Photo by Brent Addleman
John Conlee brought his 40 years of country music hits to the Ridgway Area High School auditorium last night.

By Brent Addleman

Editor

Country music star John Conlee brought his vocal stylings and four decades worth of hits to an enthusiastic crowd at the Ridgway Area High School auditorium last night in a concert sponsored by WDDH “The Hound.”
Conlee, fresh off a stand of shows at the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville, Tenn., has garnered 29 singles that have reached country music charts in his 40 years in the business. The musician is also a co-founder of Farm Aid.
“We were there Tuesday night, and this past weekend as well,” Conlee said of playing the historic country music venue. “Well, music has always been my hobby. When folks think enough of you to buy your records and buy a ticket and come see you, you want to try and please them all you can. Again, when we do a show our charge is to duplicate live what we have already done on record. I always was disappointed to go to a concert and hear songs that I’d been listening to on the radio be performed in a whole different way. So, we try to stay true to what we’ve recorded.”
Twenty-six of Conlee’s songs have charted in the top 20 or better, with eight reaching No. 1. Conlee was prepared to play a number of those songs for his fans in Elk County. A few of the more notable songs are “Rose Colored Glasses,” “Friday Night Blues,” “Domestic Life” and “Common Man.”
“We’ve had 30 hits over these years,” Conlee said. “We concentrate on those, certainly. We’ll get to all the main ones. Invariably, when I get to the autograph line after the show, I’ll hear about something that I failed to do in the show. But, that’s a wonderful problem to have. We’ll probably   do something from our Gospel CD and maybe one or two things people haven’t heard before.”
Before the show, Conlee talked of how he enjoyed coming to Ridgway.
“Well, its a beautiful town,” Conlee said. “I love the architecture. I haven’t gotten to spend a lot of time looking around. But, what I’ve seen has been gorgeous. Whoever ordered the weather – no bad either.”
The country music veteran is in the midst of a tour that will take him to Ohio and North Carolina before returning to the country music capital.
“We do between 60 and 80 shows a year on the road,” Conlee said. “I really do enjoy coming to see people where they live. Some people opt to go to a place like Branson [Missouri] and Pigeon Forge [Tennessee] and just sit down and stay there. That’s a lot less fun for me. I’d rather travel the country and visit the different communities. That is one of the neat things about doing this.
“It’s been great. I do a lot of my own bus driving, so I spent the early part of the day sleeping, getting ready for the drive tonight. But, I had dinner with some very nice folks, folks at the radio station and so forth.”
For the live show, it’s all about the music.
“We concentrate on just duplicating the records,” Conlee said. “It’s about the music and being as one-on-one with people as we can. I’ll let them ask questions and so forth.”
Conlee loves playing music and also took time to reflect on his career.
“I’m grateful,” Conlee said. “Certainly for the longevity. That was always a goal – to do this as long as I’ve wanted. That’s held up. A lot of folks that are starting now won’t enjoy that. They won’t have that opportunity, I’m afraid. There are more people that have one, two, three hits and then they disappear. I’m thankful that didn’t happen with me.”
Conlee stated more music is on the horizon.
“We’re still recording," Conlee said. "We’ll have a new project out in the coming months which is the other third of our hits and we’ll put some new songs on it as well."