Ward Davis
American singer-songwriter

Ward Davis is an American singer-songwriter from Monticello, Arkansas. Davis has had songs recorded by Willie Nelson, Merle Haggard, Trace Adkins, Wade Hayes, Sammy Kershaw, Bucky Covington, Jimmie Van Zant, Buddy Jewel, Carolina Rain, The Roys, Cody Jinks, Whitey Morgan, Paul Cauthen and others. in 2016, Davis co-wrote "I’m Not The Devil" with Cody Jinks, which went to No. 4 on the Billboard US Country Charts. His major debut 2015 album, 15 Years in a 10 Year Town, featured Willie Nelson and Jamey Johnson. "Unfair Weather Friend," a song Davis co-wrote with Marla Cannon-Goodman, was recorded by Willie Nelson and Merle Haggard for their final album collaboration together, Django and Jimmie. At Haggard's request, the song was played at Haggard's funeral in 2016.
The public source identifies “Ward Davis” as american singer-songwriter. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Ward, Davis and American.
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The entry’s evidential value lies in the named roles, institutions and publications that can be tested against primary documentation. The source revision retrieved here is dated May 1, 2026. The first chronological checks are 2016 and 2015.
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This entry incorporates text from “Ward Davis” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.