"Stay Forever" is a song co-written and recorded by American

country music Country (also called country and western) is a genre of popular music that originated in the Southern and Southwestern United States in the early 1920s. It primarily derives from blues, church music such as Southern gospel and spirituals, o ...

artist

Hal Ketchum Hal Michael Ketchum (April 9, 1953November 23, 2020) was an American country music singer and songwriter. He released eleven studio albums from 1986 to 2014, including nine for divisions of Curb Records. Ketchum's 1991 album '' Past the Point of ...

. It was released in January 1995 as the third single from his album '' Every Little Word''. The song reached number 8 on the ''

Billboard A billboard (also called a hoarding in the UK and many other parts of the world) is a large outdoor advertising structure (a billing board), typically found in high-traffic areas such as alongside busy roads. Billboards present large advertis ...

Hot Country Singles & Tracks Hot Country Songs is a chart published weekly by ''Billboard'' magazine in the United States. This 50-position chart lists the most popular country music songs, calculated weekly by collecting airplay data from Nielsen BDS along with digital sa ...

chart in May 1995. It was written by Ketchum and

Benmont Tench Benjamin Montmorency "Benmont" Tench III (born September 7, 1953) is an American musician and singer, and a founding member of Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers. Early years Tench was born in Gainesville, Florida, the second child of Benjamin M ...

Critical reception

Larry Flick, of ''

'' magazine reviewed the song unfavorably, saying that Ketchum does his "vocal best" to rescue the ballad. He goes on to call it a "not-so-special song."''

'', February 4, 1995

Music video

The music video was directed by Jim Shea and premiered in early 1995.

Chart performance

"Stay Forever" debuted at number 69 on the U.S. ''Billboard'' Hot Country Singles & Tracks for the week of February 11, 1995.

Year-end charts

References

1995 singles 1994 songs Hal Ketchum songs Songs written by Benmont Tench Songs written by Hal Ketchum Song recordings produced by Allen Reynolds Curb Records singles {{1995-country-song-stub