Inducted 2002

An early pioneer of shape-note singing and music publishing, R. E. Winsett became one of the most revered teachers of the musical style that dominated the early decades of Southern Gospel. 

Born in Bledsoe County, Tennessee, on January 15, 1876, he devoted his life to the spread of Gospel Music. His music publishing company, headquartered in Dayton, Tennessee, stood as one of the strong holds of Southern shape-note publishing for most of the first half of the twentieth century. 

The author of more than a thousand Gospel songs, Winsett penned the words and music to the perennial favorite "Jesus Is Coming Soon," the winner of a Dove Award for Gospel Song of the Year in 1969.