IN THE SPOTLIGHT – JEANNIE SEELY “I’m so proud of this area of Nashville, that people are all pulling together to help each other,” Jeannie Seely told me when I called her last week. “The tornado has left such destruction here, and such heartache.” She knows of what she speaks. She lost all her possessions […]
This week we think back 88 years, to February 25, 1932, the day a little boy was born in a two-bedroom rental home in Shreveport, Louisiana. Five-year-old Dorothy Young stood in the front yard and yelled at those passing by, “We got a new baby brother!” Faron Young remains in our hearts and in our […]
NEWS The last original member of the Kingston Trio has died. Bob Shane of Phoenix, Arizona, died of complications from pneumonia on January 26, a few days before his 86th birthday. He, Dave Guard, and Nick Reynolds formed the Kingston Trio in the 1950s and won a Grammy for Country & Western Performance for “Tom […]
NEWS Bakersfield.com reports the death of 67-year-old Mark Yeary, a California native who spent 19 years as pianist and occasional record producer for Merle Haggard and the Strangers. He died January 17 after suffering a heart attack at his home in Arizona City, Arizona. “He played music Thursday night,” his longtime girlfriend said in a […]
IN THE SPOTLIGHT – MO PITNEY When Mo Pitney returned my call last Monday night, he said, “I just left the studio. We put the final vocal on our record. So we’re a little closer to having it put out.” He remembered seeing me at his Sisseton, South Dakota, concert in November. And he appeared […]
By Andrew Marble General John Shalikashvili [shalli-kash-VEE-lee] served from 1993 to 1997 as Chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff. His thick European accent made people wonder about his heritage. Descended from a line of Tsarist Russian princes and born in Poland in 1936, he and his family had come to the United States […]
IN THE SPOTLIGHT – MOE BANDY When I called Moe Bandy to ask if he had time for a conversation, he was in the middle of a family Christmas party at his home in Branson, Missouri. Still, he took a few minutes to talk to me. He had just returned from Las Vegas, where he’d […]
IN THE SPOTLIGHT – JOE STAMPLEY It’s been almost four years since I featured Joe Stampley in this newsletter. shortly after his heart bypass surgery (http://dianediekman.com/dianes-country-music-newsletter-10-february-2016). When I called him for an update, he told me he feels good. “The thing that hurt me more than anything,” he said, “four months after my bypass surgery, […]
CONCERT REVIEW – KRIS KRISTOFFERSON When I stepped up to the ticket window at the Washington Pavilion in Sioux Falls, and asked for one ticket to see Kris Kristofferson and the Strangers, the lady said, “We have one free ticket. Would you like that, or would you rather buy one?” The free ticket was in […]
IN THE SPOTLIGHT – DAVID BALL The first time I saw David Ball in concert was when he opened for Alan Jackson in the mid-1990s at the US Air Arena in Maryland, east of Washington DC. I lived in Virginia and had to drive halfway around the beltway, into unfamiliar territory, to get to his […]