Northern Renegades

September 28th 2006 GRANDPA T.SMITH

Making a welcome return following his successfull appearance here in January, Tony tonight gave another splendid show of good old country music with the odd 'new country' song thrown in for good measure.

Dancers were on their feet all night long, Liners, Partners and Rock 'n ' Rollers alike, and those who love to singalong had plenty to keep them busy.

Once again Tony sang over forty full - length songs, the majority of which he had not performed here before. Both American and British recording artistes were well represented in his programme.

From the pen of Raymond Froggatt, Tony gave us, I Ride A Horse, All Because Of You, Belle Of The Ball and Wings On My Heels.

Also featured was Charlie Landsborough's, No Time At All and What Colour Is The Wind.

Several songs, here regarded as 'Pop', were actually Country hits in America and included Ricky Nelson's, Poor Little Fool, from 1958, Hello Mary Lou, which charted in 1970 for Bobbie Lewis and 1985 for the Statler Brothers and Save The Last Dance for Me which entered the U.S.A. country charts no fewer than five different occasions between 1976 and 1984.

Other standout songs included Clint Black's and Alabama's Gulf Of mexico,The Wayward Wind a hit in 1983 for Sylvia and James Gallaway, The Famous Last Words Of A Fool, a hit for composer Dean Dillon in 1983 and No 1 for George Strait in 1988 and Leroy Van Dykes, Walk On By, to bring a super evening's entertainment to a fantastic end.

Cyril Insley

January 5th 2006 GRANDPA T.SMITH

Over the years Tony has regularly performed at the various locations of our club, and has always been well received. An experienced showman of fifty years or so in the music business, he has played all kinds of music since the fifties, including Folk, Country, Pop and even Skiffle.

During the seventies he was heavily involved in the Country band Madison County , has produced numerous albums, some recorded in Nashville , and continues to perform after recovering from a heart attack.

His programme is mainly made up of popular Country Music standards but also includes a few from the New Country era. Of the former we had John D Loudermilk's ' Abilene ' a hit for George Hamilton IV

Marty Robbins' self - penned 'A White Sports Coat'

Hank Locklin's ' Country Hall Of Fame'

Porter Wagner's 'The Carroll County Accident'

Bobby Helm's ' Fraulein '

the Tompall Glaser / Harlan Howard hit for Bobby Bare 'Streets Of Baltimore'

Leroy Van Dyke's 'Walk On By'

Bobby Darin's 'Things '

Johnny Cash's 'Ring Of Fire'

and Merle Haggard's 'Mamma Tried' amongst many more.

Newer songs included Keith Whitley's 'Birmingham Turnaround' , Clint Black's 'Walking Away', Boy Howdy's 'She'd Give Anything', Brooks and Dunn's ' I'm Working on My Next Broken Heart ', Randy Travis' ' Diggin' Up Bones ' and Rita Macneil's ' Working Man '.

We also had hits from John Denver, George Strait,Don Williams, Hank Williams, Kenny Rogers, Ray Price and more, all of which kept the dancers on the floor and others singing along to almost every one of the Forty - Four songs so far.

The climax of the evening, Tony's encore, almost raised the roof, as everyone joined in with the Ken Dodd 1965 no1 hit ' Tears ' which brought an evening's superb entertainment to a splendid close with rapturous applause.

We all look forward to Tony's return later in the year, especially for the prolific number of favourite songs he effortlessly delivers. Great stuff indeed.

Cyril Insley