As the sun sets over the crowd at Meijer Gardens, the stage welcomes the wit and good nature of Del McCoury and his homespun band of troubadours, as well as husband-wife duo, Bela Fleck and Abigail Washburn.
Fleck and Washburn open the show with a compelling and jangly folk melody “Railroad”, immediately setting the tone for an evening of music drawing deep from the well of American roots music.
Throughout the evening, the couple charm the audience with back and forth banter that could come have come off as corny if not for their genuine chemistry. This was especially on display after Fleck dubs himself Abigail’s “Chunky Monkey” during their introductions.
“I don’t think I’ve ever called you that,” Washburn replied, laughing. “It must be Grand Rapids that’s made you like this.”
With their set nearing its end two hours in, Washburn jumped up onto a wooden mat and began clogging for their last song. It brought some much needed inertia to an audience sprawled out for perhaps too long in their lawn chairs, and was met with standing applause.
“I haven’t done this in awhile, I can’t believe they liked it!” Washburn said to Fleck, exhaling. On that note, they bow and give way to the main event.
After a brief intermission, Del McCoury and his band trample in with a the full breadth of the Loving Spoonfull’s “Nashville Cats”, a celebration of Honkey-Tonk digression and young dreams hitched down in Tennessee.
This got many of the sundress, sneaker, and tattoo clad onlookers that filled the venue out infront of the stage, pouncing on their toes, reappropriating it joyously as their own midwestern square dance. McCoury said best in the chorus:
Nashville Cats, play clean as country water/
Nashville Cats, play wild as mountain dew/Nashville Cats, been playin' since they's babies/
Nashville Cats, get work before they're two.
“I feel like retiring after that,” McCoury chirped following the introduction.
What’s amazing while watching him is how much vitality he stocks into his stage presence. He’s been at it for much of the last half-century, and this elder statesman of bluegrass has honed to a tee everything admirable about down home modesty and allows ample room for his players, some of the best in the business, to take on big songs of their own and steer the vehicle in interesting directions.
The band is slated with Del on guitar, sons Ronnie McCoury and Rob McCoury on the banjo, respectively, Jason Carter tuned to the fiddle, and Alan Bartram on the ever-present Bass.
The band has earned a lot of earned a lot of respect in Americana circles, as well as a loyal fanbase and several awards, including two Grammys for best Bluegrass album.
Drawing attention to the four black suited men beside him, McCoury called on his bassplayer to lead into “The Kentucky Waltz,” a slower swaying lullaby sung with full on classic country twang by Bartram in the purple spotlight.
We were waltzin' that night in Kentucky/ beneath that beautiful harvest moon/ And I was the boy that was lucky/ But it all ended too soon/ As I sit here alone in the moonlight/ I see your smiling face/ And I long once more for your embrace/ In that beautiful Kentucky waltz.
In and out of the set, McCoury fielded song suggestions from the audience, and occasionally replied with the aw-shucks chiming of a few familiar chords and the eventual good humored “Woah now, we have to get this going,” before launching into a signature track.
Sensing it may be time for a little crowd work (or gospel), McCoury asked the audience to sing along to “Working on a Building”, a beautiful and gutsy southern spiritual which blew its last few lines off riding full steams ahead into the whistle-stop saloon cantata “All Aboard.”
McCoury and his band definitely appear to have fun reworking rock songs from artists they enjoy into instrumental harmonies.
“This is a song we played at a little folk Festival called the Newport folk festival, ya’ll ever hear of it?” Del lauded, before lighting up the crowd with Richard Thompson’s classic hot-rod track “Black Vincent 1952.” The song is a joyride and it’s just enough fun to make you wish you never had to come back for gas.
With a last thank you to the crowd, Del and the band retreated backstage, before circling back for an entralling encore with Fleck and Washburn, as they jammed out to applause.
*Written by Joshua Scott
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