Nikki Hornsby

Nikki Hornsby (born in Long Beach, California, and raised in Burke, Virginia) is an American musician. A songwriter, singer, and guitarist, she has been active in the pop, Americana, country, and blues genres.

Teenage years
Nikki Hornsby was born in Long Beach, California, but grew up in Burke, Fairfax County of Northern Virginia where she earned her first guitar by selling flower seeds in the countryside door to door at age ten. As a young teenager, Hornsby was contacted to perform as a solo singer and guitar artist representing her boarding school at social events, hospitals, and TV broadcasts. She was paid to perform by Gulf Corporation at the newly built Reston, VA community Lake Anne Reston square for a solo outdoor concert. After graduating Fairfax Hall Waynesboro, Virginia college preparatory school, Hornsby attended Sacred Heart College and Belmont Abbey Colleges North Carolina full-time, for three years while performing at Sheraton Hotels and Resorts The Sheraton Hotels and Resorts Lounge in Charlotte NC and other various local NC clubs. While majoring in Psychology and Theology she transferred to George Mason University in northern Virginia, but Hornsby continued working accepting contracts for solo work as a singer and Musicians Union Local Washington DC Chapter guitarist. She worked as a stand up singer in a combo or duo with other professional union musicians. Some of these union contracts were as a guitar player singer soloist at Marriott Hotels & Resorts Key Bridges Hotel Lounge in Arlington, Virginia. Nikki Hornsby in the early 1970s was the first female singer-guitar player performing on the Auto Train that traveled from Lorton, VA to Sanford, FL and also was contracted as a stand up singer with a union piano player that she met on the auto train. She also worked with some other local union musicians in many clubs in Washington D.C. The union piano player, Chris Marchant, she met on the Auto-Train who asked her to work as a stand up singer in the surrounding area, including Lucky Pierre's Lounge at L'Enfant Plaza, the Watergate complex in their main cocktail lounge. Nikki Hornsby also worked as a solo guitarist singer at other Washington DC finest waterside restaurants.

1970s
In the mid-1970s, Hornsby moved back to California and worked full-time as a club performer, where she stayed building her life and career. Many clubs in the South Bay area of Los Angeles, CA, USA  like Portofino Inn, Blue Moon Saloon, Holiday Inn, Red Onion, Queensway Bay Hilton, etc. There are also many hard copy publications for verification for her work performances including TV appearances with examples of a scanned performance schedule from the 1970s to 2006 in Spain. <>.

1980s


By working full-time in music she purchased a home in Lomita, California in the 1980s. Later in the 1980s Hornsby received from a local Lomita California business owner, Ken Herbert, financial backing offer to record only her original songs under her own record label CJP-NHRecords. Quickly thereafter, Hornsby marketed her music to commercial radio stations making the charts and trade magazines throughout Europe and in the United States.

Only a few of Hornsby's original hundreds of performed songs were recorded and released for airplay on commercial radio stations in the US and Europe. In Mallorca, Spain, the "ACM Newsletter" as well as other print publications noted Hornsby's song "One Way Ticket" as number one. During that same time "Hungry For Love", Let Me Take You on a Dream" and "Hot Talkin’ Big Shot" were airplayed in Europe. All four songs reached the top ten on commercial radio station charts.

In 1988, following Hornsby's releases of "One Way Ticket", "Hungry For Love", "Let Me Take You on a Dream", "Hot Talkin’ Big Shot", and "Shoe String and a Prayer", was the reason she was named Female Singer of the Year in Scandinavia. In 1989, "Shoe String and a Prayer" charted Top 5 in the USA IRC (independent) country singles, as well as in the Cash Box Top 100 USA National commercial radio programming charts.

1990s
In the 1990s again through independent investors, "Shoestring and a Prayer" obtained USA radio airplay from independent and major commercial radio stations as well as other commercial music trade publications. "Shoestring and a Prayer" was No. 1 the entire month of August on The Music Review Top 30 Independent Chart, NY, No. 3 in the Top 30 (IRC) Debut Independent Radio Chart, Nashville, TN, No. 11 on the Cash Box Independent Chart, and No. 14 Indie Bullet Mag. Top 100 Chart, Tyler, TX. At that time as a voting member of the Academy of Country Music (ACM), based in Los Angeles, CA USA Nikki Hornsby was honored with being nominated (placing her name on the official ballot & copies found on Cjp-nhrecords.com ) in the music & lyric composition category to their Board of Directors four different times in the 1990s.

