BMI Honors Jeffrey Steele & Willie Nelson

Jeffrey Steele; Photographer: Kim Williams

Willie Nelson Photo Courtesy of Lost Highway Records

November 8, 2007 — Jeffrey Steele capped a year of songwriting highs and personal sorrow by winning the prizes for Songwriter of the Year and Song of the Year (for "What Hurts The Most") at Tuesday's BMI Country Awards, The Tennessean reports.

Jeffrey's 13-year-old son, Alex LeVausseur, died in January in an ATV accident. That tragedy came at the beginning of a year that has seen Jeffrey score massive chart hits. At BMI's 55th annual awards show and dinner, he was honored for penning Rascal Flatts' "What Hurts the Most," "My Wish" and "Me and My Gang"; Steve Holy's "Brand New Girlfriend"; and Keith Anderson's "Every Time I Hear Your Name."

"I moved my family here to chase my dream." Jeffrey said. "I lost my son this year, and it weakens all this a little bit. I'm proud to do what I do, but I wish he was here."

The awards were full of emotion — from Jeffrey, from other songwriters who were honored for writing top country hits and from those who gathered to praise Willie Nelson, who was given a BMI Icon award.

Willie broke into the business as a songwriter, though he rose to greater recognition (and a spot in the Country Music Hall of Fame) as a groundbreaking, genre-melding artist. Kris Kristofferson, Emmylou Harris, Keith Urban, Toby Keith and Josh Turner all sang in his honor.

"When I came here to Nashville, I really wanted to meet Willie because I had listened to his songs when I was in the military in Germany," Kris said. "And when I did meet him, we really hit it off. If I ever thought I'd be up here singing one of his songs for him, I'd have thought it was a dream."

Sony/ATV Music Nashville won the publisher of the year trophy, notching publishing credit on 17 of the year's Top 50 songs.