August 13, 2022 Concerts Last Week

My YouTube channel just passed 100 subscribers. I’m glad people are enjoying it. I’ve had the channel for over seven years, so it’s been a slow climb.

Last Sunday, we saw Rye Mountain Revelry at Gruene Hall. This Austin-based act combines bluegrass, country, and rock. Their first full length album is forthcoming. The five piece band is fronted by the husband-and-wife team of Eric and Anna Madden. Eric is originally from eastern Kentucky. He plays acoustic guitar and sings lead. Anna plays fiddle and sings harmony vocals. The other members of the band play drums, electric bass, and one musician splits time between mandolin and electric guitar. In addition to their original songs, they covered classic country like Merle Haggard, Buck Owens, and Johnny Cash and classic rock like the Rolling Stones and Grateful Dead. They even did a bluegrassy cover of Bob Marley.

On Wednesday, we saw Der Klein Steins at Krause’s in New Braunfels. This band has been a fixture in central Texas for decades at Oktoberfests. The Swingin’ Dutchmen formed in 1965. Der Klein Steins are a subset of that larger group, formed in 1989 to play smaller shows than the full group. The five-piece band specializes in the music of central Europe: Germany, Austria, Czech Republic,etc. They do a good job introducing and explaining the songs in English before singing in German or Czech. As is most often the case with American polka bands, a few American country songs also show up in the set, such as “Crazy,” “Fraulein,” and “I Can’t Help It (If I’m Still In Love With You).”

On Thursday, we saw Jake Shimabukuro and Andrea Magee at the 04 Center in Austin. The venue is an old Methodist church with a very high ceiling. This was our first time to visit this venue, but it was very nice. It was weird to see so many of the people in the audience in Austin still wearing masks, because thirty miles away in San Marcos, most everyone was done with that crap a long time ago.

Anyway, the opening act was Andrea Magee, who was accompanied by guitar player Dave Scher. We had seen her a couple of times with Beat Root Revival, but she is currently working on her solo career. She is best described as an “Irish singer-songwriter,” as her music doesn’t neatly fit in any popular American genre. She played guitar, bodhrán, flute, and tin whistle and all of the songs she performed were originals. She will have an album release concert at the 04 Center next month and Dave Scher will also release an EP the same date. Andrea Magee frequently plays shows in the Austin area as a solo artist, but also with groups Beat Root Revival, Ulla (group of Irish artists in the Austin area), and PAACK (group of Austin-area women songwriters).

Jake Shimabukuro is a true master of the ukulele. The Hawaiian has collaborated with top artists from every genre over the years, and the album he released last year, “Jake and Friends” is definitely worth your time. Although it’s not a “country” album, it does feature Willie Nelson, Lukas Nelson, Asleep At The Wheel, Billy Strings, and Vince Gill. Jake’s music feels young and fresh, so it might come as a surprise when digging into his musical catalog to find out how long he has been doing this. Although Jake is especially known for his rock influences, he has toured and collaborated with such artists as Bela Fleck and Jimmy Buffett, so you get a bit of everything. “Orange World” is his bluegrass-inspired tribute to Bela Fleck. He recorded the song in 2003 and it is still a fixture in his set. If you’re a fan of great musicianship, regardless of genre, be sure to see Jake Shimabukuro in concert. It was just him and an electric bass player, but they brought it. I’ll also mention that I saw Jake talking to fans outside the venue an hour or so before the show and he patiently waited for a little boy and his mother to go back to their car to bring back the child’s ukulele to sign. There was no “VIP level-only meet and greet” business like you see with so many of today’s country and pop music stars. It was just an artist being a good guy and appreciating every fan, without regard for what “level” they paid for tickets. Both Jake Shimabukuro and Andrea Magee stayed after the show to talk to fans, too.

August 4, 2022 What CMA Fest Didn’t Show On TV

Although my musical tastes are mostly more old fashioned, I did go to Nashville for CMA week. Last night, ABC aired a three hour CMA Fest show. Of course, the three hours that they chose to show is generally the “poppiest” material from the stadium. There are multiple stages during the day all four days. Including the many “unofficial” stages during the week, there are literally hundreds of artists to choose from.

The television show featured 25 artists, now listed on the CMA Fest app and web site. I planned to compare the list of 25 to the full list of stadium performers, but very curiously, the CMA erased the full list from both the app and web site.

The one omission that jumps out the most is Keith Urban, who was the closing act on Thursday. The television show ignored him completely, but aired multiple songs from several artists like Thomas Rhett (who did some awful attempt at rapping) and Lady A. Whatever you think of Keith Urban or his music, one must wonder why he was omitted from the ABC presentation.

Here are others who performed at Nissan Stadium who didn’t appear on the TV special: Deana Carter, Sara Evans, Everette, Randy Houser, Angie K, Kylie Morgan, Shenandoah, Priscilla Block, Madeline Edwards, Kat + Alex, Maddie & Tae, Frank Ray, Lily Rose, Dylan Scott, Brittney Spencer, Gabby Barrett, and Mitchell Tenpenny. Additionally, Zac Brown featured Marcus King on one song and King Calaway on another. Dierks Bentley featured Charlie Worsham on a song. That’s a whole lot of people we saw at the stadium who weren’t on the TV show.

I realize coverage of “pop country” isn’t likely to be very interesting to most who read my site, but I also believe that someone somewhere needed to write this article and I didn’t see anyone else doing so.

August 2, 2022 Early August Update

The Academy of Western Artists awards will be October 13. Here’s the list of nominees.

The Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame will have its 52nd annual induction October 30. This year’s inductees are Shania Twain, Hillary Lindsey, Steve Wariner, Gary Nicholson, and David Malloy.

Marty Stuart posted a recap video today of his annual late night jam at the Ryman Auditorium in June, which I enjoyed attending: Marty Stuart’s 19th Late Night Jam .

Here’s a bit of history from The Tractors: “It was on this day in 1994 The Tractors released their debut album “The Tractors.” It sold over 2 million copies and received two Grammy nominations, won CMT Video of the Year for the hit single “Baby Likes to Rock It” and remains the top-selling record of all time recorded in Oklahoma! It was also the fastest-selling country group debut in music history.”

Here’s a video from 1995 of Vince Gill and The Tractors at the ACM Awards . Steve Ripley of The Tractors is credited for the naming “red dirt” music in the 1970s.

Last week, I saw the Eurofest Trio at Krause’s in New Braunfels, Texas. The group specializes in music from central and eastern Europe, but it’s worth noting that the leader of the group plays autoharp and won a national yodeling championship in 1976. I think Patsy Montana was one of the judges? Members of the group used to be in a group called The Sauerkrauts. It’s not “country music” as such, but there’s one guy yodeling and playing autoharp, one guy playing accordion, and one guy playing bass fiddle (though they often have a tuba player, instead). When’s the last time you heard an autoharp at a country concert? Yodeling?

I also saw Del Castillo last week at San Marcos Summer In The Park, a free concert series. Most of their music is in Spanish and I guess I’d call it Latin Rock. This band has been around since 2000, and they once did a collaboration with Willie Nelson. What stands out the most about this band is the rapid fire guitar picking by two very skilled players trading leads.