White Horse (Chris Stapleton song)

"White Horse" is a song by American singer-songwriter Chris Stapleton, released on July 21, 2023 as the lead single from his fifth studio album Higher. It was written by Stapleton and Dan Wilson and produced by Dave Cobb, Chris and Morgane Stapleton. The song stayed at the number two position for two weeks on the Country Airplay chart, behind Nate Smith's smash hit "World on Fire". It was nominated and won the Grammy Awards for Best Country Solo Performance and Country Song at the 66th Annual Grammy Awards.

Background
Chris Stapleton stated via iHeart Country:

"'White Horse' was a song that I wrote with my friend, Dan Wilson. We were out in Los Angeles, it was about I think probably late 2012, early 2013, and there was a movie called The Lone Ranger that was coming out, and I walked in the room to write with Dan at his house, and he said, 'Hey they're looking for songs for this Lone Ranger movie.' I said, 'Cool. Let's write something. What do you know about it?' He goes, 'Well, we don't really know anything.' I was like, 'Well, let's just make a song that might sound like that.' And so, that's kind of where that came from, and we got to talking about how it would be cool to have a kind of rock-driven-western-themed song, and that's kind of where the song came from and we kind of built it around a guitar riff, really."

Composition
"White Horse" is a blues rock-inspired country song,  featuring an intro of electric guitar riffs and drumbeats. Lyrically, Stapleton tells his imaginary partner that he needs time to open his heart to her and confesses he is not ready to be the man she desires, so she must wait: "If you want a cowboy on a white horse / Ridin' off into the sunset / If that's the kinda love you wanna wait for / Hold on tight, girl, I ain't there yet". However, he also wishes this is not the situation.