Nikki Hornsby and The Rangers
Hornsby formed her back up band "Nikki Hornsby and The Rangers", for various events with professional musicians depending on the needs of the show and together as the leader she performed in many annual concerts and at local Southern California venues including Alpine Village in Torrance. Hornsby herself did all the contract bookings and travel arrangements. In August 1991, Nikki Hornsby and The Rangers performed at Redondo Beach's Summer Concert in the Park. That summer a page in the Los Angeles Times newspaper said, they drew in the largest crowd and were invited back to perform again in a series of six years in "Concerts on the Pier". Hornsby always focused on the solo songwriting recording aspect of her career, although still performing as leader of her band at different venues. The enterprise was not affiliated with the better known pop band, Hornsby and The Range, whose hit song "The Way It Is" reached #1 on the music charts in 1986.

TV appearances


In the early 1990s, Nikki Hornsby appeared as a solo folk singer guitarist on the final show of Fox Network's "Parker Lewis Can't Lose". Shortly after, Hornsby had the opportunity to record as a solo singer-songwriter with Steve Duncan (Desert Rose Band), Jack Daniels (Hwy 101 Band), Jay Dee Manness (Desert Rose Band), John Jorgensen (Desert Rose Band) as well as Al Bruno who was a multi year Academy of Country Music (ACM, Los Angeles, CA) award-winning guitarist (CA Country Music News, San Jose, CA Vol 2 No. 20, Pg 9, April 1991).

Nikki Hornsby was nominated four different years (official Academy of Country Music Ballot, composer category, 1991, 1992, 1994) for a position on the ACM's board of directors.

Hornsby acted as a judge for the California Country Music Awards and as a Music Industry Talent Judge for the National Colgate Talent Roundup from the 1990s until 2003. Hornsby has been a consultant exclusive to the music industry since she obtained the business licence  in 1989.

Dr Laura Schlessinger used Hornsby's song, "Hot Talkin' Big Shot", for several years on The Dr. Laura radio program as cue music and also for a national radio commercial advertising Ms. Schlessinger's radio show.

2004 Performances in Europe


In late 2004 Hornsby co-produced and arranged ten original songs on a CJP-NHRecords CD called "Just Wait" with Marty Rifkin,. Marty has worked on recordings with major recording artists within the music industry for many years including "Jewel" & "The Boss".

Hornsby traveled throughout many countries in Europe from end of 2004 to 2007 test marketing her "Just Wait" CD along with other original songs. This was done so CJP-NHRecords would release "Just Wait" for airplay.

In 2006, Hornsby performed the break out song from "Just Wait" called "Money's Worth" at the International Automobile Associations Annual International Event in Frankfurt, Germany. "Money's Worth" and other originals were broadcast European wide through Truck Radio which reported this song as number one on the Truck Radio European Charts.

That same year a commercial radio station, Radio Eurohertz in Eastern Germany near the Czech Republic border, invited Hornsby to perform a live three-hour show of only her own original music which was only a small percentage of her large catalog.

In 2006, The International World Cup Soccer Games took place in Europe was telecast on CNN TV internationally. Hornsby's song "This IS America" written for Joan Milke Flores from the "Just Wait" CD was broadcast for the warm up game of USA vs. Italy which was held in Kaiserslautern, Germany. Hornsby herself was one of the VIP Hosts for that city's tourist center for the six games of the FIFA World Cup Soccer Championship held in 2006.

Hornsby appeared on TV in Spain IB3 April 2006 as well as performed live original songs including songs she wrote in other languages like "Yo Tengo Un Amor" on numerous live commercial radio telecasts in Palma. She did many on air live interviews at different radio stations like Una Radio, Radio Balear, Ultima Hora and Punto Radio in Spain that same week in April 2006.

While in Europe, Hornsby supported the US military community for several months. The work included such activities as performing, giving one to one instruction in guitar & singing, and judging in US Air Force Idol Talent Contest. A US Army General Thorpe wrote a letter of recommendation for Nikki Hornsby's supporting the European military community by referencing her support.

