If you are just a little bit ‘country’, then you undoubtedly know all about Red Steagall!

According to his website (www.RedSteagall.com), the “entertainment career of Red Steagall has covered a period of 35 years and has spanned the globe from Australia to the Middle East, to South America and to the Far East.

He has performed for heads of state including a special party for President Reagan at the White House in 1983, and has completed three overseas tours for the United States Information Agency to the Middle East, the Far East, and South America.”

But his real credibility may be that he’s a Native Texican!  Singer, songwriter, actor, movie producer, TV personality — and cowboy poet.  In 1991 the Texas State Legislature named him the Official Cowboy Poet of Texas.  More recently, he was named 2006 Poet Laureate of the State of Texas.

We’ve become accustomed to taking road trips with Red Steagall (and his cohort Andy Wilkinson) — that is to say, we load up on his CDs for trips “Out West”.  There’s nothing like driving through the Palo Duro Canyon listening to “Red River Rose”.  Or wandering country roads in Texas in the springtime with “Her Eyes Were Bluebonnet Blue” wrapping you in it’s magic spell!

Visit Red’s website.  Get some of that great toe-tappin’ music!  And we highly recommend Red’s new book — “The Fence that Me and Shorty Built”. And go to Red Steagall’s Cowboy Corner for information on his Authentic Cowboy Radio Program.

*Image of Red is borrowed from his website.

On one of our recent road trips out through God’s Country, we occasioned upon Langtry, Texas — home of Judge Roy Bean who claimed to be the “Law West of the Pecos”.  (The Pecos is a river, you know.)  Now, if you missed out on geology class the day they talked about rivers, then you may not know about the Pecos.

It starts up in the Sangre de Cristo Mountains of New Mexico and flows on down into Texas where it eventually meets up with the Rio Grande River.  Not much of a story, you say?  Well, we discovered just howcum old Judge Bean was the “Law West of the Pecos” when we crossed over the bridge a few miles east of Langtry.  In the days before bridges, you had to have the wings of a buzzard to get across the Pecos River canyon — and the canyon cuts across much of West Texas!

So we wander on back home and order up a DVD on the Pecos River.  The DVD was interesting, but you wouldn’t want to watch it more than once.  Except … except for the music!

And here enters Andy Wilkinson.
According to information on his website (www.AndyWilkinson.net) he’s a “writer and singer of contemporary western folk music. His material comes from true stories of the past and present, real events in the lives and times of the people of the West like his distant uncle Charlie Goodnight, pioneer trail-driver and cattleman, or Comanche chief Quanah Parker, or Billy the Kid.”  Well — he wrote “Crossing the Pecos”, which is certainly rousing enough to be some country’s national anthem!

The song is one of our favorites on his album “Charlie Goodnight: His Life in Poetry and Song”, although “Put Your Kodak Up” and “Palo Duro Farewell” are runner-ups!

We ended up emailing Andy and getting his “The Road is Still the Road” CD — and this is how we discovered why God put the worm in tequila and the bud on the cactus!  Ole “Jesus Lucero” was quite the storyteller himself!

Visit Andy’s website and treat yourself to some of his great tunes and poetry!

*Andy Wilkinson’s photo is borrowed from his website.