus “Pig” Robbins
Class of 2013: Kenny Rogers, Bobby Bare, Cowboy Jack Clement
Class of 2014: Ronnie Milsap, Mac Wiseman, Hank Cochran
Class of 2015: Jim Ed Brown and The Browns, Oak Ridge Boys, Grady Martin
Class of 2016: Randy Travis, Charlie Daniels, Fred Foster
Class of 2017: Alan Jackson, Jerry Reed, Don Schlitz
Class of 2018: Ricky Skaggs, Dottie West, Johnny Gimble
Class of 2019: Brooks & Dunn, Ray Stevens, Jerry Bradley
Class of 2020: Hank Williams Jr., Marty Stuart, Dean Dillon
Class of 2021: The Judds, Ray Charles, Eddie Bayers, Pete Drake
Class of 2022: Jerry Lee Lewis, Keith Whitley, Joe Galante
Class of 2023: Tanya Tucker, Patty Loveless, Bob McDill
Class of 2024: Toby Keith, John Anderson, James Burton
Class of 2025: Kenny Chesney, June Carter Cash, Tony Brown
The 706 