Garth Brooks Suffers Tragic Personal Loss

Garth Brooks is mourning the loss of his longtime songwriter, Larry Bastian.

Bastian, who worked with the country superstar on hits like “Unanswered Prayers” and “Rodeo,” passed away on Sunday, April 6 at the age of 90, according to The Porterville Recorder, with Brooks remembering him as “a poet.”

“This was a great man…a cowboy, a poet, and a true friend,” Brooks told the New York Post. “I was lucky enough to be taken in by him as a student when I first moved to Nashville. I love Larry Bastian.”

Bastian is responsible for writing some of Brooks’ biggest hits, including “I’ve Got a Good Thing Going,” “Cowboy Bill,” and “Nobody Gets Off in This Town,” from the country superstar’s 1989 self-titled debut album. The pair later reunited for “Unanswered Prayers,” which appeared on the 1990 album No Fences and is considered to be Bastian’s most well-known song. Recounting the process of creating the it track, Brooks said in the CD booklet for his compilation album The Hits that he and songwriter Pat Alger “worked on this song quite a long time without a hook, without the line,” before they “passed it by Larry Bastian and it was as if it was meant to be.”

“Larry, his wife Myrna and I were taking a walk and he looked at me and said, ‘Oh, that’s simple. This song should be called ‘Unanswered Prayers’ because some of God’s greatest gifts are unanswered prayers,’” he recalled. “This is probably the truest song I have ever been involved with as a writer. This actually happened to my wife and me when we went back home to Oklahoma. Every time I sing this song, it teaches me the same lesson… happiness isn’t getting what you want, it is wanting what you’ve got.”

“Unanswered Prayers” became a No. 1 hit, and was followed in 1991 by “Rodeo,” which appeared on Brooks’ third album, Ropin’ The Wind. With the string of successful tracks, Brooks dubbed Bastian one of “music’s greatest writers of all time.”

“If one looks down the list of music’s greatest writers of all time, I couldn’t imagine the list being complete without the name of Larry Bastian,” he said in 1995.

Outside of his work with Brooks, Bastian, who was born in Porterville, California on Sept. 1, 1934, and who began his career as a songwriter in the 1970s, also wrote songs for Tammy Wynette, Conway Twitty, Reba McEntire, Rhett Akins, Tracy Byrd, and Sammy Kershaw, among others. In total, he contributed to 68 platinum albums and four gold records.

The famed songwriter’s son, Nick, announced his father’s death, sharing that Bastian passed away in California on April 6.

“The Lord called Dad home last night. He taught us at a very young age gun safety, along with teaching us hunting and fishing. He let us be boys, which seems to be a dying thing these days,” he wrote. “Thank you Dad for inspiring in how I raised my kids. I took them to work with me and raised them to be free range country kids and now they are raising their’s the same way. I love you Dad.”

Bastian’s cause of death was not disclosed.