Country Music Lost Its Voice and Garth Brooks Said Something About Bill Cody That Will Break Your Heart

For 32 years, Bill Cody's voice was the first thing country music fans heard every morning.

That voice went silent on June 9.

Now Garth Brooks has said something about Bill Cody that every true country fan needs to hear.

Bill Cody Spent 32 Years as the Voice of the Grand Ole Opry and WSM Radio

Bill Cody wasn't a star in the traditional sense.

He didn't write the songs or play the guitar.

He did something harder – he made every single artist who sat across from him feel like the most important person in the room.

WSM Radio has carried the Grand Ole Opry since 1925 – the longest-running radio broadcast in American history.

When Cody walked through the door in April 1994, Charlie Daniels was waiting to be his first guest.

After that came virtually every artist worth knowing in country music – and Cody treated every last one of them the same way.

With genuine love for the music and the people who made it.

His daughter Hannah Davis went public in late May, sharing that her father had been admitted to the ICU three weeks prior in heart and kidney failure.

Doctors determined he needed a double transplant – heart and kidney.

He passed the tests to qualify for the transplant list.

Then he took a downward spiral.

WSM Radio announced his death Tuesday evening.

He was 67 years old.

Garth Brooks Said It and Every Country Music Fan Already Knew It Was True

The tributes came fast – and they came from the biggest names in the genre.

Garth Brooks, who has sold more albums than any solo artist in American history, put it simply.

"There might be someone somewhere in the world who loved country music as much," Brooks wrote, "but nobody loved country music more than Bill Cody."

Dierks Bentley called Cody one of the pillars of country music – not just of radio, but of the entire institution.

"Bill was just as important to the fabric of our music and city as any artist, songwriter or musician," Bentley wrote.

Brad Paisley – a Grand Ole Opry member himself – was devastated.

"When the roll is called up yonder," Paisley wrote, "I hope it's your voice."

Carly Pearce didn't just mourn a legend.

She mourned her friend.

"Bill Cody devoted his life to telling the story of country music," Pearce wrote. "With a legacy spanning decades, he will be marked as one of the greatest of all time. For me, he was so much more than that. He was my friend. He will be so very missed on this side of heaven, but I rejoice knowing he is with our Heavenly Father."

Randy Travis called Cody the "Rock of Gibraltar" of country music.

Kelsea Ballerini called him the kindest and most genuine soul she ever knew.

A Voice That Belonged to All of Us

Here's what you need to understand about what Bill Cody meant to country music.

WSM Radio has been on the air since 1925 – over a century of broadcasting from the heart of Nashville.

The Grand Ole Opry has been carried on that signal for 100 years.

Cody became the human thread connecting that history to every morning in America for the last three decades.

He was inducted into the Country Radio Hall of Fame in 2008.

He received a star on the Music City Walk of Fame in 2024.

He will be posthumously inducted into the Tennessee Radio Hall of Fame later this year.

Patrick Moore, CEO of Opry Entertainment, remembered him for his profound gravitas, his incredible voice, and his infectious enthusiasm for the music.

But those are just the accolades.

What you and I know – what anyone who turned on WSM in the morning knows – is that Bill Cody made country music feel like home.

He began his broadcast career at age 12 in a small Kentucky town, sitting in with a country DJ at a 1,000-watt station where his father preached on Sundays.

He took his name from his childhood hero Buffalo Bill Cody.

And he spent the next 55 years doing the only thing he ever wanted to do.

Bringing country music to the people who love it most.

WSM Radio will honor him with a marathon of Coffee, Country & Cody moments in the days ahead.

The Grand Ole Opry dedicated its Saturday night broadcast to his memory.

That voice is gone now – and the only comfort is knowing he spent every single morning of the last 32 years doing exactly what God put him here to do.

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Sources:

• Vary Staff, "Bill Cody, Grand Ole Opry Announcer and Revered WSM Country Radio Personality, Dies at 67," Variety, June 10, 2026.
• Staff, "Bill Cody, Beloved Grand Ole Opry Announcer and WSM Radio Host, Dies at 67," The Wrap, June 10, 2026.
• Staff, "Longtime Grand Ole Opry Announcer Bill Cody Dies," WKRN Nashville, June 10, 2026.
• Miranda, "LIST: Brad Paisley, Carly Pearce, and Other Country Stars Honor Bill Cody In Heartfelt Tributes," Country Rebel, June 10, 2026.
• Staff, "Community Mourns the Loss of Bill Cody," MusicRow, June 10, 2026.
• Kerry J. Byrne, "On This Day in History, November 28, 1925, Grand Ole Opry Debuts on WSM Radio in Nashville," Fox News, November 28, 2023.