>>PREVIEW
THE DEL McCOURY BAND
Sunday, November 26
Jack Singer Concert Hall
It has been more than 50 years since Del McCoury first picked up a guitar and began learning songs, first from the Grand Ole Opry radio program and shortly thereafter from a few 78 rpm recordings including one, at that moment fresh, innovative and inspiring, of Flatt and Scruggs. That album, and the articulate playing it contained, played a huge role in the development of the young artist. The fact is, he darn near wore the vinyl through.
Elder members of the McCoury clan were players and had taught the lad how to pick and chord on the guitar and banjo, but this music presented both a challenge and a chance. Several years later he began looking toward music as a profession and teamed up with one Keith Daniels with whom he began playing radio shows and backing up a host of people more famous than themselves. These included Jack Cooke, a member of the (even back then) legendary Bill Monroe’s band. Jack Cooke was more than a little bit taken with McCoury’s playing and insisted that Monroe meet him, inevitably leading to a spot in the Blue Grass boys, Bill Monroe’s band du jour.
By 1963, under the tutelage of the best in the business, Del McCoury’s life in the music world was bluegrass and nothing but bluegrass. By 1967 he had become front man of his own band and finally made it into the studio to track his first album entitled Del McCoury Sings Bluegrass that was released on Arhoolie Records in 1968.
Since that release, the man has been prolific as all get-out, delivering another 16 albums under his own name and performing on around (the actually number is hard to peg) more than 100 albums by other artists. He also, finally, nailed a coveted Grammy Award for his 2005 effort The Company We Keep that has helped catapult him from well-respected bluegrass legend to world-renowned country music star.
It should also be noted that his recent albums, including the Grammy winner and the 2006 venture The Promised Land, are released on his own, 100 per cent independent label, McCoury Music. When asked about the transition from past labels to running his own company McCoury states "If you asked me a decade ago if I’d run my own record label I’d have said ‘absolutely not’ but while I was touring with T Bone Burnett he suggested it to me as ‘if you’re going to do all the work yourself you might as well reap the rewards.’ In that light and the fact that we were being solicited by a number of other labels, it just made sense."
When pressed, he admits that the running of the label is not all his baby. "I’m pretty busy with performing and recording so a lot of the label work gets handed down to my wife and managers Stan Strickland and Chris Harris."
With the recent CD release, press functions and support tours for The Promised Land and albums by Les Sparks and Merle Haggard to be released in the early part of 2007 it is no wonder at all that the man may need a little bit of help tending to the daily office business. |
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