Joe Melson, the songwriter whose partnership with Roy Orbison produced a sequence of ballads that changed what a rock and roll record could sound like, died on July 1 of natural causes with family present, MusicRow reported. He was 91.

Over roughly four years, Melson and Orbison wrote the songs that defined the singer's peak: "Only the Lonely," "Blue Angel," "Running Scared," "Crying" and "Blue Bayou." Together the two men wrote more than 120 songs, according to American Songwriter.

A meeting in West Texas

Claudie Joe Melson was raised in Bonham, Texas, and performed and wrote while attending Odessa Junior College, MusicRow reported. He met Orbison in West Texas in the late 1950s, in an encounter Orbison later recalled as a young songwriter tapping on the window of his car while he sat working out melodies on a guitar.

The collaboration became consequential after Orbison signed with Monument Records in Nashville. Melson pushed him toward material that used the full range and weight of his voice, a direction that broke from the rockabilly template Orbison had been working in without success.

The records

"Only the Lonely," released in 1960, reached No. 2 on the Billboard Hot 100 and No. 1 in the United Kingdom. It established the form the pair would refine: a song that begins quietly, builds without a conventional chorus, and resolves in a sustained high note rather than a hook.

"Running Scared," in 1961, went to No. 1. Built as a single crescendo with no repeated refrain at all, it resolved in a final line that reversed the story's outcome, a structure closer to a short aria than a pop single. "Crying," released the same year, reached No. 2.

"Blue Bayou" charted modestly on release in 1963. Its longer life came 14 years later, when Linda Ronstadt's version reached No. 3 on the pop chart and No. 2 on the country chart, as Saving Country Music noted, introducing the song to an audience that in many cases did not know the original.

After the partnership

The writing partnership wound down in the early 1960s. Orbison preferred to write while touring; Melson stepped back from the road to spend time with his family. The two worked together again in the 1970s.

Melson recorded for Hickory Records in the early 1960s without matching his success as a writer, and he co-wrote "Run, Baby Run (Back Into My Arms)," a hit for the Newbeats in 1965.

Recognition came late. He was inducted into the International Rock-A-Billy Hall of Fame in 2002 and the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame in 2018, Saving Country Music reported. He was frequently described as among the least recognized figures in his field, a writer whose work is universally familiar under another man's name.

Melson is survived by his sister, Katie Bethel, and by four children, MusicRow reported. No memorial service was held, in accordance with his wishes.