Lee Hazlewood, a singer, songwriter, and producer who crafted one of the iconic records of the 1960s — Nancy Sinatra’s “These Boots Are Made for Walkin'” — then dropped out of sight at the height of his success and became a reclusive cult hero, died Saturday at his home in Henderson, Nev. He was 78.

Hazlewood died of complications of renal cancer, his wife, Jeane Kelley, said. The disease was diagnosed two years ago, and Hazlewood subsequently recorded his final album, titled after a routine by British comedian Eddie Izzard: “Cake or Death.”

The Oklahoma native did notable work early and late in his career, but it was his music with Ms. Sinatra in the mid- and late-1960s that secured his legacy. He teamed with her on nine Top 40 singles, headed by “Boots,” which has assumed a life as a multipurpose anthem of tough-chick female empowerment and/or kinky domination fantasy.

“He hasn’t gotten the recognition he should,” Ms. Sinatra said Monday. “He’s one of the most influential songwriter-producers ever, and he deserves proper attention from his peers.

“They dismissed him, and they dismissed our records as novelty, but … a lot of other songs that were recorded at that time haven’t survived, and Lee’s songs have survived over decades. To me, that’s the real test.”

Hazlewood isn’t identified with a signature sound the way contemporaries such as Phil Spector and Brian Wilson were, but his mainstream productions tweaked pop conventions with subtle experimentation, and over the years, he moved from country-rooted narrative to impressionistic imagery to musical theatricality, always laced with his offbeat personality.

He’s cited widely as a primary inspiration for today’s neo-psychedelic and baroque-pop movements. In the late 1990s, he was embraced by alternative rock figures such as Nick Cave and Sonic Youth, whose drummer Steve Shelley reissued some of his albums on CD.