The Blind Willie McTell Blues Festival this year features Jim Lauderdale, country music songwriter and two-time Grammy winner for Bluegrass Album of the Year.
He earned a Grammy last year for his CD The Bluegrass Diaries , and in 2003 for working with Ralph Stanley on Lost in the Lonesome Pines .
He has just released another bluegrass CD, Could We Get Any Closer . See jimlauderdale.com.
The Statesville, N.C., native has written or co-written songs including George Strait's Where the Sidewalk Ends (featured in the movie Pure Country ); Patty Loveless' Halfway Down and You Don't Seem To Miss Me ; Gary Allan's Wake Up Screaming ; Mark Chesnutt's Gonna Get a Life ; Vince Gill's Sparkle ; and Mandy Barnett's debut single, Planet of Love .
He also has worked with Elvis Costello on a CD set for a June 2 release and is set to perform with Mr. Costello in June and August.
Mr. Lauderdale is also working with Robert Hunter, the Grateful Dead lyricist, on a CD tentatively called Patchwork River.
" We put one out a few years ago (2004) called Headed for the Hills that was all acoustic, but this one will be all electric," he said in a telephone interview.
Mr. Lauderdale is at home on a stage acting, too.
A graduate of the North Carolina School for the Arts in Winston-Salem, he co-starred in an off-Broadway and national touring production of the gospel-rock-country-flavored show Cotton Patch Gospel and was in a Los Angeles production of Pump Boys and Dinettes.
In 2001, Mr. Lauderdale portrayed one of his heroes, country superstar George Jones, in the original production of Stand By Your Man: The Tammy Wynette Story .
"When we took the play to Nashville to officially open in the Ryman Auditorium, George and Nancy Jones took me out to dinner the night before the opening," he said.
"They apologized, saying they would not be able to come to the opening because they were going on the road the next day.
"Then at intermission the next night I was told that George and Nancy were sitting in the balcony. They later said they wanted to just slip in so I would not be so nervous."
Don Rhodes has written about country music for 38 years. He can be reached at (706) 823-3214 or at don.rhodes@morris.com.
GET THE BLUES
WHAT: 16th annual Blind Willie McTell Blues Festival
WHEN: Gates open at 11 a.m. Saturday; music starts at noon.
WHERE: Festival grounds, 1 mile north of Interstate 20 at Thomson, Exit 172
TICKETS: $20 in advance, $25 at gate, ages 12 and younger free
ARTISTS: Crosstie Walkers with Mike Farris, Chatham County Line, Randall Bramblett Band, Hubert Sumlin with Willie Smith, Jim Lauderdale and Chuck Leavell
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