Tom Collins (record producer)
[1] He produced a steady stream of country music hits over a 30-year span from artists including Ronnie Milsap, Barbara Mandrell, Sylvia, Tom T. Hall, Jim Ed Brown, James Galway, Marie Osmond, and Steve Wariner.[3][4] In 1982 alone, Collins produced four number one country hits: "Nobody" (Sylvia); "I Wouldn't Have Missed It for the World" and "Any Day Now" (Ronnie Milsap); and "'Till You're Gone" (Barbara Mandrell).[5] His publishing Company, Tom Collins Music, received BMI's Robert J. Burton Award in 1983 for "Most Performed Song of the Year", "Nobody", by Sylvia.While attending a rock music club called the "Whisky a Go Go" in 1972, Charley Pride heard a performance by Ronnie Milsap, a R&B-minded singer who impressed him.Some of the top songwriters at Pi-Gem went with Collins in his new endeavor, notably Grammy-nominated writers Kye Fleming and Dennis Morgan.Fleming and Morgan decided to let the geographical spot be an image that would stimulate the imagination of the listener, without a lot of detail, reminiscent of Jimmy Webb's song "Wichita Lineman".[24] Collins also said that country music tends run in cycles between more traditional sound and more pop and that "you need to stay just a half-step ahead of the trend".[24] Mandrell's first number one hit was "Sleeping Single in a Double Bed", written by Kye Fleming and Dennis Morgan and produced by Collins in 1978.Prior to moving to Nashville from Kokomo, Indiana, she aspired to be a singer and practiced singing into a deodorant bottle "microphone" in front of a mirror.Her second album, Just Sylvia, featured the song "Nobody" which rose to number one on the country charts and was a crossover hit which reached #15 on the Billboard Hot 100.