Owen Temple

Biography

Owen Temple (born September 4, 1976 in Kerrville, Texas) is an American folk and country music songwriter and musician based in Austin, Texas.

Career

His work with producer and pedal steel guitar musician Lloyd Maines led to 1997's General Store and 1999's Passing Through. In 2002, Right Here and Now was released, produced by Phil Madeira. In 2007 and 2011, Temple was a Kerrville Folk Festival New Folk Finalist, and he won the 2007 B. W. Stevenson Songwriting Competition.
Two Thousand Miles, a fourth album, was produced by Maines and released on January 22, 2008 on El Paisano Records. A review in AllMusic said it has "great lyrics full of insight and plainspoken poetry." A fifth studio album, Dollars and Dimes, came out on June 9, 2009. It is a concept album focused on different regions of North America during hard times. In July 2009, the album was the No. 1 record on the Euro Americana Chart. In August 2009, the album was No. 5 on the Freeform American Roots chart.
Mountain Home, a sixth album, was released on April 26, 2011, and the songs on the album are about small Texas towns and the eccentrics inhabiting them. Stories They Tell, a seventh album, was released on September 24, 2013. An eighth studio album, Rings on a Tree, was released on September 29, 2023 and its songs, many with co-writers including Walt Wilkins and Hal Ketchum, comprise a concept album about intergenerational interactions.
In 2025, Temple released two additional projects: Weathered, an EP of new material, and Live in Austin, a live album recorded in Texas. Reviewing this period of his work, the Italian music blog Roots Highway characterized Temple as “one of the leading names on the Texas scene.”
A book on songwriting, co-authored with Gordy Quist, titled Songfarmer: Writing More and Better Songs was published on November 1, 2015. Dreamer: A Tribute to Kent Finlay, was released in early 2016 on Austin-based Eight 30 Records, features Temple's version of Finlay's "Mines of Terlingua."

Artist discography

General Store (1997)
Passing Through (1999)
Right Here and Now (2002)
Two Thousand Miles (2008)
Dollars and Dimes (2009)
Mountain Home (2011)
Stories They Tell (2013)
Rings on a Tree (2023)
Weathered (2025)
Live in Austin (2025)