TERRE HAUTE —
The Boot City Opry is in its sixth season and going strong. The theater is full, and the parking lot is packed every Saturday night from April to December.
The next closest opry is in Decatur, Ill., with a few scattered around the region, many in Kentucky, said Rod O’Kelley, who owns and operates the Opry with his wife, Kim.
What’s unique about the Terre Haute venue is “we operate differently than any of them. Normally what people do, they have a house band and every week … their house band performs. Rather than us have a house band and bring in a guest star, we bring in the whole act every weekend,” O’Kelley said. Performers bring a full band with them when they come.
Continuing that strategy, Terre Haute’s Opry has kicked off its 2012 season, so far welcoming The Ragtops, The Neverly Brothers, The StingRays and Swingin Cowboy Jason Petty. This Saturday’s show features an Opry favorite — Terry Lee & The Rockabookie Band.
Some groups come from Chicago, several from St. Louis, a few from Nashville, Tenn., and this year the Opry will host a handful from Branson, Mo. “These guys play everywhere. They’re big time,” O’Kelley said. “So we get some nice acts.”
Jason Petty, who performed Saturday, has won critical acclaim for his portrayal of Hank Williams in the off-Broadway hit “Hank Williams: Lost Highway,” which he has performed at the legendary Ryman Auditorium in Nashville. Petty will return to the Boot City Opry on June 23 to perform with Carolyn Martin in a Hank Williams/Patsy Cline tribute show.
O’Kelley said regional acts The Van Dells and The Marlins are “always a big draw. Jason Petty with his Hank Williams show is almost always a sellout. Doug Gabriel from Branson” is popular. “We have a few shows every year that we have to turn people away,” he said.
The Opry opens each spring and closes just before Christmas. The winter can bring snow and cancellations. “We get fairly busy here in the summer. From Easter to Christmas it gets kinda hopping. We do 33 shows this year. This could be a real barnburner season for us,” he said.
The lineup includes “rock ’n’ roll, ’50s and ’60s and the old-time country music, what they call classic country now,” O’Kelley said. The Opry doesn’t feature “any of the new stuff,” instead sticking with music of greats such as Johnny Cash, Elvis and Loretta Lynn. The Opry tries to bring in one gospel show a year.
“Most of your country people will have at least one or two gospel songs in every show,” O’Kelley said.
Most attendees consist of people in their late 50s and up. And most weekends the Opry will bring guests from out of town, everywhere from Indianapolis to Missouri, and from Princeton to Carbondale, Ill.
The Opry even offers a hotel deal. For $99, guests receive two tickets to the Opry, a room at the Terre Haute Holiday Inn and breakfast Sunday morning.
“People love it,” O’Kelley said.
The Opry also boasts a large number of season-ticket holders, who, O’Kelley says, “unbelievably are here every Saturday night. We’ve got people here that in six years, they’ve missed two shows. They have the same chair every time.”
Those chairs are recognizable because of the seat covers draped over them with an embroidered picture, icon or name. Some chairs sport cowboy hats and first names, others just symbols of the guests’ personalities.
The warm, friendly welcome is a big draw, according to 91-year-old Ada Harkes.
Ada and her husband, Morris, were planning to attend this season’s first show on April 14, which Ada said happened to be Morris’s 91st birthday. “Last year on his 90th birthday, Rod made the announcement … out came [his wife] Kim with a cake. They spoil us rotten. We are both quite abled bodies,” but the couple is still given a reserved parking spot outside the theater. “I think in the whole time we’ve missed only five or six shows,” Harkes said.
O’Kelley says the shows are alcohol-free, running for an hour with a 15-minute break and then another 45 minutes of entertainment. During that 15-minute break, fans can get an ice-cold root beer in a glass bottle, a sarsaparilla or a prickly pear at the Sour Note Saloon. The saloon also offers Coke products and water, candy bars and fresh popcorn. Everything is $1 except the glass bottled drinks, which are $1.50.
“We were at their very first show,” Harkes said. “We’ve really made friends, just from the audience. We all chat with each other; it just became a family. It’s clean, it’s wholesome entertainment. We do like country music; we just like all their shows. It’s just a great Saturday night for us,” she said.
The shows and hospitality aren’t the only things that make the Boot City Opry unique.
The stage is decorated with a barn as a background, with two large colorful murals on each side. The murals display the faces of legends such as Dolly Parton, Johnny Cash, Conway Twitty and Kenny Rogers.
The murals were painted in the early ’80s according to O’Kelley. “This is the third theater they’ve been in. They were painted for a theater over in Indianapolis. Then they took them down to a theater in Nashville, Indiana.”
From there they were sold to a groundskeeper who eventually asked O’Kelley if he’d like to buy them. O’Kelley, who said they had always had a difficult time decorating the stage, couldn’t believe how perfectly the murals fit on each of its sides, once he got them in place.
Now that the stage is set, O’Kelley is thinking about his next venture. He recently purchased camera equipment with hopes to bring the Opry to television, possibly once a week, for 30 minutes. “We’re going to be taping most of these shows. This is something new for us. We’ve just got the cameras; we’ve got ’em hooked up; we’ve run a couple little pilots, and hopefully it will all work out … it’s gonna take a little work.”
O’Kelley humbly explains that the Opry is “not a big-time theater. But we have a good sound system. We’ve got a good light system. We keep it pretty small. Basically my wife and I operate it; the gals in the office take care of the tickets; they help with some of the bookings,” he said. “It’s pretty much a ‘ma-and-pa’ operation. It’s not a big glamorous type of deal. We pretty much operate it ’cause we want to; it’s something we enjoy.”
It may not be “country’s most famous stage,” but the Boot City Opry has found a successful formula.
“The biggest factor is, I think, in making a success,” O’Kelley said, is “you’ve just got to put on a good show at a fair price.”
Features Editor Alicia Morgan can be reached at (812) 230-0830 or at alicia.morgan@tribstar.com.
Entertainment
Related Photos
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Elvis is in the building: The lobby of the Boot City Opry holds several pieces of Elvis memorabilia for customers to enjoy. (Tribune-Star/Bob Poynter)
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Opry crowd: A large crowd attends the Boot City Opry show on April 28 to watch the StingRays perform. (Tribune-Star/Bob Poynter)
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Opry stage: The StingRays on the Boot City Opry stage on Saturday, April 28. (Tribune-Star/Bob Poynter)
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StingRays: Chicago-based band The StingRays (Steve Alan, Dan Ware, Frank Rowley and drummer Ron Tripp perform April 28 in the Boot City Opry. (Tribune-Star/Bob Poynter)
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Harmonica: StingRays lead guitarist Dan Ware plays the harmonica while bass player Frank Rowley gets into the show at the Boot City Opry on April 28. (Tribune-Star/Bob Poynter)
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Opry brings in acts from around the country
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