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William "Bill" Dees (born January 24, 1939) is an American musician most famous for his song writing collaborations with legendary singer Roy Orbison.
Born in the small town of Borger in the Texas Panhandle, he played guitar and sang with a band called "The Five Bops," gaining enough recognition to perform on an Amarillo, Texas radio station. Dees eventually made his way to Nashville, Tennessee where his meeting Roy Orbison led to a collaboration that produced a string of successful songs for Monument Records including the mega hit, Oh, Pretty Woman and It's Over.
In 1967, Dees co-wrote all the songs for the Orbison album and MGM motion picture The Fastest Guitar Alive.
Beyond his work with Orbison, Bill Dees wrote hundreds of songs, a number of which were recorded by performers such as Johnny Cash, Loretta Lynn, Skeeter Davis, Glen Campbell, Billy Joe Royal, Frank Ifield, Mark Denning and Gene Pitney. In 2000, he recorded his own album titled Saturday Night At The Movies, a compilation of songs previously sung by Orbison that had been written with Dees and some that Dees had written alone.
Songs with Roy Orbison (partial list)
- Oh, Pretty Woman (1964)
- It's Over (1964)
- Borne On The Wind (1964)
- Ride Away (1965)
- Crawling Back (1965)
- Sleepy Hollow (1965)
- Where Is Tomorrow (1966)
- Communication Breakdown (1966)
- Walk On (1969)
- Windsurfer (1989)
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