Del McCoury, his sons and the other two members of The Del McCoury band entered the stage in Memorial Hall to thunderous applause Friday.
The group, an old-timey traditional string band featuring an acoustic guitar, an upright bass, a banjo, a mandolin and a fiddle, played a wide variety of songs, from high-energy bluegrass tunes to slow, sad ballads like “I’ll Break Out Again Tonight.”
McCoury’s vocals were twangy and, at times, difficult to understand due to his thick Southern accent, but he sang well throughout the show.
McCoury was entertaining between songs, as well. As a well-known, seasoned country musician, McCoury was also able to regale the audience with stories about his encounters with legendary figures in country music like Woody Guthrie and Earl Scruggs. Not afraid to laugh at himself, he repeatedly joked about his age, complaining to the audience that he couldn’t read his teleprompter.
The band used the first eight songs of the concert to introduce each member of the group. For example, McCoury introduced his son, Rob McCoury, the group’s banjo player, before a song featuring a very difficult banjo solo. McCoury said his son calls his banjo a “5-string flame thrower,” and that he can sometimes see sparks flying from his fingertips when the group plays in the dark.
Every member of the band was a very talented instrumentalist, and each sang at least once during the concert. McCoury mentioned a different major award won by various members of the group after seemingly every song during the first 30 minutes of the show.
The band sang mostly older country songs about a wide variety of subjects. They sang several songs by Woody Guthrie, which often included Guthrie’s observations gleaned from his travels around the U.S. These included songs like “The New York Trains,” which Guthrie wrote the lyrics to, but McCoury wrote the music for.
Songs like “Wimmen’s Hats” — McCoury explained that the song’s author, Woody Guthrie, spelled "women" that way — were right in line with McCoury’s goofy, fun-loving stage presence. The song made fun of the fabulous, extravagant women’s hats that Woody Guthrie saw in his travels around the country, ending with the line, “You can sell a woman any old thing if you tell her it’s a hat.”
Toward the end of the show, McCoury asked the audience for song requests. The group played several that were shouted out, including a song called “Asheville Turnaround” about a man who drives from Nashville to Asheville every weekend to see his girlfriend. McCoury explained that the song was about a friend of his, and it was mostly true.
