Sonny Curtis, the remarkably prolific singer-songwriter who once played with Buddy Holly, opened for Elvis Presley, and crafted enduring hits such as “I Fought the Law,” “Walk Right Back,” and “Love Is All Around”—the lively theme song for “The Mary Tyler Moore Show” which he also sang—died on Friday in Nashville. He was 88.
His daughter, Sarah Curtis Graziano, confirmed that the cause of death, in a hospital, was complications from pneumonia.
Born into the harsh realities of a Dust Bowl dugout in West Texas to sharecroppers during the Great Depression, Mr. Curtis carved out an important, though perhaps not widely famous, place in the annals of both rock ‘n’ roll and country music.
Over a career spanning seven decades, he wrote hundreds of songs that found their way into the hands of an extraordinary array of musicians. These included the Everly Brothers, country star Keith Whitley, and 1960s teen idol Bobby Vee.
Sonny Curtis performing live in 1994. Starting his career with Buddy Holly’s band, The Crickets, Curtis was a significant, albeit understated, figure in both rock and country music genres.
His defiant anthem, “I Fought the Law,” with its unforgettable chorus, “I fought the law and the law won,” was covered by numerous acts, including The Bobby Fuller Four, Hank Williams Jr., Roy Orbison, Bruce Springsteen, and The Clash, among many others.
Mr. Curtis, positioned on the far right, with fellow Crickets members (from left: Glen D. Hardin, Buzz Cason, and Jerry Allison) in a 1964 photograph. The band reformed not long after Buddy Holly’s tragic death in 1959.
“The song came quick,” Mr. Curtis once reflected in an interview with the International Songwriters Association. “It was one of those West Texas afternoons where the sand was blowing, those days you have in the spring. Probably March 1958. I wrote it in 15 minutes — bam! If you listen to it, you can tell you don’t have to be a rocket scientist to write those lyrics.”
Those 15 minutes proved to be exceptionally rewarding.
“It has been recorded a lot,” he shared with The Tennessean in 2014. “It’s my most important copyright.”
Curtis embarked on his musical journey as a teenager after a friend introduced him to Buddy Holly, who also hailed from nearby Lubbock, Texas. In 1957, he lent his guitar talents to Holly’s album “That’ll Be the Day,” whose title track, released as a single, soared to No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100.
The following year, Mr. Curtis joined Holly’s band, The Crickets, on guitar. However, after opening for Elvis Presley and securing other prominent gigs, the band eventually disbanded, primarily due to Mr. Holly’s move to New York. Tragically, Holly died in a plane crash in 1959.
Soon after, The Crickets regrouped, and Mr. Curtis eventually rejoined them. It was during this period that “I Fought the Law” appeared on their 1960 album, “In Style With the Crickets.”
The band continued to perform in various iterations through the 1980s and ’90s. The Crickets were ultimately inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 2012.
In 1970, while living in Los Angeles and composing commercial jingles, Mr. Curtis received a tip from a friend that the creators of “The Mary Tyler Moore Show” were looking for a theme song. The producers provided him with a four-page synopsis of the show.
“I honed in on the part that she was renting an apartment she had a hard time affording,” Mr. Curtis recounted in a 2002 interview on “CBS Sunday Morning.”
The song he crafted opened with the poignant line, “How will you make it on your own?”
Mr. Curtis performed it for the show’s producers, including James L. Brooks.
“He smiled and said, ‘Sing that again,’” Mr. Curtis recalled. “And I had to sing it about 10 times before I left that afternoon. The room was full of people standing all around the wall. I thought, ‘I believe I got a shot at this.’”
After Mary Tyler Moore’s character achieved professional success as a TV news producer in the show’s inaugural season, Mr. Curtis revised the lyrics. The updated version famously began, “Who can turn the world on with her smile?”
Sonny Curtis was born in Meadow, Texas, on May 9, 1937, to Arthur and Violet (Moore) Curtis. He was the second youngest of six children.
“I was born in a dugout,” he shared in a 2004 interview with The Austin Chronicle. “My dad dug a hole in the ground, put a corrugated tin roof on top of it, and that’s where I was born. I beat my sister ahead of me. She was born in a tent.”
Sonny’s uncles, who had a bluegrass band, taught him to play the guitar when he was just four years old.
Working on his family farm provided ample solitude and inspiration for songwriting.
“Driving a tractor,” he explained to “CBS Sunday Morning,” “you go down half a mile that way, and when you get there you turn around and come back a half mile this way. You have plenty of time to write a song.”
Mr. Curtis performing with Ronnie Wood of the Rolling Stones in 2004.
Mr. Curtis married Louise Halverson in 1970. In addition to their daughter, she survives him, along with their three granddaughters and a sister, Alene Richardson.
His daughter, Sarah Curtis Graziano, a gifted essayist and journalist, recently completed a book about her father, titled “Daughter of a Song,” which is slated for publication next month.
“When he was growing up, I know he definitely wanted to be famous,” she commented in an interview. “I think as time went on, he saw a lot of tragedies related to fame. He saw people succumb to accidents and addiction. He saw Buddy Holly die.”
Her father, she noted, came to accept, and even appreciate, the ability to navigate life unrecognized: “He was able to live a normal life but still make a living in the music business. And that’s no small feat.”