Troy Tomlinson

Personal

Tomlinson was born and raised in Portland, TN, the son of Ella and Vernon Tomlinson. He spent his early childhood roaming the 80 acres of farmland his parents owned with his younger brother, Tim. He graduated from Portland High School in 1982. In 1987, Tomlinson married Sylvia Keith. They have two children and two grandchildren.

Career

After high school, Tomlinson pursued what he thought was his lifelong vocation as a machinist. His first job following graduation was an apprenticeship position at a plastics company in Portland. While working there, he received second and third degree burns on both hands. At the time, a new acquaintance of his, Cliff Williamson, was searching for a trainee song-plugger at a newly formed publishing company, Multimedia Entertainment in Nashville. Williamson heard of Tomlinson’s accident and in 1983, he hired Tomlinson and started him on what was to be his life work, music publishing.

After Multimedia was sold, one of Tomlinson’s songwriters, Don King, asked Tomlinson to help him start his own company. Not long thereafter, Muscle Shoals studio mogul Rick Hall tapped Tomlinson to run the Nashville division of Hall’s publishing company, Fame Music Group.

In 1988 Tomlinson caught the attention of Jerry Bradley, who had become president of Gaylord Entertainment’s 16th Avenue Records and Acuff-Rose Music Publishing. Bradley brought Tomlinson to Acuff-Rose, where he worked with famed songwriters Dean Dillon, Skip Ewing, Jim Weatherly, and Whitey Shafer, among others. Tomlinson is also credited with the discovery of Kenny Chesney, the Country Music Association’s four time Entertainer of the Year. While at Acuff-Rose, he secured hit recordings by platinum artists Alabama, Collin Raye, Conway Twitty, Reba McEntire, Randy Travis, Tracy Byrd, Gary Allan, George Strait, and Bryan White. He also obtained a record deal at RCA Records for platinum artist, Aaron Tippin. During Tomlinson’s 14 years at Acuff-Rose Music Publishing, he rose through the ranks to the position of Executive Vice President of Acuff-Rose Music Publishing.

In the summer of 2002, Gaylord Entertainment sold Acuff-Rose to Sony/ATV Music Publishing, which had previously purchased Tree International, Acuff-Rose’s perennial rival. Tomlinson was asked by then President/CEO, Donna Hilley, to join the company as Vice President of Creative.

In 2005, Tomlinson was appointed President/CEO of Sony/ATV Music Publishing Nashville. While continuing to work with the aforementioned artists, he has also overseen the songwriting careers of artists such as Taylor Swift, Kenny Chesney, Miranda Lambert, Luke Bryan, Eric Church, Blake Shelton, Gary Levox (Rascal Flatts), Brett Eldredge, The Band Perry, Johnnyswim, Cole Swindell and Chase Rice. In addition to Sony/ATV Music Publishing’s writer/artists, Tomlinson also guides the careers of hit songwriters Tom Douglas, Casey Beathard, Jaren Johnston, Monty Criswell, Shane Minor, Jim Beavers, Bill Anderson, Bobby Braddock and Bob DiPiero to name a few. He is responsible for stewarding the massive song catalogs of Hank Williams, Merle Haggard, Willie Nelson, Buck Owens, Hank Cochran, Roy Acuff and the Everly Brothers. Under Tomlinson’s leadership in 2007, Sony/ATV Music Publishing Nashville became the only country music publishing company in history to win the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers’ (ASCAP) Country Publisher of the Year, Broadcast Music International’s (BMI) Country Publisher of the Year, the Society of European Stage Authors and Composers’ (SESAC) Country Publisher of the Year, and Billboard’s Publisher and Publishing Corporation of the Year, the same year. Additionally, Sony/ATV Music Publishing Nashville has been named BMI’s Publisher of the Year for an unprecedented 15 consecutive years, as well as Billboard’s Country Publisher of the Year for the same time period.

In July 2012, with Sony’s acquisition of EMI Music Publishing, Tomlinson added to his responsibilities the songs of Kris Kristofferson, Alan Jackson, Guy Clark, John Bettis, Chris Young, Dallas Davidson, Rhett Akins, Chris DeStefano, Ross Copperman, Jon Nite, and Thomas Rhett to name a few.

In April 2016, Tomlinson was honored with Belmont University's 2016 Robert E. Mulloy Award of Excellence for his outstanding three decade career on Nashville's Music Row.

Activities