2007 Forward Additional information


Nikki Hornsby is a BMI Broadcast Music, Inc. associated songwriter. This organization www.bmi.com has a listing of all professional writers through their site for verification. Nikki Hornsby herself has written over 300 songs, some of which have been used on radio, TV, and in movies. Many of 34 recordings listed online iTunes, YouTube and only 2 where Hornsby wrote only the music and lyrics written by Weinberg in a co writing collaboration like a prior radio commercial for the "Tile World" business in Southern CA. The Positive Christian country songs were released on the CJP-NHRecords "Reaching Out" CD.

Her family association with Jimmy Van Heusen, Emmy and Oscar songwriter for Frank Sinatra and others, influenced Hornsby at a very young age. Documents can be found in the Library of UCLA UCLA Library in Los Angeles CA holding Hornsby's first recordings and industry photos among the Jimmy Van Heusen collection.

Hornsby achieved commercial airplay success many years prior to joining ([The Recording Academy]) National Association of Recording Arts and Sciences (also known as The Grammys) at the end of 2006 as a voting member. The NARAS committee placed compositions of music from Hornsby's commercial charted "Just Wait" CD on the first ballot in 2007 in 8 different categories.

A European Military Community VIP base pass in June 2006 allowed access for Nikki while she was in Europe and she volunteered to play guitar and sing at the Kaiserslautern Germany Daenner Kaserne Chapel weekly for the military community church services for this Kaiserslautern Military Community largest USA European base. This was at the end of 2006 she was asked by phone to report to the Vogelweh Community Center main office at Vogelweh Facility of the Kaiserslautern Military Community. The administrator at that time said there was a two-year waiting list for music & vocal instructions and asked Nikki Hornsby to help at the community center for USA military men, women in service and their families. She believed waiting that long was unacceptable for USA Military overseas and made the time in her project scheduling to provide one to one instructions with her own Nikki Hornsby beginning acoustic guitar and vocal method.

2007 for appointments and networking during Grammy week, Hornsby had to take leave to travel alone to Los Angeles, CA but agreed to be back in a few days. She was injured in an international airplane in-flight accident February 8, 2007. She was unable to continue to write, record, or professionally perform her music afterwards and soon returned home to Los Angeles CA as injuries forced her to avoid future live appearances.

2009 CJP-NHRecords released "Just Wait Instrumentally" which is the instrumental version of the "Just Wait" CD released in 2006. 2010–2014 Video Support of Nikki Hornsby songs found on YouTube. DVDs made available through CJP-NHRecords.com that maintains current business license to this day.

2014–2015 CJP-NHRecords released three singles of 1 pop dance uptempo and 2 pop orchestral of Hornsby music and lyrics from collaborative work with international talents. Singles found on iTunes and eStores worldwide. These three Hornsby pop singles were listed first ballot 2014 in the arrangement, instruments and vocal category of the 57th Grammy TV awards process for 2015.

In July 2020 for a live IB3-TV show in Mallorca, Spain performances of a medley of “Red Roses On The Floor” and “Yo Tengo Un Amor”, words & music by Nikki Hornsby, were released and published by CJP-NHRecords.

Nikki Hornsby has carried on the Hornsby music family tradition as the granddaughter of Columbia Records artist Dan Hornsby who was also an A&R representative for Columbia/RCA in Atlanta GA in the early years of his career, was a radio program director, Radio WSB DJ, a professional musician, a producer engineer for Columbia and a singer-songwriter, a recording artist with many 78 speed vinyl full disc recordings.

Dan Hornsby was the first recorded voice of "The Arkansas Traveler" song. He recorded many other songs like "Take Me Out to the Ball Game", "Oh! Susanna", "Little Brown Jug", "Little Liza Jane" and "Oh Danny Boy". Nikki Hornsby never met her grandfather, who was inducted posthumously into the Atlanta Country Music Hall of Fame in 1986 for his lifetime of work in the music industry. The Grammy Museum Grammy Museum at L.A. Live, Los Angeles, CA in 2013 displayed Dan Hornsby's work for Columbia Records 360 event for a year-long. This Grammy Museum display was seen by Nikki Hornsby in a private viewing where she learned even more through the curators and Ex. Director of the Grammy Museum about the man whose work was before she was born so she carries forward in her professional lifetime career a noteworthy Hornsby music tradition.

To this day Nikki Hornsby is honored to have voted over ten years annually for The Grammy Awards. She's been among the honored NARAS National Academy of Recording Arts & Sciences voting membership www.grammypro.com percentage to participate with listening for all those who wanted to be considered for their own Grammy gold awarded music recorded prior year projects and casting her votes in many categories and fields.