SHORT TAKES : Country Musician, Promoter Die in Tennessee Plane Crash

A country music guitarist and his promoter were killed Sunday when their plane crashed two miles short of a runway in heavy fog, authorities said.

Murry Kellum, 47, of Antioch, who had the 1963 hit “Long Tall Texan,” and promoter Johnny D. Swanner, 55, of Hendersonville died in the early morning crash, said Sumner County Sheriff Richard Sutton.

Swanner was flying the single-engine plane and may have tried to land in a cornfield, Sutton said. There was heavy fog east of the airport in Gallatin, which is about 25 miles northeast of Nashville.

Swanner ran Transworld Artists Inc. from his Hendersonville home, said his wife, Rosa Swanner.

The men were returning from a concert in Ada, Okla., and had refueled in Memphis, she said.

Kellum also co-wrote a hit song for the country group Alabama called “If You’re Gonna Play in Texas (You’ve Gotta Have a Fiddle in the Band),” Rosa Swanner said.