The One Day Tour

aka

Gene Watson Concert

September 5, 2021

Myrtle Beach to Newberry SC (200 miles +/-)

Gene Watson…..Finally!

 

One of the unsung great performers of country music is Gene Watson. Only recently invited to become a member of The Grand Old Opry, for a long time he never got the respect he deserves in the industry. I don’t think he ever kissed up to the Nashville establishment. Every year he tours in an old bus, sings traditional country for his fans and then goes home to his garage in Texas to work on hot rod cars.

Millie and I have been fans of his for quite a while and we always held out hope that our traveling path would have a confluence with his touring schedule somewhere along the road.

 

And so it was in the summer of 2020 that he was to appear at the Newberry Opera House which is about two hundred miles from our home in Myrtle Beach. It’s over in the center of the state about forty miles west of Columbia, our state capital. No problem we thought, we’ll make it part of a road trip. This is how the Georgia and South Carolina High Points tour was conceived.

Unfortunately, the china virus happened and the concert was postponed until January 2021. Thinking we would not want to take the RV in the winter we started looking into hotels in the area. Early in December the venue emailed me again, this time the concert was cancelled. I was issued a credit to be used at a future date.

 

In July I received another email from Newberry, Gene Watson had been rescheduled and were we still interested? I called them right away and scored seats in the third row. Once again we started making travel plans for travel to Newberry. The show was finally going to happen on September 5^th.

This time we held off on travel commitments and in the end we decided to drive to the show and back home afterwards, just in case it was cancelled again. It was a four in the afternoon show so we would not be driving late at night.

 

Interior of the Newberry Opera House

The Newberry Opera House is old, but appeared to be well preserved. The theater is on the 2^nd floor, I think the first originally held the town offices. There was only one stairwell for the audience and one small elevator. I know there must be a stairwell for the performers behind the stage and I decide that will be our emergency exit, should the need arise. I think like that every time I’m with a crowd in a confined space, it’s just what I do. I’m not paranoid, just prepared.

 

The crowd was seated without any social distancing, that was ok with me I’ve had the Krippin vaccine! lol (movie: I am Legend) Actually the audience was 100% senior citizens and I’m sure they were all vaccinated.

Lifted from the net, not Newberry

 

Gene Watson and his band came out promptly at 4pm and played without any intermission for 90 minutes. He played all his hits and interjected short stories about each song between them.

 

Gene and the band

Mr Watson is 76, but his voice is still bracing, clear and emotional, just like it was when his songs were hits in the 70’s and 80’s.

The stage from our seats. I'm blaming the poor photography on LED stage lighting!

 

Our seats were great watching the show, but not for photography, we were below the stage and the lighting was such that I couldn’t get any good pictures. Most of the pictures here are lifted from his website; I don’t think he will mind.

 

We enjoyed the concert thoroughly. On the way home we drove to the east side of Columbia and stopped for dinner at a Cracker Barrel Restaurant. The journey home was pleasant in light traffic once we passed the Columbia area.

 

Was Gene Watson bucket list worthy……..What the heck, why not………….CHECK!