Jim Lauderdale, Elizabeth Cook, Chuck Mead and Shawn Camp Live!

Jim Lauderdale is both a “songwriter’s songwriter,” who’s written/co-written many modern classics for iconic artists, as well as an intuitive sideman, who’s enhanced the music of a bevy of esteemed musicians. As a solo artist, since 1986 up until now, he’s created a body work spanning 29 albums of imaginative roots music, encompassing country, bluegrass, soul, R&B and rock, as well as helping pave the way for the current Americana movement.

A longtime ambassador of the Americana genre, Jim received the WagonMaster Lifetime Achievement Award, presented by George Strait, on Wednesday, September 21, 2016, as part of the 15th annual Americana Honors & Awards.

“I know him mostly as a songwriter; a really, really, really good hit songwriter, and I’ve been very fortunate to cut a lot of his songs over the years,” Strait said in his speech. “Like Porter Wagoner, Jim Lauderdale is a consummate entertainer, a sharp dressed man as well, a terrific songwriter and a great singer.”

Lauderdale has released at least one, and sometimes as many as three, records every years since 1998. He is the second most recorded writer in George Strait’s canon, as well as responsible for country hits for Patty Loveless, George Jones, Mark Chesnutt and the Dixie Chicks. He’s also recorded albums with Dr. Ralph Stanley, the North Mississippi Allstars, Donna the Buffalo, Elvis Presley’s band, Elvis Costello and Buddy Miller, as well as collections written whole albums with long time Grateful Dead collaborator Robert Hunter. He’s the co-hosts a weekly radio show on SiriusXM with Buddy Miller, “The Buddy & Jim Show“. He is also co-host of Music City Roots, the weekly live and radio, podcast and PBS series.

June 30th Lauderdale released his 29th album, London Southern that was recorded in London at Goldtop studios and produced by Neil Brockbank and Robert Trehern. London Southern features co-writes with Dan Penn, Joan Oates, Odie Blackmon and Kendell Marvell alongside six Lauderdale solo compositions and a host of celebrated guest musicians.

For the past twenty years, Chuck Mead has been at the forefront of what has come to be known as Americana Music. Raised in Lawrence, Kansas, Chuck has been a professional musician since the age of 13 playing in his parents country band and then leading several roots rock outfits in the midwest most notably the Homestead Grays. He landed on Nashville’s Lower Broadway in 1993 where he co-founded the famed ‘90s Alternative Country quintet BR5-49. The band’s seven albums, three Grammy nominations and the Country Music Association Award for Best Overseas Touring Act of 1997 built an indelible bridge between authentic American Roots music and millions of fans worldwide. Chuck has also co-produced popular tribute albums to Johnny Cash and Waylon Jennings, guest-lectured at Vanderbilt University, and became a staff writer at one of Nashville’s top song publishers. In 2008, he was the Musical Director/Supervisor for the Broadway/West End musical Million Dollar Quartet (which broke the record in Chicago for longest running musical) and acted in the same capacity for the CMT television show Sun Records producing all the re-recordings of classic rock n roll, country, and blues. He has released three solo works starting in 2009 with his acclaimed solo debut album, Journeyman’s Wager on the Grassy Knoll Records label, and continues tour clubs, concert halls and international Rock, Country and Rockabilly festivals with his band The Grassy Knoll Boys.

Chuck’s acclaimed 2012 release, Back At The Quonset Hut (Ramseur Records), was recorded at Nashville’s legendary Quonset Hut Studio where Patsy Cline, George Jones, Merle Haggard Roger Miller, Loretta Lynn, Johnny Cash and more cut some of country music’s greatest tracks. Produced by original BR549 producer Mike Janas and with the participation of students from Belmont University’s College of Entertainment and Music Business, the album of classic covers features surviving members of Music Row’s original ‘A Team’ studio musicians Bob Moore, Harold Bradley, Hargus “Pig” Robbins, and Buddy Spicher as well as guest appearances by Old Crow Medicine Show, Elizabeth Cook, Jamie Johnson and Bobby Bare.

2014 ushered in Free State Serenade, on Nashville-based Plowboy Records. Produced by long-time ally and friend Joe Pisapia (kd Lang, Ben Folds Five) and featuring BR5-49’s Don Herron, and Old Crow Medicine Show’s Critter Fuqua, Free State Serenade is Chuck Mead’s love letter to his home state of Kansas.

Chuck is currently working up new material for a 2018 record release and still oversees two Million Dollar Quartet productions and is developing some new theatrical stage shows.

Some careers can be described with a couple of words, but Grammy award winning producer Shawn Camp’s isn’t one of them. The Arkansas native has earned wide respect as the top-tier penman behind #1 Billboard hits for George Strait (“River of Love”), Josh Turner (“Would You Go With Me”) and Brooks and Dunn (“How Long Gone”), in addition to the Brooks smash “Two Pina Coladas.” Camp frequently splits pages with legendary tunesmiths like Guy Clark (“Sis Draper,” “Magnolia Wind”) and Jim Lauderdale (“Forever Ain’t No Trouble Now). Shawn also penned Blake Shelton’s “Nobody But Me”. A true artist, Camp’s previous solo albums – including 1993’s Shawn Camp, 2004’s Live at the Station Inn and Fireball in 2006 – consistently have turned heads.

The accomplished instrumentalist, who has accompanied luminaries including Guy Clark and John Prine, frequently backs seamless lyrics with his fiery fiddle, guitar and mandolin riffs. Shawn is also a talented producer; a skill that won him a Grammy nomination in 2013 and a Grammy win for 2014’s Best Folk Album of the Year (Guy Clark’s, My Favorite Picture Of You). Most recently, Shawn formed the band with NRBQ’s “Big Al” Anderson to make the World Famous Headliners (along with Pat McLaughlin, Greg Morrow and Michael Rhodes). Their debut album spent over 6 weeks in AMA’s top 20 and was named one of the Top 100 Americana Albums of 2012.