deric ruttan

Deric Ruttan has journeyed a two-pronged path to success. As this native of Bracebridge, Ontario fired up the Canadian country charts with his first hot singles in 2003, he was also topping the U.S. country charts for the first time as a co-writer of Dierks Bentley’s smash “What Was I Thinkin’.” Since then, Ruttan’s handiwork has brought him over three dozen cuts including a Top 5 song for Bentley in 2005, “‘Lot of Leavin’ Left To Do", a Top 10 for Eric Church in 2010 with "Hell On The Heart", as well as other cuts with Joe Nichols, Gary Alan, Terri Clark, and Paul Brandt.

Even as an in-demand Music City songwriter, (amassing 5 ASCAP Airplay Awards and 6 SOCAN Awards), Ruttan has hung on to enough of his hard-driving anthems and beautifully rendered ballads to carve out his own impressive recording career. Fourteen hits have climbed the charts from Ruttan’s three albums including 9 top tens like “When You Come Around”, “That's How I Wanna Go Out”, SOCAN’s 2009 Country Music Award winner “First Time In a Long Time” and 2010‘s most-played Canadian country single “Up All Night.” In 2007, Ruttan’s hit-making prowess won him his first CCMA Award for co-writing Aaron Pritchett’s “Hold My Beer.” Another collaboration with Bentley, “Good Time,” nabbed a #1 video on CMT for Ruttan in 2008. In 2011, Ruttan was honoured when his self-produced album Sunshine was nominated for "Best Country Album" at the 2011 Juno Awards.