To protect both our audiences and our performers, we will be requiring that all audience members wear a mask whether they are vaccinated or not. We ask for your cooperation. By working together, we can ensure that our performers feel comfortable and that the Opera House doors stay open for future performances.
Hank Williams, considered by many to be country music’s finest composer and recording artist, will be remembered at a special tribute concert at the Pocahontas County Opera House on Saturday, November 6, 2021. This live performance will feature the talents of some of West Virginia’s top musicians and vocalists and will recreate the songs and the sounds that made Williams an international star during his lifetime and a country music legend in the decades since his unexpected death in 1952 at Oak Hill, West Virginia, at the age of 29.
John Lilly of Elkins, West Virginia, will take center stage during the tribute, which will include such popular Hank Williams songs as Your Cheating Heart, Jambalaya (On the Bayou), I Saw the Light, Lovesick Blues, and many others. Additional musicians will include guitarists Ron Sowell and Ritchie Collins, fiddler Georgia Lilly, steel guitarist Karl Smakula, drummer Ammed Solomon, and bassist Nick Blake.
In addition to authentic renditions of many of Williams’ hit songs, the tribute will include some of Williams’ less-known titles, details from behind the scenes of Williams’ storied and troubled life, and a world premiere of a Hank Williams tribute song written by Lilly.
A lifelong fan and admirer of Hank Williams and his music, Lilly is also a prolific and respected songwriter and performer in his own right. After more than 20 years of traveling and producing tribute shows to the music and career of Hank Williams, Lilly has announced that the show in Marlinton will be his final Hank Williams tribute concert. Lilly, age 67 and suffering from Parkinson’s Disease, says that the time is overdue to share his original music with as wide an audience as possible.
A special John Lilly tribute concert is planned in Charleston, West Virginia, on January 8 at the Clay Center. This concert will exclusively feature Lilly’s original compositions and will serve as the official CD release celebration for the new album April In Your Eyes: A Tribute to the Songs of John Lilly.
