When country music songwriter and impresario Craig Wiseman first went to Nashville in the early 1980s, he already had a contract in hand. But it wasn’t the one he eventually signed.
On a week off from the road with his band, the Hattiesburg native bummed a ride to Music City to have a real industry mind review the proposal a bandmate’s lawyer cousin had recently handed him.
Wiseman may not have had an appointment, but he had determination and gumption to spare. He brought it all to the city’s famed Music Row and convinced a junior attorney to read it for $20. After flipping through pages of legalese, he explained to Wiseman that he’d be signing away his publishing rights, one of the main ways songwriters make money…