Duane Steele coming to Bonnyville for “The Legend of George Jones” concert
Vinyl LPs, CDs, and online playlists are great. But nothing beats a live performance of the music you love.
If you love the music of George Jones, you’ll want to come to Bonnyville’s new Strathcona Performing Arts Centre see Duane Steele perform the songs that earned Jones the nickname “The Rolls-Royce of Country Music.”
Like many performers, Steele paid his dues in bar bands covering hit songs for a dance crowd. As he took to writing his own material, his career took off. His #1 single “Anita Got Married” is one of many songs he has placed on the Canadian country music charts.
With that success, he drew audiences for his own music rather than the covers he played on the bar circuit. With his singer-songwriter reputation, he wasn’t sure he wanted to go back to singing covers for a tribute project.
“I’m a ‘serious artist’ now,” he said only half-seriously, “so it took a while to come back around to that idea.”
Steele’s friend Rob Shapiro of GNR Entertainment spent a couple of years convincing him that a Jones show was right for him.
“I’m a country music artist myself, so I love the music. And of course, I have great reverence and respect for George Jones’s music. I just wasn’t sure I could even sing it, for one thing,” Steele said.
“But they persisted and so we did try it back in 2017 in Camrose. That was our first show and I was hooked on it.”
The show includes stories about Jones’s life and his music, along with a multimedia component. There’s a lot of teamwork involved—Steele’s primary role on the team is carrying off the songs and doing justice to the George Jones legacy.
“I spent months learning the songs and trying to wrap my head around the nuances of his musical phrasing,” he said. “What was the most gratifying, I think, was how much the people wanted it.”
The historical bits—the photos, stories and anecdotes—are important to understanding the music. Jones had a difficult and often tumultuous life which had a profound effect on his long career.
“I tell stories about his life, little historical anecdotes, and some are funny. But some aren’t,” Steele said. “He had a rough life. We do a multimedia presentation with pictures of George throughout different phases of his career from his early times right up to 2013 when he passed away.”
The show includes a couple dozen songs over two sets.
“People come out of there going ‘wow, I didn’t know that’ or ‘I forgot about that song.’ We have people crying in the audience because it hits home to a lot of people, especially the die-hard George fans,” Steele said.
The Legend of George Jones is presented Saturday, May 24 at Strathcona Performing Arts Centre in Bonnyville. See ad on page 2 for more information.
